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Extended Delivery Window Being Shown to Buyers
I just got off the phone with Seller Support who informed me that effective October 1 Amazon extended delivery windows being shown to buyers for non-Prime merchant fulfilled orders. We noticed a massive drop in sales (even worse than they have already been). I was reviewing listings to try and get to the bottom of this latest issue and noticed 2 week delivery dates being shown to customers. The 2 weeks is if I were shipping to my own state.
We have AHT set at 2 days and delivery to our own state set to 2-3 day delivery. We had SSA in place, even after I disable SSA to play around with shipping times and templates Amazon then started displaying a 1 week minimum up to 2 weeks for delivery, again to our own state.
This is clearly deterring buyers from making FBM purchases thus negatively impacting business. I was told by the Seller Support agent that I could explain to potential buyers on the listing that we actually deliver faster than Amazon is advertising (this is against Amazon policy). I was also told that I could reach out to buyers who have completed purchases to explain to them that they will be receiving their packages much faster than the estimated delivery window Amazon provided them.
It is clear to me that Amazon wants to do away with 3rd party merchants who do not use their FBA services or force us into using FBA especially considering the high costs associated with improperly handled inventory counts, long receiving times, having to battle with Amazon every step of the way to correct an Amazon caused mistake, the list goes on.
0 replies
Seller_Zw8LsZUQSH440
Prime Day is coming, so Amazon is trying to push FBA.
Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ
Normally I would agree with that thought but this issue is not being applied universally to merchant fulfilled non-Prime offerings for all sellers, only some sellers are being impacted.
Seller_S9GHoSdpBtbtq
We are dealing with the same ridiculous BS as well!!!
We're typically 2 days handling, 1-3 days transit so its suppose to reach the buyer latest 5 days later. Yet, we're being extended by another 2-4 weekdays!! ... This is extremely unfair..
What else did seller support share with you??
Seller_4L3GdkdZ2UHrz
What is your On Time Delivery Rate percentage at? If its below 96% then Amazon will most likely add delivery time to your listings
Seller_ocWXA2GEIlt38
Hello TCS952,
We are having the same issue. From what I was told they did this due to the storm that we had come through the East Coast. If that is the case then they waited until after the storm had passed and caused all of its issue before they added this Extended Delivery Window which makes little sense.
The real kicker, at least for me is that Amazon is telling customers that if they order from us that it will take at least 14 days to receive their orders, however when the order is placed, Amazon is telling us that we have to deliver this order in 2-4 days, so this Extended Delivery Window does not help sellers in anyway. I mean first they tell your customers that it will take at least two weeks to get their item, this is at the very least, so that customer is going to pass on that item. Then if they do decide to place the order they are not giving you the seller two weeks to get it to them, they are going to hit your OTDR when you do not deliver it in under a week.
Our SSA is setup to have USPS Ground as our shipping method for Amazon to estimate delivery times and they have packages going from the East coast to the West coast with a delivery estimate of 2 days on some packages. I asked my Postmaster and she just laughed and said there was no way.
Amazon just pushed every seller into this SSA, automated Handling time deal which they claimed would give customers a more accurate delivery estimate and increase our orders, but now they have done this without any notice from what I can tell and we are doing the work and dealing with the extra stress created by this new policy that they forced onto us, but getting nothing in return.
Honestly most of these issues would not be half as bad if they put something on the home page or a banner at the top in seller central letting us know these things and how long they are going to last.
I am not sure about anyone else viewing this post but for us this is in addition to them throwing every penny of every sale into "Deferred Transactions" without any notice and they are not responding to anyone who is asking about this. We are not a new seller, we've been with Amazon for over a decade, we have perfect metrics and OTDR. No issues.
So they sign you up for this automated idea, added delivery extensions so long that customers do not want to buy and then hold all of your money and do not bother with answering the sellers who are their customers when they ask about this.
I just feel that they should lead by example. They want us to treat our customers so great (which we should) and give them any and everything, most of the time for free. However we are their customers in this and what do we get and how are we treated when there is an issue? One example is Amazon is always saying that if you know there is going to be a delay, reach out to your customers and inform them. Okay, I agree. Now, is Amazon reaching out to us? Are they informing us?
“Don't do as I do, but as I say”
Seller_Ha6JyVvDK6Ybs
Manipulation punishing all sellers who do not pay more for Amazon to ship, steal and damage your product through FBA. Don't forget about all the Price fixing with high pricing errors setting prices to out of date MSRP or Zero data along with Buy Box removal also deterring buyers . Saying items ship slower or forcing you to pay more to ship faster only benefits Amazon. My last personal PRIME orders all arrived up to a week late so wtbs.
Seller_8cIsVssvO29X6
I agree with you about Amazon wanting to do away with third-party sellers - I've thought that for some time. In actuality, Amazon keeps reducing my handling time. I have it set for 2 days from order to ship because I sell books that go Media Mail. Recently, I have often been required to ship in one day - other times two - completely inconsistent. So I am running to the post office almost every day, although they give a lot of extra time (Thursday to Tuesday!) on the weekend. Again - inconsistent.
But - may I ask you a question, please. For a very long time, I have been unaware of a phone number a seller can use to actually call Seller Support on the phone. Would you be extremely kind - since you did say you had been on the phone with them - to give me the phone number you used to reach Seller Support? I don't need to call them at the moment, but I have wanted to in the past and had no way to do it. If you can give me the number, I can keep it in case I need it in the future. Thank you so much.
Seller_JNpMXcdRHNA4F
Do you happen to be near where the past hurricane hit or the next hurricane is coming? Maybe being even a state or two away would cause them to pad the merchant fulfilled shipping times? I'm not defending them - only a thought.
Seller_hFzlf81bvje9u
I really don't understand the issues here. We are 100% FBM and had an amazing Day 1 Prime Day. Try to take advantage of premium shipping options. Don't use Economy or expedited shipping options, only standard and premium 2 days. use the 2-4 transit time option for most regions and add a default handling time to ensure your orders are not late - Or set an ASIN specific handling time. We ship with USPS Ground Advantage for non-premium and have a handling time of 2 days (We normally ship same day anyways) and customers get an average transit-delivery time of 5-6 days, which is fair.
We stay far, far away from automated transit or handling times. Remember Amazon does not include weekends in automated shipping calculations.
Seller_8cIsVssvO29X6
Thank you, I remember doing that when I had a case awhile ago but I never was able to talk live with a person. I remember that sometimes that is an option and sometimes it isn't. I will keep that in mind and should open a case because Amazon keeps changing handling times on my - making them shorter than the Shipping Settings I have had for 15 years - not longer in advance of Christmas mailing as some sellers have said. Wish Amazon would do that to me! Thank you again for reminding me of that. Best of luck with your case.
Seller_u9sWbO6CHxYFV
Exact same issue here! My sales are half of what they were before I set SSA and AHT. Delivery times shown to customers on my items are now 2 plus WEEKS OUT! That's RIDICULOUS!
Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ
A bit of an update from today's call with Seller Support. I was told that my case from 10/4 was finally transferred to the technical team. They identified nothing wrong with my account or my settings that would cause these long delivery dates to be displayed to potential buyers.
The member from the internal team who I spoke with today was very patient and eager to find a resolution. While on the phone with her she checked the status of the case which had been updated toward the end of our call.
She stated that the other internal team indicated that somehow Amazon incorrectly added what looked like a full week to the correct delivery dates . I am waiting for an update on when I can expect a fix/to be notified that the issue is resolved.
I was adamant about not only fighting for our account to be corrected but for the thousands of other sellers experiencing this same nightmare. I made it clear in all interactions with Amazon that this is a significant and widespread issue.
Feel free to share your experiences and any updates you have come across in getting a resolution.
Seller_b3m5hTin8xQg6
Does anyone have any updates? Our sales have been cut by over half because of this bug. We reached out to seller support on Friday but still haven't heard anything back.
KJ_Amazon
Hello @Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ and all sellers asking about delivery promises.
As many sellers know, additional time (known as a “promise extension”) may be added to the estimated delivery date that customers see to account for logistical factors that might slow delivery. When a promise extension is added, the customer sees a later date than the “Deliver by” date that you see.
I understand that sellers have strong feelings about promise extensions, and I have shared this feedback with our partner teams.
KJ_Amazon
KJ_Amazon
Hello @Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ
Please review the date range in the Fulfillment Insights Dashboard to see which orders may be included in the "Promise Extensions" section showing delivery promise extensions.
Since the date range is based on promised delivery dates, there will be a gap from when an order is placed and when it is eligible to be included in that dashboard.
I am continuing to share seller feedback about this topic with our partner teams.
KJ_Amazon
KJ_Amazon
Thank you for those details @Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ
Orders/offers from October 1 and afterwards are likely not yet appearing in your Fulfillment Insights Dashboard, as those orders/offers may have promised delivery dates beyond the 9/9/2024 - 10/9/2024 range.
If an offer/order has a promised delivery date of October 10 and afterwards, it is not yet accounted for in that dashboard.
KJ_Amazon
Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ
Promise extensions are a result of a lagging indicator, I know that, that has never been at issue. The offers being shown on October 1 are impacted by the performance on 9/9 and sooner, yes?
Something changed on October 1 and we are not the only sellers to mention that date. If it were directly related to metrics it would be an easy answer. You would say seller xyz, these were your metrics, this was your promise extension at this date range which is what caused 4-5 days to be added. That is not the case here.
Amazon is clearly telling me in their own Fulfillment Insights Dashboard that for "Time window: 30 days | Promised delivery date: 9/10/2024 - 10/10/2024"
The promise extension is now 0.5 days. On October 1 it was 0.6 days, it was as low as 0.4 days since October 1 and it had zero impact on the delivery promise being shown to buyers. Amazon was tacking on an extra 4-5 days for no reason.
Are you saying that Amazon is showing sellers one set of metrics, telling us that our delivery promise extension is based off of those metrics, and then is applying some other set of delivery date metrics to the actual delivery promise to buyers?
KJ_Amazon
"Your delivery promises were extended by 0.5 days on average."
That means that for all orders placed with you with promised delivery dates between 9/10/2024 and 10/10/2024, there was an average delivery promise extension of 0.5 days.
It is not related to any promise extensions which may be applied to your current offers.
Count all of your orders that had promised delivery dates between 9/10/2024 and 10/10/2024, then try to estimate the total number of promise extension days for those specific orders. Days/Orders is that figure.
Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ
Where do we see what the promise extension is for current offers? How is that calculated? How do those numbers translate into promise extension days?
Please make this make sense for the thousands and thousands of sellers who sell on here and are just as confused as I am.
Ultimately we're talking about:
"Promised Delivery Date:
The date that customers see when they place an order and this date includes your managed delivery time. It is often the same as the "Deliver by" date you see in the order details page in Seller Central unless Promise extensions are added."
Surely we should be seeing at least a full week+ from the October 1 orders already being accounted for in the promise extension number. If that doesn't start to skyrocket by the end of this week will you please do a deeper dive into what is going on here?
I will take screenshots every day and post them here. If my promise extension goes from 0.5 to 4.5ish then we have identified the issue. If it does not, the problem is something else.
KJ_Amazon
There is no display that calculates a seller's overall average promise extensions.
I will continue to share seller feedback with our partner team for review.
Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ
I was not asking about overall average promise extension, I was asking about current promise extension. I also edited my post to add more detail if you could kindly review that.
Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ
I have been checking my ODTR on a daily basis since Amazon announced the changes. We have never been below 90% since the metric began to be counted for potential harm to a seller, we have never received an OTDR warning.
Is the 95% OTDR number the trigger for punishing sellers by applying longer promise extensions?
KJ_Amazon
There is no report or dashboard showing a seller's overall average promise extensions for their current offers, taking all possible shipping locations into account.
Do your October 1-7 orders all have delivery promise dates in the metric timeframe? If so, then yes, the above will be accurate.
It is not necessary for you to post screenshots of your dashboard to confirm that you are having promise extensions applied to your orders/offers. I will post any updates on the subject I receive from our partner teams, but I do not have any seller/offer-specific information available on how promise extensions are applied.
KJ_Amazon
Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ
Thank you for confirming that Amazon does not currently have a way of sharing current handling time with sellers even though it is clearly being enforced on sellers. I wouldn't expect SKU level data although Amazon does have that information available and it would be helpful to sellers.
The reason I was going to post the screenshots of the dashboard is to make a public record of the change or lack thereof of the displayed promise extension. My concern is that the promise extensions have been dramatically altered from what the were previously to the great detriment of both buyers and sellers. If I am not seeing a large change in the displayed promise extension due to the 4-5 days in addition to our historic below 1 day promise extension, that means the following:
1. Something is not right with the calculation/display in the dashboard. (Yes, I am accounting for the lag in the dates as we previously discussed.)
Or
2. Amazon is adding more days for a specifically unidentified reason.
Either way, we require more transparency from Amazon/correctly displayed data. Data that is either incorrect or not timely is not helpful in addressing this week's concerns. Since Amazon prides itself on being customer centric, it needs to help sellers better serve Amazon's customers by giving us good quality tools and information and by displaying accurate data to buyers to make informed purchase decisions.
KJ_Amazon
It may also means that only a small number of your orders in that timeframe have had promise extensions added.
If you had 200 orders with delivery promises between 9/12/2024 and 10/12/2024, and 20 of those orders had five promise extension days added, that would be 100 days divided by 200 orders = 0.5 days average.
We have AHT set at 2 days and delivery to our own state set to 2-3 day delivery. We had SSA in place, even after I disable SSA to play around with shipping times and templates Amazon then started displaying a 1 week minimum up to 2 weeks for delivery, again to our own state.
If you received orders beginning on October 1 with up to two weeks delivery promises, many of these orders are still past the October 12 range for that dashboard.
KJ_Amazon
Seller_8HBeojhszSviQ
If that were the case then there would be no reason for ALL of my SKUs to have been impacted especially for orders being shipped to my own zip code. Only the SKUS included in the theoretical small number of orders should have been impacted. If Amazon is basing current displayed extensions to buyers based upon past delivery performance per every SKU/ASIN what buyers are seeing for the entire catalog does not match with that theory.
It bears repeating that many many other sellers here on the forums are experiencing very similar extra days added all of a sudden to their entire catalog. That should inform this discussion that this is not an isolated incident of an handful of SKUs.
Furthermore, we looked up the delivery dates being displayed to buyers, again in our own zip code, for new listings that have not yet seen a single sale. Those items should not be receiving any promise extension adjustment under AHT or SSA based on sales history but rather based upon the settings we set under the shipping templates. Again, we are located in New Jersey which was not impacted by severe weather or slow carrier network issues.
Yes understood, that's why I'm keeping an eye on the number to see how it trends. That data will be valuable to creating understanding of what is happening.
KJ_Amazon
I am not able to provide any seller/location/offer-specific details about why promise extensions are being added to any seller's offers. I understand that you and many sellers have strong opinions about how and when these extensions are applied, and I have shared those with our partner teams.
The dashboard metric we have been discussing is based solely on orders that have been placed that meet the delivery promise timeframe. The metric does not account for a seller's other available offers, whether or not those offers are also displaying extended delivery promises.
Seller_b3m5hTin8xQg6
We are having the exact same issue as TCS952 is having. Has anyone received an update on this? The Hurricane promise extension dates are over so it can't be related to that.
Seller_8M8iuPlv9MCNY
Same here...sales dropped like crazy! Extended delivery dates are shown to the customer, but from my selling point of view I see the actual estimated delivery dates when I'm viewing orders. I think it is a push for FBA honestly
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