Its even more frustrating as a customer. Even when you ask for additional packaging it is no promise that they won't stick it in an envelope like the light bulbs that i ordered. Smashed almost flat.

I could be wrong, but aren't you supposed to package your item (the way it should be received by the buyer) yourself before sending to FBA?

Hi @Seller_xyYWDmsuklk8I,

Dominic from Amazon here, I would like to help with this. When you send your products into the FC are the labeled and ready to be picked and packed by an FC associate? Can you provide a picture of how the item is returned to you?

Best,

Dominic

I can attest to this as someone who is a frequent Amazon Warehouse Buyer and there have been numerous items I've purchased that have arrived in that exact condition. It was the boxed item in "shelf packaging" or corrugated cardboard boxes. The item I remember most. I about 4 of them as gifts. Mrs. Potato Head. I think 3/4 had the labels cut out along with a large chunk of package. It certainly couldn't have been resold as new and I don't understand why it was shipped that way in the first place. It arrived to me boxed with other items.

While I haven't had this problem with items I sell, as a buyer, this often happens with items delivered by Amazon directly (ie, not shipped through UPS, USPS, etc). The "shipping label" is just placed on the original retail packaging and cannot be removed without serious damage to the retail packaging.

maybe you could try putting that box of knee sleeves in a poly bag before shipping it to fba so then wont they most likely have to put in in some type of packaging to mail it?

The term is SOIC and stands for Ships in Own Container. I have noticed that I have begun receiving items as a buyer in the same manner. While I understand and sort of appreciate the less shipping material approach, your concern is definitely valid. I had to fight for an odd-sized item to be shipped in a box, as it was only retail-ready and Amazon was SOIC. What's infuriating, is that the item itself was all set as retail-ready and there's zero information or even visibility into the items they deem SOIC, but hold sellers to the metrics caused by this. So while a brand creates and brings to market items, they do so using retail-ready guidelines and the expectation Amazon will ship safely. While challenging Amazon on my situation, they continued to refer me to the Amazon package testing website url and documents of standards that a. I couldn't even access or b. are not disclosed in any seller central help section.

So my advice would be to open a ticket and begin simply by asking how to have your ASIN removed as SOIC and see how it goes. I don't deal with this risk any longer, so I do hope it's a more defined process with a possible easy solution.

We have experienced this problem too. We have them returned to us and repackage. Additional costs all around.

In addition to this, we get a significant amount of returns on our greeting cards for being damaged/ripped/bent and the customer states are not suitable to use. The cards are not SOIC, but the shipping envelope/package doesn't seem to be significant enough to withstand the rigors of AMZ inventory, handling, and delivery. Has anyone else had this issue? We have thought about putting in cardboard to prevent this, but it will again be additional costs/labor/shipping. Any suggestions?

I would say this is just a second and more minor issue since you can always repack them at your warehouse, the bigger issue we found is that a customer would send it back to amazon and amazon puts it back in inventory and than sending it to another customer and that customer sends it back because it looks used and so the item keeps on going back and forth.

And what about when you sell a 5 pack or any pack of anything and the customer send it back to amazon and its missing 1 pcs from the pack and amazon repackages it and puts it back on the shelf to send it to the next customer who offcourse sends it back for items missing.