FBA Fee Refunds: What You Need to Know

We’ll be discussing all that you need to know about FBA fee refunds or reimbursements. First off, Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) is a service provided by Amazon to sellers so that they can offload their logistical requirements on to Amazon, including returns and exchanges, in addition to handling customer service. Logistical requirements for ecommerce fulfillment include product storing, packing, and shipping.

Amazon has one of the most buyer-friendly return policies in the market today, and this results in a higher-than-average return rate, which in turn, is not as beneficial to sellers who wish to see a healthy profit ratio. While returns and refunds are an unavoidable fact of life for sellers, you can stay on top of your FBA Fee refunds and reimbursements to make sure that you don’t lose money. What’s more, keeping track of what Amazon owes you means you get back your money and don’t lose out.

Does Amazon refund an FBA fee?

Of course, within reason. Since Amazon deals with large-scale logistics, errors can and do occur, and this is what you must guard against. The larger the volume of sales, the more that you can expect for customer return rates. This equates to the probability that you need to file more reimbursement claims against your FBA fees.

Amazon can refund your FBA Fees depending on the reason.

Amazon can refund an FBA fee for (but not limited to):

• Lost or damaged inventory due to Amazon error – this includes items that were lost or damaged on its way to the customer, en route to the fulfillment center, damaged by the carrier, and missing from the Amazon inventory
• Customer denies receiving the products, but delivery tracking shows that the items were received
• Amazon has destroyed the items without the sellers’ permission
• Customers’ returns beyond the allowed 30 days
• Customers not returning items – this includes products that were replaced by Amazon, where the original item was not returned back to the fulfillment center
• Customers returning incorrect items
• Customers returning products deemed unsellable
• Customers returning the incorrect number of items
• Customers receiving more than the number of items ordered
• Customer received a refund from Amazon that’s more than the ordered amount
• Errors in order quantity
• Discrepancy in product inventory (shipment received by Amazon and closed but items were deducted later on from the list of inventory)
• Inaccurate weight and dimension FBA charges
• And other FBA fee errors

What is FBA fee refund?

Amazon can process a reimbursement for FBA fees, provided that you file a valid claim within a reasonable period of time. This simple definition belies the fact that you have to run and cross-reference a lot of reports and pore over each item to produce valid proof that there were errors on the fees charged to your seller account. The listed items below are some of the reports you have to pore over to make sure that you are getting your money back:

• Daily Inventory
• Monthly Inventory History
• Inventory Adjustments
• Manage Orders
• Received Inventory
• Inventory Event Detail
• Customer Shipment Sales
• FBA Customer Returns
• Removal Shipment Detail
• Reimbursements

How can I request for an FBA fee reimbursement?

If you are doing it yourself, you just need to go to Amazon’s Seller Central support page and file a request. However, you have to file a coherent case with supporting documents, files, reports, and submit it with clear details and with no guarantee that your request will be granted. You might want to file one claim for each reimbursement request. You run the risk of getting your reimbursement claims denied if one item in a bundled claim is deemed an invalid request. Approved reimbursement claims should appear on your account within 4 – 5 days. The onus is also on you to track if your reimbursement has been credited to your seller account.

Let Seller Maven handle the hard tasks for you

You don’t need to do the time-consuming task of poring over countless reports and tracking reimbursement claims that might not get approved. Seller Maven can do the hard work for you and you don’t even need to pay any monthly fees, upfront fees, nor do you need to sign up for a long-term commitment. We will only bill you for successful reimbursements, or for inventory that has been fully replaced. The only thing you need to do is concentrate on selling your products, and we will handle your FBA fee reimbursements for you.

Schedule a call with a Seller Maven expert