New trick by Amazon

I use Amazon quite a lot. I don't use 'Prime' and they keep telling me how much I would save if I did. I've never investigated the cost of using 'Prime', but I assume there is some sort of monthly fee or whatever for so doing.

Deliveries are often next day, and if not are usually before or within the dates they quote. I'm in far West Cornwall.

I am pleased with the service I get and have no complaints.

The date probably changes when they contact their supplier to place the order and find that delivery to Amazon is later than their records say is normal.

I ordered an item for Christmas in November 2024, and was then told delivery would be March next year. In fact, it turned up around Christmas Eve. I think that's the only item I've bought from them that didn't meet their advertised delivery date.

Yes, it happens to me as well. Most annoying. Similarly, I won't buy from any site that will not tell you the carriage costs before you enter your personal details.

You can get free delivery to your local collection point/post office on most items. I.e., no minimum order. Luckily my post office is a 5 minute walk away.

I'm like you, order occasionally from Amazon and take great care to avoid joining up to Prime.

I think accuracy of delivery dates may depend on whether the item is fulfilled by Amazon or is actually sold by some other supplier with Amazon merely providing the shop-front (there is normally small print to tell you which an item is). If the whole chain is under Amazon's control and my experience is that their delivery predictions tend to be accurate. Not so sure about the others.

Another observation: in December I found an item that Amazon listed, but an eBay retailer had it at considerably cheaper price, so ordered from eBay. It was, to my surprise, delivered on the expected date but by an Amazon van.

Is this just the time of year. The delivery may be normally 3/4 days for free delivery if you meet the order amount threshold but if you are actually buying from a third party that company may be closed from Xmas to the new year, hence a later delivery.

In message snipped-for-privacy@jrenewsid.jretrading.com>, at

Yes, this is a feature of items bought via the Marketplace (ie not direct from Amazon themselves) where delivery is also arranged by the seller using random couriers, rather than Amazon's own logistics fleet.

Meanwhile, the main attraction of Prime (other than the streaming content) is that if an item is marked as "available with Prime" (and by no means all of them are) it will almost certainly arrive the next day,

Contrast with another well known seller [not eBay] where it's claimed "99% of items are shipped next day", and it didn't hit the Royal Mail tracking site until five days later.

On ebay many seller claim UK stock and shipped via Royal Mail. Often this means first shipped from China to a UK agent who then uses RM to post the item to you. Tracking will indicate within minutes that there is a RM tracking number.

I've found that delivery dates can vary depending on whether I'm logged in or not. If I am, it knows I have Prime but also knows my address, and often offers next day delivery. If I switch the address to another, those items jump to 2 day delivery - presumably because an address in southern England is further from Midlands distribution centres. If I'm not logged in the date can be something like 'delivers on 14th January, or 9th Jan with faster shipping' - presumably you have to pay more for the latter.

So it could be that the date calculation changes based on it knowing the address at the point you login. But all these changes happen before the actual purchase goes through.

Do you know if it's on items dispatched from Amazon or third party fulfillment? Are the items in the UK or abroad?

Theo

In message snipped-for-privacy@mid.individual.net>, at 11:20:53 on Sat, 3 Jan

I have an item like that in transit at the moment, except they are using Evri. And to confound the muddle, Evri emailed me on day-one to say they had the parcel and were arranging to deliver it, when it spent the next week in China and on its way to the UK. Still hasn't arrived yet.

In message <6Rh* snipped-for-privacy@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>, at 12:02:46 on Sat,

They have delivery centres in the south, too. Five effectively around the M25, and four on the south coast. Mine usually come from either Peterborough or Milton Keynes.

They've applied for PP to build one in Ely**, on a site originally earmarked for a retail park, but the developers recently pulled out - ironically due to 'death of High Street'. It was a dead duck when their anchor store (Tesco) - decided against moving there about five years ago, and refurbished their existing shop by the station, instead.

If offered a Prime free trial there's no reason not to accept. Cancel membership straightaway and have 28 days use of it for free. And there's no limit to the number of free trials that you can have.

I once placed an order when I didn't have a Prime trial in progress but wanted the item, whatever it was, the next day so agreed to Prime. As soon as the order had gone through I cancelled the membership and it was converted to a free trial so it cost me nothing.

No. There was nothing to stop you cancelling the order without penalty.

No.

A few weeks ago BBC Panorama devoted a whole programme to how poor Evri were at delivering packages.

We knew that from a long time ago but the programme shows Evri hasn't improved.

It is scammy and in the US Amazon got a huge fine for the way it slipped Prime into orders.

"FTC Secures Historic $2.5 Billion Settlement Against Amazon Agency alleged that Amazon used deceptive methods to sign up consumers for Prime subscriptions and made it exceedingly difficult to cancel"

Like many people, I got 'caught' by their dark pattern methods to sign me up, but didn't find they resisted cancelling Prime, and after a couple of free trials, I do now pay for Prime.

In message <XnsB3C9AD455F19A1F3QA2@157.180.91.226>, at 17:01:59 on Sat,

I have no particular reason to believe the parcel will be mis-delivered once it gets to their UK depot.

The issues here are (a) It's not Royal Mail and (b) After more than a week it still hasn't got to the UK.

ps Although most vendors pick Evri's cheapest service, they also have a next-day service which works reasonably well.

Yes, I think it's time for them to change their name again. Actually, is the name "Consignia" now free?

In message snipped-for-privacy@mid.individual.net>, at 18:02:03 on Sat, 3 Jan

I'll place an each-way bet on DHL-local.

I got so fed up with Amazon sharp practice, having to check every line, every click to see if they were actually selling me what I wanted, not signing me up for Prime, not putting me down for a monthly repeat delivery subscription etc etc that I quit in 2024. My only regret is that I didn't hold out until 2025 so that I could resign in disgust at the way the president of Amazon was brown-nosing his way with the President of the United States.

Since then I have bought my music at the local record store and my books at the local bookstore. Things that I buy on line come to me Click and Collect so that I'm not waiting around all day just to miss the (non) knock on the door with the parcel.

Nick