Low-price FBA rates to replace Small and Light on September 26
Starting September 26, 2023, we will introduce low-price FBA rates for all items priced at or less than (including Value Added Tax (VAT)) £10 in the UK, €11 in Germany, €12 in France, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands, SEK 140 in Sweden, PLN 55 in Poland. This means that the price threshold will remain the same as for Small and Light while providing FBA delivery speeds and apply a low-price FBA fee rate card to all eligible selection.
All eligible items will automatically receive the low-price rates.
With this change, we will close the Small and Light (SnL) programme, effective as of September 26, 2023, when the new low-price FBA rates go into effect. Until then, SnL enrolled items will continue to have SnL rates applied. Enrolment of new products into the programme will end after September 14, 2023.
If your products were enrolled in SnL and qualify for low-priced FBA rates, your fee may see an increase, but your products will benefit from the fast FBA fulfilment speed. If your products were not enrolled in Small and Light and are priced below the thresholds, this change will mean that you will pay lower fees while continuing to enjoy the fast FBA fulfilment speeds.
To help prepare for this change, we recommend that you review your product offerings, check your inventory status and review the FBA and low-price FBA rate cards to assess any changes. To review the FBA and FBA low-price rate cards, go to Low-price FBA fees.
For more information on the current FBA rates, go to FBA fulfilment fee.
0 replies
Seller_7VbclcPFFRTnc
They had a massive influx of fba sellers during covid and again when they opened up extra country’s eligibility to sell on here
I have certainly seen unprecedented numbers join in the last 2 years - far more than the previous 10 altogether at a guess
They encouraged sellers on these forums to help new sellers get through verification and send to fba warehouses
Perfect - cash rolling in
Then the cost of living crisis kicks in
Rent on their warehouses rise, they have even cancelled plans for new warehouses in some instances , fuel costs, and workers strike for a 50% pay rise
They can’t afford 50% - but they need the staff as there is so much stock and orders to deal with - catch 22
So how to reduce overheads without getting rid of sellers .
Up the fees significantly - It’s a win, win situation
Those that have no choice - no warehouses, non UK, those who have watched the yt videos and are doing it on the side of ft employment will have to continue
Those that cannot afford to will have to look at fbm - amazon still get referral fees
They never loose …
Seller_pchSAlnixy7zj
I guess Jeff is determined to beat Elon to Mars with his New Glenn heavy-lift rocket and we’re all paying the price for it, customers and suppliers alike.
Seller_9cePvE5bylALt
Amazon earnings beat estimates by 43% - announced today. Just saying.
Seller_lljyzgTxr5fgI
Like Richard (@Smiley_Guy ), I am not normally a vocal critic of Amazon, per se. However, this is a clear example (in my opinion) of what I call PPPP, which is Post Pandemic Penny Pinching!
During Covid lockdowns, online megaliths like Amazon made an absolute fortune because people were stuck at home, couldn’t go on holiday so used the money to buy stuff. Amazon and many others flourished. Once reality set in again, incomes dropped considerably, some even below pre-pandemic levels for some companies. The best (and quickest) ways to recover momentum is to apply “penny pinching” methods, at very short notice, to get revenue flowing back in.
We have seen the changes to Account Level Reserves being applied (even to sellers such as us who have never had a reserve, ever, in 9 years and are 100% FBA). Holding onto funds for an extra week or two, from millions of sellers makes a nice little earner in interest. Likewise, scrapping the S&L scheme and telling everybody it’s good for them because of the fulfillment speed is just a cop out. The increase in fees more than wipes out any advantage that will have.
Seller_QugeC1a8fXpYs
It’s a very poorly planned fee increase when Amazon just announced yesterday their Q2 results
“The company reported a quarterly profit of $6.7 billion, nearly double what analysts expected.”
While on a paper it’s still very favourable rate they need to move away from this nonsense buy box suppression due to the non competitive price where they compare advertised price completely ignoring any shipping charged on external sites.
Seller_Fy4XBxEXKbKRZ
This is a shocking decision by Amazon - lure you in with small and light then pull the rug with this.
this means that now to sell a product through the new system you will need to price the item for at least £4.99 for you to receive more money than Amazon and you then have to cover all your additional cost from that my items are all shippable through the letter postal system which is significantly cheaper than Amazon FBA program
Seller_REpwnsPUPqcEE
What a nightmare! Amazon made me explain in writing to them last week why I do not keep 8 weeks worth of stock in SNL at a time.....know I know exactly why!!!!!!
Seller_DTufFoxJuMU0M
We have decided that after some consideration FBA is not worth the risk anymore
We are still quite convinced that people will pay the inflated prices for cards, we would be selling our cards for about £3-4 (over £1 more than our FBM offers), and there are quite a few cards currently in that price range or even above, with well known brands selling for even more.
However with the increased fees adding increased risks, potential loss of sales (if more people opt for FBM to save some money), and the fact that we can’t even get our stock back, the risk is too high at the moment, we may in the future send in some very good selling lines, but likely we’ll just go back to FBM.
Its a pity as I was just started to grow FBA after testing the waters over the last year, however knowing that everything we sent to them was sale or destroy, always held us back from going all in.
I still think that their prices are relatively fair for what they are offering, but I think it won’t work with low cost/low value items that don’t have much of a profit margin or aren’t items that people “panic buy” (most people know when birthdays are coming up…)
Seller_FZLmkAPnHuV4L
The fee increases are 60p per item for us, but we will be putting everything up by £1 at least, if Amazon can increase their fees, we don’t want to see our net profit margin harmed further. As far as buy box and what other sellers will do price wise, we don’t care, anything unsold after 11 months will just come back automatically at our expense. FBA was good while it was reasonably priced, that’s no longer the case so it’s mostly back to FBM.
We are expecting a 70-80% drop in our FBA sales. At least Amazon will have plenty of warehouse space after this.
Seller_nMG3DELAaM23L
The most oppressive thing is, once sellers increase their prices to account for this, they will likely be slapped with suspended products due to high price.
Seller_J2H5GprhaORbt
I do agree , that Amazon seem very hot on the suspected high pricing and there seems nothing one can do once amazon deactivates a listing for High Price .
I get this in Europe all the time , with products that are sent to European warehouses , whereby we have increased delivery fees and duties that can be as high as 12% . which obviously has to make the retail price higher , but Amazon will not have this
Seller_J2H5GprhaORbt
One of my biggest gripes with FBA and Small and Light is the following
A buyer buys 3 items
If I sold them
I can put them in 1 envelope or one box and pay 1 fee
yet on Amazon this quates to 3 fees
sometimes this can work out ridiculous
for example a buyer buys 10 different cards
it does not cost Amazon £16.00 to send these out
I appreciate that sometimes FBA fees are relatively cheap compared to our couriers that we normally use , but not in this instance
Seller_vUU6B2MNqwHir
<moderator_edit: removing inappropriate word> poor TBH, This is such a short period of time to get all of your sellers to adjust, a 50% increase on the cheapest of S&L models will kill a lot of businesses and products.
Where is the community outreach before implementing these ideas?
Seller_KWqGA485qnwWS
I crunched the numbers and it’s really bad… I don’t know how high volume SnL sellers are going to deal with these changes. Amazon have done us real bad on this one, wouldn’t be surprised if it priced out a lot of sellers, we’re all on tight margins with Amazon’s competitive pricing model, some sellers are happy making 30-40p per item at volume, but wiping this out to a loss will be catastrophic! You will only benefit from this change if you send <400g Small Parcel! And even that saving is a measly 7p !!
This is awful…
Seller_gLuAKrzt1EbIV
My items are large envelope and above, so I am not effected as much as some of you.
Even though, some of my items are 4-5 pound and I am struggling to sell them at those prices even with 10 -15% margin. I don’t know what to do, shall I convert some of my items to FBA now, apply the new fees and revise my prices and see how it goes with FBA?
Can I list one ASIN with two SKU’s one FBM and one FBA and try how does it go? The problem would be if I make FBM cheaper it will flag the FBA one being expensive… Curious of what to do next.
Seller_ZOvRiZxwOLTNq
Has there been any confirmation on the cost of labelling after the changes, at the moment S and L is 8p per unit but standard FBA would be at least 15p?
Could be another hidden cost rise for those who pay to label
Seller_77IcbQKVGdZo0
The FAQ indicates that it will now be the standard Envelope Size for labelling which will now be 15p a unit. Although I have to say this is far from clear but it appears the 8p only applies when you are enrolled in Small and Light, the 15p is for any envelope size products outside of Small and Light. Therefore I am assuming that it will now be 15p as not small and light
Amazon have also confirmed in the FAQ they will not reimburse for removals if products become too expensive to sell under the new fee structure
Once the FBA Small and Light programme is closed, I won’t be able to sell some of my products due to increases in FBA fees. Will Amazon reimburse me for removals?
Amazon will not reimburse you for removals, so please plan accordingly before the FBA Small and Light programme ends.
Also interesting enough they also saying have 2 offers against the ASIN is not a violation. I always thought this was against policy but apparently not
Does having two FBA SKUs for the same ASIN violate any listing policy?
No, you can connect multiple SKUs to an ASIN. For the long term, we recommend keeping only those SKUs associated with an ASIN that you can actively manage.
Seller_DTufFoxJuMU0M
Plan accordingly, thats amusing considering 6 weeks notice. Hardly any time to Plan anything!
Seller_77IcbQKVGdZo0
Yes I would say that statement made me a little angry.
The more I look at this the more I can’t see any way forward. I am full of gloom about this change.
I was even planning early this year and had ordered a lot of Christmas Stock which I was planning on sending in end of August/September. This is sitting in boxes ready to go and I have no idea what to do with it.
I am surprised more sellers are not commenting on this to be honest, there must be 100’s or 1000’s impacted. Or will it be the same as the reserve and they will only realise when it actually happens?
Seller_DTufFoxJuMU0M
I would say only notice when the prices go up, I haven’t got an email, or any formal notification that its happening, there is no notification or information on my home page
I only found out because I frequent this forum, those that don’t, probably have no idea what is going on and will be in for an expensive shock when they realise they are losing money all of a sudden - lets face it, how often do you check your FBA fees. I know I do it semi regularly because they keep measuring things wrong and messing it up, but its maybe once a fortnight, or once a month…
For such drastic changes, there should be a huge banner across the seller central homepage, I would much rather know that my FBA fees are going up, than the homepage is getting a new design!
Seller_77IcbQKVGdZo0
I also don’t think the email was that clear either unless you read the detail in the links provided
In my opinion the email hides a lot of detail and puts a positive spin on the changes.
I think a lot of people are going to be surprised on or after the 26th when they realise they are making a loss on every item they sell.
Seller_DTufFoxJuMU0M
To be honest I wish I’d found out a few days earlier, I wouldn’t have bothered sending in 600+ cards…
Well if anything, it made us take a look at FBA, and the cons seem to outweigh the pros now, might send the odd card in if I hit a really good seller, but am not going to bother for most things
I have the advantage of FBM to fall back on - you still have no buy box sure you don’t? Your FBM sales must be quite low
Seller_7VbclcPFFRTnc
If the comments on the delivery date reserve policy threads are anything to go on, the forums will be flooded with complaints on the morning on the 26th Sept when it’s too late
Seller_77IcbQKVGdZo0
Still no buy box. My FBM sales are 50 this week which is about normal. I get 5-6 orders a day on average, If I have a good day I get 10.
I have tried everything I can think of. Complained to support and MD email and just get the same reply each time. Mediation told me it wasn’t an eligible dispute. I even tried the CMA commenting on the Amazon investigation to see if that would get passed onto Amazon.
I have been asked a couple of times to join one of these programs where you have to pay extra for better support (at least that is how it is sold). I told them I would only consider if I got the buy box and thought they might actually do something if they thought I was prepared to spend extra money. No luck again
FBM is no go for me. I actually really can’t see a way forward, I don’t believe people will pay the additional for a greeting card on FBA when FBM sellers are so much cheaper. Then when they implement the buy box changes due to the CMA investigation I think it will impact higher priced FBA lines even more.
My only hope is that the CMA changes may give me the buy box back. Reading through the consultation document it is not clear though as there is a two stage eligibility process and I am failing the first stage. The changes for the buy box only seem to apply if you get past the first stage. I have commented on the consultation document asking for clarity on this but I don’t hold out much hope they will listen to me.
It is almost certainly the end of greeting cards for me, I have other lines to fall back on but reworking my cash flow to exclude greeting cards would mean I probably be bust within 6 months. I am going to have to find something else for FBA and quick.
Seller_DTufFoxJuMU0M
Is crazy that none can tell you what you done to justify a permanent buy box ban
Seller_77IcbQKVGdZo0
I agree and it came down to illness at the end of the day and my partner just couldn’t cope with the order volumes on her own, looking after 2 kids and worrying about me.
This just ended up with a high ODR and LDR. However other sellers get that and they don’t get permanently banned from the buy box.
In hindsight she shouldn’t have tried to carry on and just put it on holiday mode which is the plan now if it was to ever happen again.
Seller_jeHAq028Nn59S
As soon as it occurs, just like VTR and the new DX+7, the forum will have several new topics per day.
Seller_02U4twsVIW95V
I’ll probably have to get another job now, on top of my Amazon job. And stop paying into my pension. Can’t believe so little notice given by Amazon. Really really poor.
Seller_YUakS29fOXogL
I think this need to be reported here:
Report a competition or market problem - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
We need them to open an investigation on the tremendous increase on amazon fba fees,
Seller_77IcbQKVGdZo0
So today I have written to my MP about this and also the CMA as well.
I am not entirely sure it is in the remit of the CMA but I think it is worth highlighting where possible. If it is in there remit it would take so long for any kind of investigation to happen that it is likely the changes will already be implemented and the damage to my business would already be done.
I am considering writing to the managing director email address but I think I will just end up with ‘We understand your concerns’ type of reply.
Seller_FZLmkAPnHuV4L
Anyone else doing a massive firesale? We thought this would be easier then having 3000 items coming back to us. But even with the price reductions, around 1000 pieces will probably not be sold by Sept 26th and that will incur a removal fee of around £400.
