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Drop Shipping Policy reminder

by News_Amazon

We’ve updated our Drop Shipping Policy page to provide additional details about our policy and help you adhere to the guidelines.

Drop shipping, or allowing a third party to fulfil orders to customers on your behalf, is not acceptable unless it’s clear to the buyer that you are the seller of the record.

The following examples of drop shipping are strictly prohibited. If you violate this policy, your ability to sell using Amazon’s Merchant Fulfilled Network (MFN) may be restricted:

  • Shipping orders with packing slips, invoices, external packaging, or other information indicating a seller name or contact information other than your own
  • Purchasing products from another online retailer and having that retailer ship directly to customers (if the shipment does not identify you as the seller of the record) or if anyone other than you (including the other online retailer) appears on packing slips, invoices, or external packaging

When a customer sees packaging and invoices/receipts identifying a seller that is not you or Amazon, they may be confused about how their order is being fulfilled and who they should contact with any problems or questions.

If you intend to fulfill orders using a drop shipper, you must always:

  • Have an agreement with your supplier that they will identify you (and no one else) as the seller of the record of your products on all packing slips, invoices, external packaging, and other information that is included or provided in connection with the products
  • Remove any packing slips, invoices, external packaging, or other information identifying a third-party drop shipper prior to shipping the order
  • Be responsible for accepting and processing customer returns of your products
  • Comply with all other terms of your seller agreement and applicable Amazon policies
Tags: News and Announcements
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Seller_CW0P5hgbsiqWX
In reply to: News_Amazon's post

We send that full text to the buyer who uses us to drop ship products for them. We may omit the invoice, but tell the buyer at shipping we will not identify them as the seller. Adding that they may want to use another seller to do their drop shipping. We also inform them that they are responsible for any return claims.

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Seller_SOUEmsGmzIl84
In reply to: News_Amazon's post

Is there any way to report people who are doing this. We have problems with people selling on Walmart (at double our price) and then purchasing our product to ship. However they are not paying attention when purchasing the correct item/size. We then get calls from the package receiver complaining and it is very difficult to explain to that customer that they did NOT purchase the item from us.

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Seller_CW0P5hgbsiqWX
In reply to: News_Amazon's post

Now… The policy is good, but is it half thought-out. How do FBM sellers tell the buyer is using them as a drop shipper? The policy is for the seller who USES this selling method, but not for the seller in USED by the selling method. I’m I correct, or missing something?

  1. First time buyer named “Doggie” purchased from us and has the product sent to “Mary Jane”. Is Mary Jane really Doggie?
  • For the first sale, I don’t know.
  • For the 2nd and 3rd sale, each to a different address, I begin to suspect yes.
  1. With a PO Number as the address, I don’t know for sure.
  • If “ManyBooksForYou” is the buyer, I suspect YES, a drop shipper.
  • If “Betty” is the buyer and it is shipped to a company, library, or institution, I suspect no.

With all the effort Amazon has but in to making the seller as transparent as possible, even with this drop shipping policy, sellers are kept in the blind of the actual buyer. In fact, in the revised policy above, Amazon states:

When a customer sees packaging and invoices/receipts identifying a seller that is not you or Amazon, they may be confused about how their order is being fulfilled and who they should contact with any problems or questions.

Well… Well sellers are confused when “Bobby” makes a purchase and has the product sent to Ellen. The 5 days after after delivery, Bobby makes a return request.

  • Well, Bobby didn’t receive the product, Ellen did.
  • If Ellen received the item and was happy, Bobby just may be attempting to collect a full refund for the item, as additional profit.
  • If Bobby didn’t actual receive the item, he dropped ship the item, Correct.
  • The seller should not be responsible for any return, Correct?
    Now how does this fit into Amazon’s new instant Refund when returned product indicates shipped?

Amazon should stop using band-aids, when is needs internal surgery to recognize, correct, and resolve problems.

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Seller_WtOwWhtSrFjva
In reply to: News_Amazon's post

When we first started, many years ago, a company was drop shipping for us. Then they started putting their name on the shipping box. Then the merchandise. But what made us stop was when they “accidentally” three times, put the invoice in the package showing their price to us. These are just the ones who said something to us about it. And they were not very nice in what they said. There were probably many more. So we stopped drop shipping. This was back before Amazon had any drop shipping rules.

On another note, while this was going on, I kept emailing Amazon that instead of one US shipping zone for the same price, that it would be nice if there were three or four shipping zones. The items were shipping from Maine. The person in New York paid the same shipping as the person in California. A year after we stopped drop shipping, I noticed they had set up the US into several shipping zones.

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Seller_a2w0PsXL3O7Z3
In reply to: News_Amazon's post

I didn’t know Amazon it was possible for Amazon to make typo mistakes.

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Seller_cu1Lr54OxusWw
In reply to: News_Amazon's post

I don’t know how much clearer Amazon can be about this issue.

If only every new seller had to click in a check box …

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Seller_vQhAhWJR08Xu7
In reply to: News_Amazon's post

We don’t mind someone who buys our product and sells it to someone else- we get our price, and don’t mind not placing an invoice or packing slip in the box or envelope.

What is bothersome is when the drop ship scammers claim their customer has not received their package, even when tracking states it was delivered (i.e., try to get a “freebie”).

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Seller_ZDGgATBGegBqy
In reply to: News_Amazon's post

To whom do we report this?

There are a bunch of dropshippers who buy and sell on Amazon. I have names, addresses, order numbers, and other info. How do I report these?

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Seller_1FT0o5FEeryp7
In reply to: News_Amazon's post

[sigh…] Which you’re covered for if you do your job correctly.
We get A-to-Z Claims. Heck, we SEND people to do A-to-Z Claims.
If we did our job correctly (shipped on time – as in scanned in by the carrier on time – and using Amazon services), we have NEVER gotten dinged for it.

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Seller_YBfUTeoG971hG
In reply to: News_Amazon's post

What’s the point of reiterating this rule, Amazon, if you aren’t going to enforce it? A drop shipper who routinely buys from us – and we are only ordinary, diligent, hardworking, 3P sellers — operates under several different account names (another violation of Amazon rules) and never asks us to leave out the packing slip with our details on it when we ship it directly to their customer. We know we have described our item carefully and accurately, but who knows what the drop shipper’s customer is expecting? How has the drop shipper described the item their customer bought? Their customer sees our name on the packing slip, contacts us. He or she is rightfully displeased because the drop shipper has promised a Like New item, but when the time came could only find our Very Good item. Then WE get a “not as described” violation from the drop shipper (even though the item was EXACTLY as described by us) and we are in a mess. PLEASE Amazon! Enforce this rule!!

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