SFP Questions - Please help
Amazon keep asking me to join SFP and Im trying to figure out if it is worth it.
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Amazon have removed the Premium posting option from my other listings as they say I am delivering these orders too late. Now I send anything with Premium posting as Royal Mail Tracked 24 and they are all sent same day if ordered before 2pm. If I am having this trouble now won’t the same issue effect my SFP postings? If so, what are the repercussions?
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I have a Royal Mail account but as I understand it with SFP I have to buy my labels through Amazon and not via Click and Drop. I am sure I read somewhere I will be charged the same as I have agreed with Royal Mail but what about volume quantity? Do the parcels bought via Amazon count towards the volume I have to send with Royal Mail? Royal Mail have given me specific prices based on my expected volume - but if my Amazon SFP orders do not count I may not reach that target.
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Can someone confirm I have to buy labels via Amazon and not use my Click and Drop account?
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I understand I can choose which products I have in SFP - how easy is it to make this switch? Do I have to ‘edit’ each product or can they be done in bulk?
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I understand all SFP Prime orders have to be sent RM Tracked 24 and all SFP non Prime orders can be sent RM Tracked 48 - is that correct?
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I get a daily collection from Royal Mail - do I have to separate the Amazon SFP orders in their own sacks apart from my regular orders?
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Do the SFP orders have their own manifest I have to print off from Amazon?
Thanks
32 replies
Seller_rQvQ81c4j1EhT
I cannot answer all of your questions, but what i can say about SFP
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I send 99% of my orders SFP no matter if they a prime or non prime. Simply because
a. You cannot get negative feedback regarding delivery
b. If it doesn’t arrive you get a refund immediately for the cost and the postage
c. A couple of other points I wont go into here -
My sales rocketed once on the SFP program, but you do need to send the required volume.
Regards
Seller_iBrSIJDZKlsXi
Hi, we are working with SFP for some time now, so I am going to try to answer your questions:
1: If you are going to join SFP and stick to the requested dispatch dates and using Buy shipping with Amazon, then if this will get delivered late by Amazon, you are not affected and you will continue to be able to benefit from it.
2: You will have to buy shipping for at least 98% of orders from amazon, so your click and drop labels are not allowed. In terms of volume, the more you ship the better price you can negotiate, just as you did with royal mail.
3: This is the case, you will have to buy shipping from amazon for 98% of orders minimum.
4: It isdead easy to switch products to SFP, Amazon will help you to create new shipping template and once its done, in your inventory you can group switch shipping template from default to prime shipping and its done.
5: No. All SFP orders need to be shipped with either tracked 24, Amazon next day if you use Amazon carrier service, but only if it is chosen by customer as next day/second day delivery, NON SFP orders can be shipped as before through click and drop.
6: If you will choose Amazon carrier, they will arrange for your collections and their own courier will come to pick up their stuff, not RM, so ake sure you are ready for their arrival.
7: SFP doesnt have any manifest, it does use different shipping system called ship.amazon (very intuitive and much better than click and drop IMO)
All in all, we have been happy shippers with them since first day and never had a problem with the system or collections, just you need to be sure that you will set it right to begin with and if there is any problem, keep communication going with SS so if anyone asks what you did to resolve it, you will have proof of that communication in your cases.
Seller_KKcTTZzy6Jd6Q
responses to your first questions:
1: if you use Buy Shipping (for SFP or standard MFN) you are protected from late delivery defects as long as the item is scanned on time, however Royal mail have a habit of scanning your items in their depot at 2am the following morning (which is too late)
2: If you link your Royal Mail account to Amazon then the labels purchased will count towards your shipment counts. During the SFP trial period you MIGHT not be allowed to use your own RM account, it depends.
3: that’s correct but as stated you can link to your own RM account.
4:You have to edit the product, specifically you need to assign a shipping template, there are multiple methods of doing this in bulk so it doesn’t HAVE to be a manual change.
5: that’s correct, though some people have issues with RM 48 not showing up.
6: I believe this depends on your quantities/etc. and is down to RM’s discretion as to whether they make you split them or not.
7: I’m unsure on this one since we use Amazon logistics (the ship.amazon thing mentioned previously is for this courier, NOT for Royal Mail)
Most of your answers only apply if using Amazon Logistics as a courier, it is completely different when using Royal mail, DPD or China Post.
This is completely wrong, customers can choose standard shipping even for prime orders, such orders can then be despatched with a slower service and in many situations can even be despatched with a 3rd party courier without a negative metric hit. (absolutely do NOT try this during your SFP trial period though)
1: Yes
2: Unsure since we don’t use RM for SFP
3: As #6 above, I believe it’s up to RM as to what they want you to do.
4: Customers can choose “standard” delivery at the checkout, when this happens you can despatch using RM tracked 48, once you’ve completed the SFP trial period you can also start to despatch these orders through 3rd party couriers without it affected your metric, though I wouldn’t recommend it as these metrics tend to take random hits from orders that are supposed to be exempt.
5: Yes, ANY courier available through Buy Shipping counts the only stipulation is that the order MUST be scanned as collected within the despatch timeframe, so printing a label at 11pm and posting it the next day won’t fly (while this would be “ok” for normal MFN orders).
Seller_tRuvBEHDedp4q
Thanks to everyone who has responded. Ive accepted the post by OneMore with the link to the Royal Mail website FAQ as the solution as it answers most of the things I was concerned about but you have all helped.
