We enabled AHT…I am just starting to play around with SSA. I don’t know that we will do either of these come September 25 but I want to at least see what the results are before it starts to actually “count”.
However, when I enable SSA, it basically keeps automatically creating a 1-day delivery service along with our normal shipping options we offer (we normally offer either 1) standard shipping for a certain price, 2) expedited shipping for a larger price, and 3) a 2-day shipping for an even larger price).
However, I DON’T want to offer 1-day service anywhere and we don’t have this option selected currently for our listings.
Am I doing something wrong that it keeps creating this 1-day delivery service option or is this a requirement under SSA?
We are in the process of setting up a thread that will help you set up your SSA shipping templates. Notice we said templates (plural)? … For many to control SSA parameters, they will need different templates for different product.
This will change with SSA settings and the way you think of shipping.
If you happen to sell Customized items make sure to deactivate One-Day Delivery and Two-Day Delivery shipping from the options as they will not include handling time.
Custom items with One-Day Delivery or Two-Day Delivery will have to ship same day because handling time is excluded while Standard does include handling time.
We added Expedited with 1-2 day delivery speed as an option for buyers because Expedited includes handling time just like the Standard shipping.
Side Note: a long time ago in a warehouse far far away… our production team was mad at me for a few days because of that oversight.
Using these systems seems to be making FBM sellers SFP-lite. Since SSA is the same thing that most sellers on SFP use it will likely be handled the same. You can deselect the 1 day option, but you will probably still get 1 day shipments. Amazon seems to handle it in two separate systems.
While doing this prevented customers from seeing a 1 day shipment on their end Amazon was calculating that we had SKU X in warehouse Y. It was close enough to the customer for 1 day and when the order released to us, it was still a next day delivery regardless of what the customer saw in their cart.
Again, this is only our experience with SFP using the same systems. They could honor deselecting the option when it’s a standard FBM order. We don’t use this system for anything but our SFP and I would be interested to know the outcome.
Edit: And because I forgot to explicitly answer this question, every time you turn SSA on for a template it will default to having the 1 day box checked.
It just seems to control what the customer sees rather than what Amazon decides the transit time is. I’ll again say my experience with SSA is in terms of using it with SFP.
It may operate differently for a standard FBM order and if anyone would try it I’d love to hear the results. I recommend deselecting both the one and two day transit options.
Just to add, as I’m not sure if this has been clarified: OTDR protection only applies to standard shipping (the expedited option is, interestingly enough) not protected.
All this OTDR cr*p is an obvious way to avoid FBM sellers to perform better on the shipping speed department than Prime. It basically forces sellers to withhold their shipments to avoid being punished for “shipping too early”.
I am working on a positive, posting to show our results and workarounds. We are just getting off a regional mission, that makes us much more than Amazon sales. So that first.
To this point, we have created the “Box of Despair” a big box that all orders go into that are done and ready to ship. They wait 24 hours to 5 days to be shipped. Even though they could ship now!
All other channels get items early, our websites, other eCommerce venues.
Then we have a region of the country, that we will illustrate when we can, that if we wait until the last day to ship, Amazon makes us ship 2 day shipping.
While we did SFP and enjoyed it, this is forcing us to do it, and we do not get the prime badge.
If this is happening, then your shipping template(s) need some work.
We have 2 day handle time. Our Thursday orders go out Monday. Currently, we have SSA enabled with ONLY Standard Shipping and ONLY USPS Ground Advantage (less than 1lb) as the shipping service. USPS Ground Advantage (less than 1lb) is always offered.
Note
If we needed to use a faster shipping service like USPS Priority Mail, it is still available with our current settings.
We would set up five templates with the appropriate shipping service needed per template …
SFP items
Same day items
2 day on demand items
5 day items
Greater than 5 day items
Assign items to the template needed. Avoid turning on AHT but you could use SSA (Shipping Service Automation) for US destinations. If you set a SSA template to only one shipping service and only use Standard Shipping, then the order estimated delivery times will all be calculated at the shipping service which you selected (example USPS Ground Advantage less than 1lb). Doing so will avoid the forced 2 day shipping issue.
Let me get back to this when I can. We also have three day ship items that are custom. We need the extra day to manufacture them due to wait time on the process we use.
Though we can set up a template for that too.
We will not be doing a SFP template, though they are still in my system. Can not control it like we once did.
The main issue is we are on the east coast. The problem areas are south of the panhandle in TX and west of the Rocky Mountains. We have used our own shipping as a workaround.
All that, it still drives me nuts that we have dozens, even hundreds of packages that could go today! Yet they sit rotting in boxes to ship on the last day.
So I’ve been switched to SSA for a week or two now and mostly all goes as planned with buy shipping except one or two forcing UPS over my preferred carrier (USPS GA less than 1lb). I assume they were because of address verification as they had weird addresses.
Today however I noticed one order is forcing me to go Priority however I have no priority set in my templates. I have checked the template assigned and it is correct. Also I noticed a few of my orders do not display “Shipping Service used to calculate Delivery Promise”
Are all of your items under 15.99oz? … We have seen other reports of issues with weights just over 15.00oz. Ours are all under 8oz and have had no problems.
Are you running more than one SSA template?
All of ours have had this since we went to SSA. We would note that all of our items are on the same SSA template using only Standard Shipping with USPS GA (less than 1lb) as the preferred service (and no other services selected).
Here’s another example of an SSA template set up for GA ONLY, and it does not display “Shipping Service used to calculate Delivery Promise” and It forced me to use Priority. I’m wondering if I should waste my time trying to get an answer from support. Been almost daily now one or more order gets forced to Priority.
SAS Confidential (members only)
