No, that is not correct or at least it has not been. Amazon was said to intermingle the inventory in the warehouses, mixing third party products with those shipped and sold by Amazon. So that gave you zero protection.
I read that they made internal changes to tag shippings properly to reduce the risk of that behaviour, but am not sure it is true or has been effective.
Has this co-mingling of sold by Amazon ever actually been documented at any scale beyond “extremely rare stock/pick” mistake? I am of course aware of the option for manufacturers to enable this for their registered products on FBA - and it may not have been optional at one point in time.
When I researched this a while ago I was unable to come up with much compelling evidence that it was an actual thing. It certainly has not happened to me over thousands of purchases - or anyone I know for that matter. Of course a fake could have been so good none of us could tell, but I do actually attempt to inspect carefully.
I have found counterfeit items from other web stores not on Amazon so it’s not like my detection skills are zero. Third party marketplace of course is different.
Heck, even Costco sent me an unsolicited refund for a counterfeit item they unknowingly sold me - so supply chain issues are bound to happen.
I don’t want to defend Amazon too much here, but this one is almost at urban legend status to me. Likely happened at limited scale some time ago, but it’s strange everyone says it’s endemic but no one IRL I know across probably tens of thousands of purchases has noticed it.
I don't think Amazon has ever outright admitted that they do, but Amazon's own terms give them the right to commingle their inventory with those of third party sellers.
F-4 Storage
We will provide storage services as described in these FBA Service Terms once we confirm receipt of delivery. We will keep electronic records that track inventory of Units by identifying the number of Units stored in any fulfillment center. We will not be required to physically mark or segregate Units from other inventory units (e.g., products with the same Amazon standard identification number) owned by us, our Affiliates or third parties in the applicable fulfillment center(s).
Right, that’s FBA. I’m talking about sold by Amazon. I’m specifically talking about a case where a sold by Amazon item came from co-mingled inventory from a FBA seller.
I also know from direct second party experience (I also personally saw the terms) that at least at a certain level of “brand” you can decline this option with Amazon for your registered product skus/ASIN even for FBA. I don’t know if this is offered to everyone though - I know it went through some sort of “deal reg” process in the one case I saw. I imagine this came through some sort of lawsuit or threats of one for a major brand at some point - but that is speculation on my part.
> I’m specifically talking about a case where a sold by Amazon item came from co-mingled inventory from a FBA seller.
The FBA terms I quoted specifically say that Amazon can co-mingle FBA inventory with their own (if the FBA seller doesn't opt out of "virtual tracking").
> The FBA terms I quoted specifically say that Amazon can co-mingle FBA inventory with their own (if the FBA seller doesn't opt out of "virtual tracking").
The wording in the quote explicitly states that an FBA unit can be substituted by owned by Amazon unit or other FBA units. But the wording is not clear whether SBA (Sold By Amazon) unit can be substituted by an FBA inventory. The terms covering Amazon's "first party inventory" (SBA, a.k.a. Amazon retail) are internal to Amazon and are not shared, AFAIK. But i can be wrong :-)
I have absolutely bought multiple hard drives that were "shipped & sold by amazon" which turned out to be fake/counterfeit in some way. The serial numbers did not verify on the manufacturer's website either and they were completely DOA.
I read that they made internal changes to tag shippings properly to reduce the risk of that behaviour, but am not sure it is true or has been effective.