I have been providing buyers with the following instructions on how to file an A-Z claim.
Go to Your Orders on Amazon.
Locate your order in the list and click “Problem with an order.”
Select the issue from the list and select “Request refund.”
Enter your comments in the text box and click “Submit.”
In the past years, there haven’t been any issues, but now, for some reason, they are unable to file it. Amazon has made my product ineligible for return, but A-Z claims should still be an available option.
Could someone please inform me about the new method for filing an A-Z claim?
(I am aware of the impact of A-Z claims on my account, and I only resort to it occasionally and for big orders.
Hi @Petunic! It almost looks like Amazon is finally enforcing its long-standing rule that Buyers must contact 3P Sellers directly about the order issue and then allow them 48 hours to respond, before offering the A-to-z claim option.
Don’t worry. I’m sure Amazon is doing this for Amazon’s own benefit. For example, I used a 3P order that I received last week, trying the INR option, and received this:
It appeared that Amazon requires me to contact the 3P Seller, directly and specifically about the INR issue, AND give them 48 hours to respond, before giving me any other options.
Of course, this benefits Amazon by reducing the number of refunds for INR cases when shipping labels are purchased through Amazon.
Sales are down so they need to make adjustments to increase profitability for its shareholders. This is why they have discontinued the Small and Light program.
In my opinion, the opportunities seem to be diminishing and the platform appears to be in a state of decline.
Unfortunately, I actually did receive the item, and was just testing the process for you as far as I could, without actually reporting any (non-existent) difficulties, so I will not be able to report back.
I don’t provide detailed instructions on how to file claims. I just tell them to open an AtoZ through their Amazon accounts. Amazon changes the process too often, mobile vs desktop, etc. I would rather not give instructions than give wrong instructions. Most buyers can figure it out on their own, and the ones that can’t probably won’t be able to follow the instructions I would give them anyway.
Generally speaking, any SHC ("Seller Help Content) of CHC page that includes a “G” @ the beginning of the ‘Help Content ID’ - i.e., the actual URI (“Uniform Resource Identifier”) portion of the URL - is usually an indication that it was originally deployed as a result of the Editorial Team’s 2018 Help Consolidation Initiative.
A primary goal of that initiative was to do just that - consolidate far-flung data into fewer examples, which is why many long-extant CHC pages will now redirect to an SHC page on the same subject; in some cases, however, it actually produced more examples - of which the page you’ve linked is an example.
When the project was 1st undertaken, those redirected pages would almost-invariably include a top-of-page disclaimer referring to the reason for the redirection; over the years, many of those have been removed, but a few artifacts still existed last time I conducted a check for them.
Another aspect of that initiative was the deployment of the still-extant regimen of an addition of a leading ‘G’ to SHC URIs; these, where they exist, are entirely superfluous, apparently added as a tracking mechanism for Amazon’s internal purposes - which is also the most-likely explanation for many of the ‘complex’ URLs which Amazon provides in Seller Support Case Log Responses, via various ‘Learn more’ pop-ups & blurbs, and the like.
Because I’m aware of some of the strange, non-standard things which Amazon does with cookies & other types of LSOs (“Local Storage Objects”), we always parse URLs down to their simplest-viable expression - the ‘simplified default’ - before using them.
In the past I had requested the customer start an A-Z claim by selecting the order and the “delivered but not received” option. When I requested this to the customer, she said that it tells her she already started a conversation with the seller and refers her to acknowledge the chat, and does not give her the option to start a claim…
Most packages arrive on time, but, sometimes, the tracking may show as “delivered” and you don’t have your package.
1 - Confirm shipping address in Your Orders
Verify if your shipping address in Your Orders is correct. For more information on how to handle a wrong shipping address, go to Add and Manage Addresses.
Check your mailbox or wherever else you receive mail.
3 - Check around the delivery location
Check your delivery instructions in Your Addresses. The package could have been left where you requested.
4 - Ask your household members and neighbors
Check if someone else accepted the delivery.
5 - Wait 48 hours for the package to be delivered
Packages may be mistakenly scanned as delivered up to 48 hours before arrival.
6 - You can check with the carrier
The carrier may have more information about the location of the package. To track your package on the carrier website or contact them, go to Carrier Contact Information.
What to do next?
If you have not located the package after following the steps above, you can:
If your order is shipped and sold by a third-party seller, contact the seller directly for assistance. Go to Contact a Third-Party Seller.
If your order was shipped by Amazon, contact Customer Service within 30 days of expected delivery. We’ll do everything we can to help.
Interesting that they are recommending the buyer contact the carrier, that is new to me.
I buy shipping from Amazon for the A to Z coverage, but the process for the buyer to file one is getting more obscure.
After Problem with Order it is very different than before. I cannot go through the whole process on a recent order without claiming there was a problem. So I can’t explain it to the buyer. I think they are trying to foist the missing package problem on 3P’s to make us refund regardless of where we buy the shipping!
Yepper, and in more than a singular iteration of that CHC (“Customer-facing Help Content” in ‘Dogtamerese’) page.
Something’s been afoot on the INR/Buy Shipping Guarantee front for several months now - early warnings surfaced in Q2 here, there, and elsewhere - but I have yet to discern whether or not it represents a sea-change on The River, or simply another example of Amazon’s insouciance…
Interesting. Let’s see if others have more info. Perhaps we need to adjust the 
