Amazon Takes More Control of Seller Handling Time

Sellers who ship "too fast" could see Amazon take control over their handling time settings, an announcement that was met with protest from numerous sellers last week. The policy takes effect at the end of the month, but it could have unintended consequences. In the announcement, Amazon explained what was changing as follows:

"Starting June 29, 2026, you'll need to ensure that your seller-fulfilled SKUs have accurate handling times. Your handling time is considered accurate when the actual handling time consistently matches your configured handling time for each SKU. There are two ways you can comply with this new requirement:

"(Recommended) Enable Automated Handling Time (AHT): AHT sets handling time for your SKUs based on your recent shipping history and provides late shipment rate (LSR) protection. We recommend enabling AHT to comply with the handling time requirement without having to monitor individual SKUs. You can enable AHT now in your Shipping settings.

"Maintain accurate SKU-specific handling time: You can also manually set handling time at the SKU level, as long as it stays accurate. We'll monitor these SKUs over 30 days to make sure your stated handling time matches your actual shipping speed. If a SKU is consistently shipped at least one day faster than stated, it will be flagged, and you'll have 30 days to update. If accurate handling time is not provided, we'll start managing the SKUs on your behalf and provide LSR protection for 180 days. To learn more, go to Modify handling time."

Marketplaces such as Amazon and eBay use sellers' handling time to calculate the estimated delivery date they display to shoppers. Amazon said "every one day improvement in promised delivery time leads to an average 5% increase in sales." 

But sellers who pad their handling time do so for several reasons. They want to manage buyers' expectations - receiving a package early is a pleasant surprise compared to the disappointment of receiving a package late. It gives sellers breathing room if and when something goes wrong in their operations. And, sellers say marketplaces penalize them when their packages arrive late, so the extra padding saves them from getting a hit to their OTDR on-time delivery rate metric.

There may be unintended consequences of the policy change. In a discussion thread about the change, a seller said, "It should be obvious that Amazon is incentivizing sellers to ship later than they might otherwise; is this really what Amazon wants? Because that's what they're getting." Another agreed, writing, "That’s right! I’m setting my handling time to 1 week and just hold on shipping until the Ship-by date. Most of the time we have stuff ready to ship but occasionally we run out and need a few days to make more. We are getting punished for shipping early, so I say hell with that! I’ll always going to ship on the last day I can from now on."

The policy only apply to sellers on the professional selling plan, and handmade goods are excluded. Amazon is also looking into feedback provided by sellers that print-on-demand items should also be excluded.

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