FBA warehousing fees soared 300% overnight, sellers: This is a money grab

Recently, the peak season promotion that the sellers in the industry have been looking forward to for a long time has finally arrived. The sellers are all gearing up to make a big effort. Unexpectedly, overnight, the fees charged by UPS for warehousing to FBA suddenly soared by 2-3 times , and this increase is not within the normal range of peak season surcharges.

Recently, many Amazon sellers have reported that the cost of sending inventory to Amazon via UPS has suddenly increased significantly, and the shipping fees have suddenly doubled, which the sellers cannot accept.

According to sellers, the price increases were staggering. For example, one seller's normal shipping cost for a box of goods was about $17, but it suddenly increased to $36.

The cost of shipping a 4x8x8 box more than tripled from $5.50 to $19.

What's more, the shipping cost for a box of goods doubled from about $25 to $93.06.

Based on the feedback from these sellers, it can be found that the cost of UPS shipping to FBA has suddenly increased by 2-3 times , and this price increase was neither announced in advance nor in line with the normal growth range of 2%-5% of the previous peak season surcharge!

This news inevitably caused panic among sellers, especially at the critical moment of preparing for Black Friday and Cyber ​​Monday. The preparation work for various goods is quite heavy. Some sellers even said bluntly that they have canceled many shipments and will not ship again until UPS restores normal charges.

Fortunately, UPS officials noticed the abnormal shipping costs in time and demonstrated efficient execution, completing the system repair work on the same day and restoring normal prices . In addition, UPS also reminded affected sellers to cancel orders within 24 hours after the shipment is created to avoid high shipping costs.

Although UPS repaired the system in time, sellers still need to face the extra workload caused by this sudden accident . Some sellers said that in order to avoid the excess warehousing fee of US$600, they canceled 23 batches of shipments in one morning, and the estimated time required for rework is 90 minutes.

Every year at the end of the year, the freight market always changes suddenly, and sellers always have to go through some extra tests. However, just when sellers are busy canceling shipments, new problems arise. After the freight rate returns to normal, it returns to a high level again the next morning.

This error seems to have been repeated over the past few days, with some sellers finding that the problem has been fixed, but others are still being affected by high shipping costs.

Some sellers said that they canceled the shipment because they did not want to ship at a higher price. When they planned to restart, the system showed that they still had to pay a higher fee because it had been more than 24 hours, but in fact it was only a few hours, so the sellers ended up paying the higher shipping fee.

In addition, many sellers have also noticed that UPS's return fees have increased significantly recently.

One seller said, “We’ve been experiencing a lot of crazy UPS return shipping rates lately. For example, one order was assessed a return shipping fee of $65.15. The product actually weighed only a few pounds, and the Amazon transaction detail page showed the “customer entered dimensions” for the product as 52 pounds. I don’t understand how our shipments could have such a high weight, which is about 50 pounds higher than the actual product weight .”

Similar fee issues are common among other sellers, with UPS adjusting fees more frequently, and both UPS and Amazon denying responsibility. In addition, sellers have expressed concerns about FBA warehousing configuration fees. Some sellers have found that the configuration fee option marked as $0 will result in higher shipping costs .

One seller described two shipments he made:

The first batch was 5 20 lb boxes, the total shipping cost was $55-60, and the no-configuration option was $195. Even though I chose the 0-configuration option, the overall cost seemed to increase.

The second batch, eight heavier 39-pound items, had a similar shipping cost to the configuration fee option, and he was skeptical about whether he could get a refund for the extra money.

In short, it is normal to encounter various emergencies during the peak season. Sellers need to pay close attention to changes in logistics costs and the impact that extended delivery time may have on sales plans. Reasonable adjustments to inventory management strategies and delivery plans will help maintain competitiveness during the peak season.