Further update

After checking the return tracking pages more closely, I found something that makes the process even harder to interpret.

One return showed:

estimated arrival: 1–3 April

event on 30 March: “Package left the courier facility”

But the same page later showed:

• 20 April

• Post Office Counter

• “Return or Replacement or Exchange Collection succeed”

So the timeline itself does not read like a clean, normal transit chain.

If the parcel was only meaningfully handed over later, then the earlier estimated arrival was not a reliable indicator of real return progress. If the earlier event was already meant to represent true carrier acceptance, then the later event wording becomes difficult to interpret.

Either way, this suggests Amazon’s return page may be mixing together internal workflow events, label-generation events, and genuine carrier events in a way that looks more certain than it actually is.

That is the real concern.

Because sellers are then left trying to decide whether they must refund, wait, file SAFE-T, or claim from Royal Mail — without a clean evidential distinction between:

• label created

• parcel accepted

• parcel in transit

• parcel actually returned

I would still appreciate moderator clarification on whether those tracking-page events are always proof of real carrier acceptance, or whether some are only internal / pre-transit workflow states.

Hi everyone,

I wanted to raise this publicly as I am currently experiencing a serious issue with an FBA shipment and I am not confident it will be resolved quickly through standard Seller Support.

The situation:

I sent a shipment of 236 units to an Amazon fulfilment centre. Upon Amazon receiving the parcel, the ASIN was marked as buyable before the individual units had been scanned and checked in. Acting in good faith, I began running paid advertising campaigns once the product appeared live and available, which generated 20 customer orders.

It has now been 4 days since those first orders were placed (including a weekend), and the inventory still shows as FC Processing. Amazon has not completed the check-in of the units received, meaning none of the 20 customer orders have been fulfilled.

The core problem:

Amazon's systems marked the inventory as buyable prematurely, before the check-in process was complete. I had no way of knowing the units were not actually ready to ship. I ran ads in good faith, customers ordered, and now those orders are sitting unfulfilled through no fault of my own.

My concerns:

Late Shipment Rate, Cancellation Rate, and Order Defect Rate are all at risk of being impacted despite this being an Amazon-side delay.

Significant advertising spend has been wasted driving orders that cannot currently be fulfilled.

Customer experience is being damaged, which could lead to negative feedback on my account.

I have raised a support case and am awaiting a response, but given the urgency, I wanted to ask:

Has anyone else experienced this issue where FBA inventory is made purchasable before check-in is complete?

Were Amazon willing to protect your account health metrics when the delay was caused by their own systems?

Did escalating via the forums help get things resolved faster?

Any advice or similar experiences would be greatly appreciated. I am hoping that raising this publicly also helps draw attention from Amazon moderators who may be able to escalate internally.

Thank you.

I had a similar case a few times.

In one of mine, the shipment took about 4 weeks to check in fully, but an order still came through the day after I dropped the shipment at the drop-off point.

I contacted Seller Support at the time and was told it would not affect my metrics. I was also told that if the buyer could not wait, they would cancel the order.

So based on my own experience, the early order can happen before the inbound process is fully completed. In my case I did not run any advertising, so I cannot really comment on the ad spend side of it.

I would still wait for Support’s reply on your case, especially because your situation includes 20 orders and paid ads, which makes the impact much bigger.

Hi everyone,

Like many sellers, my sales have been worse than last year.

I only sell on Amazon, so I do not have eBay, a physical shop, or another channel to compare against directly.

At first, I assumed the main reasons were broader UK economic pressure, inflation, and weaker demand. That may still be part of it.

But after switching from FBA to FBM, I started paying much closer attention to individual orders, customer messages, and what buyers thought they had selected.

That made me wonder whether some sales problems are not only about demand, price, ads, or seasonality.

They may also involve buyer-side friction in how Amazon presents listings, options, variations, or default selections.

A few examples from my own orders:

• A buyer thought she had bought one white zip, but later found she had actually ordered five off-white zips.I do not know exactly how Amazon presented the product on her side, but similar colours, grouped options, or selection flow may have contributed.

• Another buyer wanted a 22-inch zip pack, but had actually ordered the default 14-inch zip instead.Seller Support later confirmed this was a UI issue.

• A customer wanted to buy deep plum purple zips in both 20 inch and 22 inch to test which size suited her project.She was able to find the 22 inch single-zip listing, but not the 20 inch single-zip listing, even though when I checked it from my side, the 20 inch listing appeared normal.
• I have also seen two duplicate-order cases where the first reaction was to assume customer error, but later a moderator confirmed there was a backend issue. That made me more cautious about treating all unusual ordering behaviour as simple buyer mistake.
• In another case, a buyer thought she had bought two 20-inch zips, but had actually ordered two packs of 5 zip bundles in the same colour group, and in 16 inch, not 20 inch. What makes this more interesting is that these were not only different sizes, but belonged to different parent listings. That makes me wonder whether app or browser display can sometimes make nearby products look more interchangeable than they really are.

So I am starting to think that sales drop may be more complicated than many sellers assume.

It may not be only:

• lower demand

• weaker economy

• more competition

• ads becoming less efficient

It may also involve:

• unstable product display

• catalogue changes

• variation / listing presentation issues

• inconsistent visibility between what sellers see and what buyers actually see in browser or app

• default selections leading buyers into the wrong item

I am not claiming this is the main cause of all sales drops, and I know some cases will still be normal buyer error, weaker demand, or competition. My point is that buyer-side display and selection friction may be an under-recognised factor that sellers cannot easily see from their own side.

I would be especially interested in hearing from sellers who have seen:

- buyers saying they thought they selected one option but received another ordered option,

- child listings that appear normal to the seller but seem hard for buyers to find,

- confirmed UI / variation / backend issues that later affected orders or conversions,

- or drops in conversion where impressions and clicks stayed fairly normal.

What makes me think this matters is that, if buyer-side display or selection friction is real, sellers may be trying to solve the wrong problem. More ads, more keywords, or listing tweaks will not fix a buying path where the buyer is being shown, defaulted into, or guided toward the wrong option. A listing can look active and normal from Seller Central, but that is not the same as knowing how it is actually being surfaced and selected on buyer browser, buyer app, or mobile view.