Is premium shipping on Amazon worth it?

September 30, 2020

October 4, 2024

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5 min read

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Being able to provide fast and cost-effective shipping options to your buyer has always been a top priority in eCommerce selling.

With that in mind, Enterprise companies, like Amazon and Walmart, have constantly worked to improve shipping speed; even implementing programs to help sellers get ahead of the competition. That's why Amazon has created Premium Shipping. As long as you meet requirements and adhere to them in the future, you may be eligible to offer Premium Shipping on Amazon.

Premium shipping qualifications

In order to offer Premium Shipping with Amazon you must have:

Been selling on Amazon for more than 90 days
A Valid Tracking Rate of at least 99%
An On-Time Delivery Score rate of 97% or greater
Seller-initiated cancellation rate of less than 0.5%

Aside from selling on Amazon for 90 days, you must meet the other requirements for 30-days before you'll be eligible to offer your customers Premium Shipping options. You will then be able to go-live with Amazon's Premium Shipping options and it can be managed in your shipping settings on your Amazon sellers account.

When you're approved, Premium Shipping options include One-Day Shipping, and/or Two-Day Shipping. Keeping up customer satisfaction will be a must moving forward, as Amazon will establish your ongoing eligibility by your delivery performance. As a seller, you'll be able to track your eligibility status through your Premium Shipping Eligibility dashboard so you're aware of your standing in terms of continued qualification.

Seller Fulfilled Prime won't be affected

Orders placed under Seller Fulfilled Prime are evaluated separately from Premium Shipping orders. Eligibility for Premium Shipping is determined solely based on orders placed with a Premium Shipping option, ensuring that if a seller loses eligibility for Premium Shipping, it does not impact their Seller Fulfilled Prime eligibility. This separation allows sellers to maintain their competitive edge and continue benefiting from the Prime badge on their listings, even if there are issues with their Premium Shipping performance. To maintain eligibility, sellers should focus on consistent performance, efficient operations, and effective customer communication.

Setting premium shipping rates

In today's online landscape, one of the most common aspects of a check-out process is offering little to no shipping costs for online buyer's. As a seller, with Premium Shipping you can choose how to rate your items in order to be competitive and ultimately gain sales. You can charge buyer's shipping cost by item/weight-based, price-banded or weight-tiered.

With item/weight-based shipping, Amazon applies the flat per-shipment rate and the appropriate per-weight or per-item shipping rate for the order.

If you were to choose price-banded shipping, Amazon lets you create ranges or bands of order prices. This way, each price band has its own shipping rate. For example, if a customer was to buy $1-$50 worth of products the shipping rate you specified for that price band will be applied.

In weight-tiered shipping qualified Premium Shipping sellers can create tiers by order weight for freight shipping. Somewhat similar to price-banded shipping, each weight tier has its own shipping rate. The flat per-shipment rate will be applied based on the total order weight.

Is it worth it? Yes.

If you qualify for Premium Shipping on Amazon and believe you can keep up with the requirements and constant evaluations, then yes! Consumers expect products in seconds and realistically that's not attainable. But, getting qualified for Premium Shipping is a step closer in sending your orders out in a timely manner.

When customers are the root of what fuels your business, it doesn't hurt to expand your shipping options to keep up with their expectations of online shopping.