Recent changes to Seller Fulfilled Prime

Introduction

We recently announced updates to Seller Fulfilled Prime (SFP) in Japan to improve the delivery speed that Prime customers expect regardless of fulfillment channel. This guide provides additional details on these changes to help you prepare before these new requirements are included in SFP eligibility and enforcement. The new requirements will not go in to effect until July 15, 2021. In addition to the existing SFP requirements, the new requirements in Japan are:

• Sellers enrolled in SFP will be required to have nationwide Prime delivery coverage for all standard-size products on Prime enabled shipping templates (all prefectures in all regions except Okinawa, Hokkaido, and Ritou). You can see which products are standard size or oversize on the Manage Seller Fulfilled Prime page.
• Sellers enrolled in SFP will be required to ship on Saturday and Sunday to provide customers with a more consistent delivery experience throughout the week. View your Order Fulfillment Settings to set weekend options (Saturday and Sunday as a pickup day will be mandatory starting July 15, 2021).
• Sellers enrolled in SFP are required to meet targets for one-day and two-day delivery promises. These metrics measure the percentage of customer page views that displayed a one or two calendar-day delivery promise when your SFP offer was the featured offer, regardless of whether a purchase was made. These Delivery Speed Targets ensure that customers have a similar experience regardless of who fulfills their Prime order.

More details on each of these new requirements are included later in this guide. However, we want to remind you of the tools and features available now that can help you achieve faster delivery speeds. These include:

• Weekend pick-up for Prime offers: this feature enables customers to see faster delivery speeds when they view products where you are the featured merchant.
• Flexible order cut-off time options that vary by day of week (with earliest cut-off time being 2p.m.) and shipping service. These settings give you more granular control to fine tune cut off times to maximize the number of customers that see your offer before cut off time thereby improving delivery speed.
• Performance Dashboard contains details on the delivery speed metric target and your current performance.
• The Seller Fulfilled Prime reports allow you to investigate which SKUs are contributing to lower delivery speeds. You can apply the tools and features to increase speed.
• Amazon automatically classifies your products into standard-size or oversize based on the product’s package weight and dimensions; this information is available in Manage SFP. View more information on the Item Size, Weights, and Dimensions help page.
• Manage SFP provides SKU-level visibility into the calculated Prime coverage percentage for the assigned shipping template, which ensures your SKUs are on the appropriate shipping template.

In addition to the above, we will continue to innovate and launch new tools and capabilities that enable you to improve your Delivery Speed.

Starting July 15, 2021, Sellers enrolled in SFP will be required to meet both the existing requirements and the following new requirements to maintain SFP eligibility:

Delivery Speed metrics

Meet Delivery Speed metrics for less than or equal to one-day and two-day delivery promises. At times Amazon may add additional transit time padding to the delivery promise shown to the customer on the detail page. This happens when carrier performance is affected by natural disaster or weather conditions. When this happens, the additional transit time padding is not shown on the Performance Dashboard.

The targets for SFP Delivery Speed metrics are below, and also visible on the Performance Dashboard.

	Standard-size	Oversize
1-Day or less detail page views (%)	70%	35%
2-Day or less detail page views (%)	85%	75%

Weekend Operations

Sellers enrolled in SFP are required to operate and ship out Prime products Monday through Sunday. Customer page views occurring after cut-off time will be expected to ship the next day before cut-off time.

Nationwide delivery coverage

Standard size products on a Prime shipping template must offer nationwide delivery coverage (all prefectures in all regions except Okinawa, Hokkaido, and Ritou). You can see which products are standard size or oversize in Manage Seller Fulfilled Prime. For more information, see the help page here.

1. Why are you making these changes?

We know that as a seller enrolled in SFP, you work hard every day to provide customers with a delightful shopping experience. Despite these good intentions, even before COVID impacted deliveries this year, less than 26% of SFP orders in Japan met the one-day delivery promise customers expect. We are introducing these changes so customers in Japan can rely on the same Prime experience regardless of how their order is fulfilled.

2. How and when will these new requirements be enforced?

We are announcing these new requirements now, in January, so you have time to adjust your business. The requirements will not be enforced until July 15, 2021.

If your performance metrics fall below the requirements after July 15, 2021, your Prime eligibility may be suspended.

3. What factors influence the Delivery Speed metrics?

Amazon considers your ship-from location, ship-to destination, and performance of your preferred carriers to determine the accurate promise to be shown to customers. Based on this information, we display a guaranteed delivery date to customers on the product detail page. Other factors that influence Delivery Speed metrics include later order cut-off times, delivering on the weekends, and weekend pick-ups.

4. What happens if I meet the speed requirement for standard-size products but not oversize?

You must speed requirements for both product sizes. If you don't, your Prime eligibility may be suspended.

If you do not meet delivery speed targets in the trailing 7 days for either standard size or oversize products, then we will follow the same enforcement process in use today. This includes, where necessary, suspending your Prime eligibility until a plan of action is submitted and accepted. This is the same process followed for existing eligibility requirements.

5. For oversize items, do I need to ship nationwide to meet the one-day delivery speed target?

No, you do not need to provide nationwide one-day delivery coverage for oversize items. In general, the ≤one-day delivery speed target is measured based on the percentage of detail page views when the customer delivery promise displayed is 1 calendar day or less. This is determined by the one-day delivery region coverage defined on your shipping templates along with your order cut-off times, weekend operations, and delivery settings defined under Order Fulfillment Settings. For example, if the customer is located in a one-day region, and the detail page view occurs before the order cut-off time on Monday, the customer delivery promise will be on Tuesday and considered as a one-day detail page view. However, if the customer views the page after the order cut-off time, the customer delivery promise will be adjusted to Wednesday thereby making it a two-day detail page view. The table below illustrates how delivery promise for a detail page view is calculated for one-day delivery.

Detail Page View Day	Detail Page View Time	Expected Ship Date	Customer Delivery Promise	Detail Page View (calendar days)
Monday	Before order cut-off	Monday	Tuesday	1 calendar day
Monday	After order cut-off	Tuesday	Wednesday	2 calendar days
Friday	Before order cut-off	Friday	Saturday	1 calendar day
Friday	After order cut-off	Saturday	Sunday	2 or 3 calendar days

6. How can I see what shipping templates meet the new nationwide shipping requirements for standard-size products?

Go to Settings > Shipping Settings to see a list of your current templates on the left-hand side of the screen. To identify if a template meets the criteria for standard-size products, confirm that the Prime regions selected cover the all prefectures except Hokkaido, Okinawa, and Ritou.

7. What shipping services are available for weekend pickups and deliveries?

All accepted shipping services for SFP in Japan listed below support weekend pick-ups and deliveries.

Yamato: TA-Q-BIN, TA-Q-BIN Compact, Neko-posu, TA-Q-BIN Timeservice.

Japan Post: Yu-Pack, Letter Pack Plus, Letter Pack Light.

8. When will new sellers be allowed to reenroll in SFP?

Our priority is to help existing sellers adapt to these changes to improve the Prime customer experience. We will share more information about SFP enrollment and eligibility in Japan at a later date.

9. I don’t operate on the weekends. Can I get an exception?

No, we will not grant exceptions to this requirement. To provide a consistent Prime customer experience regardless of fulfillment method, Sellers enrolled in SFP will need to support Saturday and Sunday deliveries and pickups. Customers may choose a different or slower delivery method but this does not affect Sellers’ responsibility to offer Saturday and Sunday pickup and delivery options. This requirement will be effective July 15, 2021.

10. Why are the requirements different for standard size versus oversize products?

Standard size products are more economically shipped to meet the delivery promise. Offering this selection nationwide with a one-day delivery promise provides this selection to the maximum number of Prime customers. Oversize products will remain eligible for fulfillment regionally.

11. What’s the difference between standard size and oversize?

Standard size is defined as any item that, when fully packaged, weighs 9kg or less and does not exceed 45 x 35 x 20 cm in packaging dimensions. Any item exceeding the weight or any one of these dimensions is considered oversize. You can go to Manage Seller Fulfilled Prime to update the item package weight and dimensions of your item. We use the most accurate information to determine the size tier (standard size or oversize) if there are multiple sources for dimensional data.

12. Amazon shows many of my products are standard size even though they are oversize. How do I change this?

If an item is missing any dimensional values or weight, it will be classified as standard size. You can view items missing these values in Manage Seller Fulfilled Prime and update to the correct values or submit a bulk upload. When you update the values, it will be reclassified to the appropriate size tier and reflected in Seller Central and on the detail page.

13. Will you institute these requirements for SFP outside Japan in the future?

These requirements only apply to SFP in Japan. If requirements in other countries change, we will notify participating sellers directly.

14. What will happen to SFP trial?

We have temporarily stopped the enrollment of new Sellers in SFP trial. If you enrolled in SFP trial before Jan 15, 2021 then you can complete the trial and become eligible for Seller Fulfilled Prime with the existing program requirements. However, starting from July 15, 2021 you will be required to meet the existing and new requirements to maintain SFP eligibility.

15. Do I have to ship on a public holiday?

No, +1 day extension will be applied on all public holidays. For example, if Monday is a public holiday, you do not need to ship on that day but must ship on Tuesday. If Tuesday is also a public holiday, then another +1 day will be applied to the extension and you must ship on Wednesday.

• Order fulfillment settings
• Order fulfillment settings FAQs
• Shipping Region Automation
• Manage your delivery time
• Shipping account settings
• Program terms for Seller Fulfilled Prime
• Product detail page and offers