…but I don’t confirm shipping until the date I need to ship it, will that work to avoid problems with handling time gap?
I am asking this because I have an expedited order. My handling time is set for 9 days so I can go on vacation. I want to send it early, but with it being 4 items and nothing else being shipped, my gap time will go to pot if I ship it now with Buy Shipping.
I absolutely cannot afford to lose my ability to adjust handling time.
It might work
The other option is to not enter a valid tracking rate. I’m at 100%, and it’s measured over 30 days. My volume is very low, but 4 orders does not exceed 5%. If someone knows for sure, I’d appreciate a heads up as to whether I can buy now and confirm later.
If the label is purchase off of Amazon, the day that the tracking number is entered into Amazon will be the date that is used in the Handle Time Gap calculation.
So yes, this would be the way to do it as long as you remember to enter it and that the day you enter it is on or before the last ship by date.
No … could create a bad habit that will come back to bite you later.
It should work, but it will likely mess with your VTR.
It sounds like that matters less to you, though, and I don’t have a better suggestion.
I would imagine there might be some red flags if your shipment is scanned, and especially if delivered, before you enter the tracking info. This seems like the type of thing that a drop-shipper might do, and might make Amazon suspicious.
But that’s only a guess.
So how many days early are you shipping compared to your last ship by date? If your 9 day handle time is set after you recieved these orders and these orders have a shorter handle time say like 3 or 4 days, then shipping a day or two early from entering in the tracking may not be a problem.
On the other hand … if the handle time on these orders is 9 days and you are shipping on day 2 and not entering tracking until day 9, then what @Picks_by_Nisha has brought up could be a valid point.
Most of us were probably thinking a day or two delay in entering tracking which shouldn’t be a problem, but 7 or 8 day delay … that is different and probably would spell some type of issue with Amazon.
Okay, thanks. I did not think of that. The handling time is 9 days. It is expedited shipping. To do it right, I have to wait 8 days before shipping. I can either wait or ship it. If I ship early, it will destroy my handling gap because I am not shipping anything right now, so the handling gap will be like 8 days or so.
Can I ask what you guys would do in my shoes? My main concern is I don’t want to lose my ability to set handling time.
I am also concerned with having to wait until December to ship this expedited order without a handling gap, but if that’s what I have to do, that’s what I will have to do. If I don’t ship by Friday, I can’t ship until December 2. Amazon says ship by December 3-4.
From my experience, even when Amazon turn on “Auto Handling time” in our shipping setting, we still can manully turn it off afterwards.
I would ship it asap, and update the tracking in a few days, or not at all.
You will probably have a VTR hit from this order either way, so no difference there.
The concern of getting tagged with dropship related issues very small, especially when it is just one order. I would not make any decisions about this order with that concern in mind, but if you are worried about it, skipping the tracking completely is probably the safer way.
Either way, the buyer will have the item before you update the tracking (or not) so there is no impact for the buyer in either course.
If I paid for expedited shipping and it took 8 days just to get in the carrier’s hands I would be pissed. Your buyer most likely would be pissed as well. So actually delaying the shipment would be a bad option.
One thing you could do (though this will come at a cost of an additional label) is to ship the item to the buyer now, then buy another label and ship an empty box when you’re “supposed” to ship it and give that tracking # to Amazon.
Another idea, put a receipt in the 2nd box/envelope so it looks like you just sent a receipt/invoice separately. This way they won’t be too confused why they’re getting it.
Thank you. I think what I might do is buy the shipping and enter tracking later. Like you said, it is one order, so I can’t see them tagging me as a drop shipper. I mean, I’m sure people have forgotten to enter it and have had to enter it late before, and this is just one order. I can also prove that I make my own items. Nothing is drop shipped.
This is an idea.
Keep in mind that dropshipping itself is not necessarily even off limits. It’s the retail arbitrage stuff that gets sticky.
I have added tracking to orders days after they were actually shipped before and I have never had a problem. I took the expected VTR hit and that was it.