As a buyer, I think that FBA must have already seen its best days.

Fulfillment by Amazon FBA orders and Customer Services
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1

Two incidents in the past two weeks.

This week, with Prime Day in effect, my usual next day order for an item was a Prime Two Day order. Not surprising or overly troubling.

When the delivery date arrived, I noted that the order was not Out for Delivery. The delivery time estimate was updated periodically throughout the day, but it was still not Out For Delivery.

At 8PM, I was notified that the order was scheduled for delivery the Next Day. They claimed the delivery to the Haverhill hub was delayed and they were working on resolving the issue.

The next day, I noted the order was not out for delivery. The time estimate was not updated. Late in the evening, the delivery was changed to the next day.

The next day, I noted the order was not out for delivery.

Apparently, the orders are being rescheduled by AI and nothing is being done about missed deliveries.

I went off to Amazon Help to chat. The bot told me exactly what I saw, and told me to go away until another day passed without delivery. Mad as I could be, I went away.

The next day I returned and the bot told met I had to wait for the deadline which already passed. It refused to offer any assistance, until I asked to be put in contact with a CSR.

An India based CSR reviewed the chat notes, said the shipment is lost and asked if I wanted a replacement or a refund. I opted for a replacement. It is scheduled for delivery tomorrow.

This comes on the heals of another FBA screw up. An order included a small tub of spackle.

When opening the tub I noted a drop if spackle on the outside of the lid. Very small. I opened the tub and discovered much of the contents were gone. No sign of the contents in the packaging.

AI did not offer a replacement but only a refund, which I accepted and visited the hardware store to replace.

2

Plus, the extended wait time is functionally a longer delivery time.

Were/are these deliveries handled completely by Amazon, or are they handing off?

3

Okay, that was just mean. The suspense will kill me. :upside_down_face:

4

“…I think that FBA must have already seen its best days”

My wife CLAIMS that I am a pessimist. It’s possible she is correct, but I prefer to think I am a REALIST.

As you note, Amazon is incapable of taking care of their own business. How on earth are they to be trusted to take care of all the details for someone else?

I can imagine a coming disaster for any companies that decide to embrace Amazon and THEIR storage. shipping, and, handling of inventory to relieve themselves of all the hassles of doing it themselves.

The biggest issue will be that once those companies have farmed everything out to an inept/incompetent company it is a herculean task to unwind that relationship, regain custody of their own inventory, hire all new warehouse and shipping staff, and basically start all over.

How long will THEIR customers have to wait while Amaozn spends MONTHS on withdrawal orders that can’t be removed because they are at warehouses without that capability?

Will those larger/largish companies be expected to be as willing to wait as ALL FBA sellers currently are when withdrawals and transfers are screwed up every day of every week?

Amazon has outgrown their ability to manage their own operation but are delusional enough to believe they can offer solutions to other, much smaller companies that can’t afford to be disrupted by their breakdowns.

I see a future of an army of lawyers getting rich on the fallout. I had always thought about law school so maybe I need to reconsider. My daughter doesn’t like suing people so my efforts would offer her firm a diversified income stream…:smiling_face_with_horns::smiling_face_with_horns::smiling_face_with_horns:

5

All my orders are shipped through Amazon Logistics, no other carrier involved.

6

Although you may be correct in being concerned, implicit in your position is an assumption that there is a company offering these services which is more competent., I would love to believe that there is, but despair that Gresham’s Law is being applied to all of US industry.

7

UPS watching Amazon struggle with logistics.

tawa-2097959770

8

My experience is very similar. I’ve gotten to where I’m expecting Amazon deliveries to be late.

9

Same here.

My wife has 10 orders in the past 2 weeks. 2 of them were delivered on time. 4 were 1 day late 4 were 2 days late.

Amazon has nothing to say about it other than, Too bad, so sad.

10

Which is why THEY don’t show a feedback score for themselves.

How convenient…:face_with_symbols_on_mouth::face_with_symbols_on_mouth::face_with_symbols_on_mouth:

11

Delivery was made today.

Saw something new. The order as shown on the app shows Delivery Facilitated By Amazon. I assume it is an attempt to put distance between Amazon and Amazon Logistics.

The item was among half a dozen orders left blocking the entrance to our building. They were scattered when I opened the door to get them in, Not the usually highly responsible Amazon contractors we are used to.

12

Late in May, I traveled by auto to my granddaughter’s graduation in PA.

Have not had a long road trip in some time.

I did none of the driving, so I had plenty of time to try to amuse myself by observing things that had changed along familiar highways.

One of the big differences was in the truck traffic on the Interstates. The most common trailers, after the plain white ones were blue Amazon trailers.

They outnumbered all of the well known freight haulers like Old Dominion and other well known companies.

All of the trailers were hauled by cabs driven by small haulers or indie drivers.

My sample may be skewed but Amazon is already a power in shipping. Competing with other providers of LTL shipping is a natural extension of their business model, and doing so as part of an extended fulfillment operation more likely to be profitable.

It is also likely that inferior service will have less impact on Amazon profit and reputation than FBA would. Bad as things have gotten, Amazon logistics is superior to FEDEX Ground/Home most of the time.

Amazon might just force FEDEX to give up the ghost.

As for lawyers, many of them are not in the business of going to court, they act to force settlements. Amazon is less likely to fold and agree to a settlement than many other potential targets. That is likely to encourage the lawyers looking for a big payday to choose other targets.

13

I bought several items on Prime Day, and ticked a box that offered an extra 1 percent credit if I agreed to a delivery date a week away.

Everything was shpped in 3 separate boxes that arrived the next day.

Amazon can still do some things right, although I think political backlash against Bezos may be affecting sales for some of us, especially booksellers.

FWIW, I used Amazon FBA for thousands of books, from 2011-2017, but had to leave after conditions changed.

One of the books that went to Amazon FBA and back was purchased a few days ago by one of the AI buyers via Alibris.

14

There is definitely an anti-Amazon backlash but I suspect it is not the source of bookseller’s problems.

Nor do I think it is truly political. Bezos’ wealth offends the left but Bezos’ embrace of many leftist social policies offends some on the right. And his ownership of WaPo offends both right and left.

On the whole, billionaires are unloved unless they are putting money in the pockets of professional agitators.

15

It’s not. Most people on all spectrums are coming to the conclusion that taxing work and not wealth means these obscenely consolidated wealthy people are a symbol that the system is broken just like congress and insider trading.
Nobody cares how wealthy another person is if they know the game is played fairly. When Jeff or Elon or any of the other billionaires pay the same percentage of their wealth as a Lawyer, Doctor, Fire Chief, etc, then you will see all parties not care how wealthy the others are.
Just like we all know that retail theft raises the costs to those who pay, the same is with the tax loopholes, corporate inversions, insider trading, borrowing against stocks, stock buybacks before collapse and/or a gov bailout… Its just cheating the system either morally or illegally or both.

And that is not even brining up the consumption of assets economically, as Mr. Bezos’ wealth is the GDP of the bottom 5 states of this nation. Estimating a simple ROI on his assets at ~$40M a day, one has to acquire more assets because we tax work not wealth, meaning he will just keep growing and growing raising asset prices with his other billionaire buddies.

16

No doubt this is the case in my area as Amazon delivery trucks are now on my small island. When I do go off island on an early ferry, there is a continuous stream of Amazon Rivian delivery trucks for 10 miles or so going back to I-5. A LOT of trucks heading to a sparsely populated area. Routes that UPS is surely trying to get rid of especially with the cost of diesel.