Amazon calculated the promised delivery date incorrectly - glitch
Happy Friday!
This is, mostly, for MODs (I'm reporting a glitch). If other sellers ran into this today - please comment too.
Here is an instance we ran into today (Friday) for the first time:
Order numbers:
112-8560879-5383414
114-8724817-8813001
Both show:
Ship by: Fri, Aug 23, 2024 PDT
Deliver by: Sat, Aug 24, 2024 PDT
Both orders indicate that Shipping Service used to calculate Delivery Promise:
Carrier: FedEx
Shipping Service: FedEx Overnight
Both locations are rural. None of the carriers offer overnight Saturday delivery to these locations (including FedEx Overnight that Amazon used to calculate the promise date). The soonest delivery available is Monday.
Because of that, all Buy Shipping options (USPS, UPS, FedEx) have "Late Delivery Risk", which makes these shipments ineligible for protections. Our OTDR will be hit too, of course.
My questions to Amazon are:
-Why did Amazon promise delivery date that even FedEx Overnight (that they used to calculate the date) shows it is not possible? And how can this be prevented by Amazon in the future?
-Why is our OTDR going to be hit because of Amazon's error (that's a rhetorical question, of course)?
-Can you check with your engineers and have them address that so sellers don't run into situations when Amazon promises something to the buyers that cannot be done and then punish sellers?
I'm not creating an SS case. We all know that it won't help to report a glitch through the SS. I'm hoping that one of the MODs here will notice this and have the appropriate team to investigate and fix this glitch.
Thanks.
Amazon calculated the promised delivery date incorrectly - glitch
Happy Friday!
This is, mostly, for MODs (I'm reporting a glitch). If other sellers ran into this today - please comment too.
Here is an instance we ran into today (Friday) for the first time:
Order numbers:
112-8560879-5383414
114-8724817-8813001
Both show:
Ship by: Fri, Aug 23, 2024 PDT
Deliver by: Sat, Aug 24, 2024 PDT
Both orders indicate that Shipping Service used to calculate Delivery Promise:
Carrier: FedEx
Shipping Service: FedEx Overnight
Both locations are rural. None of the carriers offer overnight Saturday delivery to these locations (including FedEx Overnight that Amazon used to calculate the promise date). The soonest delivery available is Monday.
Because of that, all Buy Shipping options (USPS, UPS, FedEx) have "Late Delivery Risk", which makes these shipments ineligible for protections. Our OTDR will be hit too, of course.
My questions to Amazon are:
-Why did Amazon promise delivery date that even FedEx Overnight (that they used to calculate the date) shows it is not possible? And how can this be prevented by Amazon in the future?
-Why is our OTDR going to be hit because of Amazon's error (that's a rhetorical question, of course)?
-Can you check with your engineers and have them address that so sellers don't run into situations when Amazon promises something to the buyers that cannot be done and then punish sellers?
I'm not creating an SS case. We all know that it won't help to report a glitch through the SS. I'm hoping that one of the MODs here will notice this and have the appropriate team to investigate and fix this glitch.
Thanks.
28 replies
Topher_Amazon
Hey @Seller_NzEmZKTEdcpPZ,
Thanks for sharing this. I understand you don't want to open a case but we'll monitor for other such examples and escalate any cases that do get opened in addition to looking into this one.
Have a great weekend,
Topher
Seller_zc50DVO3FE5fz
We've also encountered this a few times. Promised delivery is Saturday but no carrier will ship to arrive on Saturday, including the shipping service used to calculate the promise. We've had to cancel rather than risk an unprotected INR and be out the money simply because Amazon's delivery promise system is broken.
On a side rant - it absolutely is downright shameful that Amazon allows buyers to get free stuff simply by claiming INR on something like this, and it's automatically granted because it's ineligible for protection. If Amazon were the shipper and shipped late, the buyer can't get a refund the same way. This practice seriously needs to stop - protections are great and all, and should be there - but also even if an order isn't eligible for protection should NOT mean an instant A-Z win.
Seller_nxvyRDZCFduAS
We sell hazmat and it has to ship ground. It says it's calculating the delivery by date using USPS Ground Advantage, yet it's only allowing 2 days for delivery.
Ground advantage can take 6-8 days for delivery.
It's trying to force me to use shipping methods that I cannot use to ship hazmat.
This is a mess.
Here are the ground advantage options for this order:
Seller_NzEmZKTEdcpPZ
And Bam!
Received a message from Amazon today that our Premium Shipping Options eligibility was removed. Because of one of these orders that I proactively reported to Amazon, but they ignored it (Order ID 112-8560879-5383414, Case ID 15903226611).
And the other order that contributed to this is order id 114-3455022-0726647 where a business customer placed an order on Thursday and Amazon promised to deliver it on Friday, even though the customer showed that they will be closed on Friday (pre-Labor Day long weekend, I'm guessing), making all options at Buy Shipping arriving late, putting us into impossible position where we get a ding no matter what.
All other non-prime orders are fine. But these two suckers put us at 96.7% of the required 97%.
Classic Amazon...
This doesn't hurt us much, because it's only non-prime orders (we are, mostly, SFP), but seriously, Amazon, what is the point in hurting sellers? Why do I need to deal with this now instead of working on increasing sales and continue delighting customers?
@Topher_Amazon
Seller_NzEmZKTEdcpPZ
@Topher_Amazon,
Judging by the sudden spike of similar posts by other sellers at the Forums, it appears that this issue is becoming epidemic. There are many posts by other sellers, reporting the similar issue: Amazon's system is not calculating Promised Delivery Date correctly. Buy Shipping does not offer any shipping options that would get the package to the customers on time.
This puts sellers into a bad position: no matter what we do, the package will be late. And, just like us, there are reports from other sellers that this very issue is causing On-Time delivery metrics (in both SFP and non-SFP orders) to go below tresholds. Sellers are losing Premium Shipping eligibility. Some lose SFP eligibility because of this. This is a very bad situation.
I strongly advise to address this with your higher ups as soon as possible. And, while the glitch is being fixed, don't punish sellers by removing their eligibility. Seller Performance team does not understand the issue, or chooses to ignore it, or simply doesn't even read the appeals to have eligibility reinstated in such cases. We simply can't count on them to immediately turn the eligibility back on if it's removed due to this issue.
