Important news, via our friends at KhooCommerce, who specialise in Order Management, Amazon has updated its on-time shipment policy for vendors. While the headline change is an increase from 90% to 95%, the bigger shift they say, is how Amazon now decides whether a shipment is compliant.
- The on-time shipment requirement increases from 90% to 95%
- Amazon will now measure performance using your Advance Shipment Notifications (ASNs), not their internal receive signals
- Two chargeback categories are being merged:
- Purchase order not on time
- PRO / BOL mismatch
- The non-compliance chargeback remains at 3% of the purchase cost of the goods
How Amazon defines an on-time shipment
- WePay (Collect): measured using the freight-ready date (freight must be ready and picked up within the ship window)
- Prepaid: measured using the scheduled arrival time (appointments must fall within the PO delivery window)
KhooCommerce say that this change rewards vendors with tight processes and exposes manual workarounds and best-guess data,
Amazon is rolling this out in two phases:
- 19th of January to 24th of February 2026: defects are reported for visibility only
- From the 25th of February 2026: defects are invoiced and charged back
If you cannot ship on time, cancelling is often the least costly option. As long as cancellations happen within five days of the shipping window opening, there is no charge. Shipping late almost always costs more.
– KhooCommerce
