Is Amazon's free shipping getting slower?

bigdaddybruce44

bigdaddybruce44

CAGiversary!
Feedback
26 (100%)
Over the years, I have placed many, many orders with Amazon...probably over 100, at this point. Anyway, except for a three month period where I had a Prime trial, I almost always use their Free Super Saver Shipping. Usually, the items would be shipped out within a day or two of the order's placement. Lately, though, it seems like it is taking up to four days for them to ship stuff.

Of course, this has only happened with the last three or four orders, so it could just be a fluke. So, has anyone else noticed their free shipping getting slower?
 
i too have noticed that their free shipping service has gotten slower. it seems like it takes about 3 days max for them to process orders now.
 
Yes, I've noticed the same thing. I've used Super Saver since they started offering it, and it's always been inconsistent. Sometimes an order would ship UPS the same day, other times it sits processing for three days then ships Media Mail. Over the years it's gradually shifted from more of the former to more of the latter.

But hey, for the price, I'd expect the slow service every time. I just consider it gravy when they ship something quickly.
 
I've seen Super Saver shipping take longer to process, yes. The last order I placed that was an in-stock item were some BR's on Saturday night or Sunday night. They didn't ship out until Wednesday, though they happily auth'd my credit card the day before. :whistle2:s

Almost everything I order from Amazon.com comes from their KY warehouse, so even UPS Ground gets here in a couple of days. Media mail is usually 3-4 days from there to here.

I'm sure it's some subconscious way to get people to get Prime, yes, though after the price guarantee fiasco of recent, I think that's not likely to happen again.
 
[quote name='Ryuukishi']Yes, I've noticed the same thing... But hey, for the price, I'd expect the slow service every time. I just consider it gravy when they ship something quickly.[/quote] Stole my thunder. Unless I need it right away though I don't care (much), and if I needed it right away I'd buy it at a brick and mortar.
 
Yes, Amazon is still pretty quick on their free shipping...certainly faster than some others places, like Buy or DeepDiscount. Still, the fact that they use to be even faster makes me wonder about the possibility of it being an attempt to get us to pay for shipping or sign up for Prime. They were losing money on the price guarantee, and we saw what happened there. They probably don't want to get rid of the free shipping, because it's a big draw, but at the same time, they probably wouldn't mind making it a little less attractive.
 
I swear I read somewhere on Amazon's site that they (may) tack on up to an additional week on free shipping orders.
 
I used to use free shipping all the time and i would normally get my items f in like 2-3 days. Now using free shipping im waiting a week plus for my stuff. And i may be just using revisionist history here but its right around te time prime started to take off
 
It has been hit or miss for me. I had one order ship rather quickly and arrive in a few days while another order made about the same time has been in the "getting ready to ship stage" for about four days now.
 
im done with amazon for pre ordering games.

After delaying the ds harvest moon nearly a month, POSTAL on blu ray not shipping for a week even though its showing in stock, and TOV being delayed 2 days.. Ive lost all hope in ordering from them.

ill pay 5 bucks more at retail rather than wait a week for my product with using Prime and 2-day shipping
 
Super Saver shipping has always stayed the same for me, even with my last 3-4 orders (within the last month). sometimes i luck out and get stuff next day (like 1 out of every 8 or so orders), sometimes it can take a solid 5-6 days from the time i order to when it hits my doorstep (this doesn't happen often at all), but usually total delivery time is 3-4 days. i always use Super Saver, and i've likely placed a couple hundred orders with Amazon over the last 3-4 years.
 
A friend and I ordered Cowboy Bebop on the same day from Amazon. I ordered 3 hours before him though we both used Super Saver shipping. His order showed up yesterday and mine still hasn't shipped yet so it seems to be very random and perhaps shipped out by some last name system.
 
I'm just going to say this after reading too many posts concerning people complaining about the length it takes for something with free shipping to ship.

It's fucking free. If you want it faster either pay for faster shipping or go into a store.
 
[quote name='probablysober']I'm just going to say this after reading too many posts concerning people complaining about the length it takes for something with free shipping to ship.

It's fucking free. If you want it faster either pay for faster shipping or go into a store.[/quote]

Wow, you're completely missing the point of the thread, apparently. No one is complaining about the speed of the shipping. What they are complaining about is the potential shadiness of purposefully slowing down the processing time, in order to lengthen the ship time and motivate people to pay for shipping. After Amazon got rid of the price protection policy, it wouldn't surprise me if they were also trying to save some more money by discouraging people from using free shipping on protects that they want within a week, which use to be a very realistic goal.
 
Yeah it's been really random for me. I think I put in 4 orders in Amazon this year so I don't use them enough to justify buying Prime. 2 of those shipped out within 24 hours of placing the order and I received it within a couple of days which was really impressive. The third one took 3 days to ship out which surprised me since I was so used to Amazon shipping stuff within a day of the order.

Last order I placed was in May for GTA4 which was kind of bizarre. I put the order in on a Saturday and for some reason it didn't ship till the following Friday. They claimed it was in stock so I can't understand why they delayed shipping. Odd thing was it shipped from a warehouse about an hour from my house so it came the next day. Maybe they were delaying it so I wouldn't get the order faster than 2 day shipping?

I rarely need games urgently so I don't mind the wait. It always seems to get here within a week of when I placed the order so that's still acceptable for me.
 
I was going to argue and say "Theyve been good with me" but the last two orders (Free 2 day with Amazon Prime) seem to take an extra day to ship out. Its not a big deal but they do seem to be a little bit slower. But hey, free shipping, no tax cant beat that.
 
[quote name='bigdaddybruce44']Wow, you're completely missing the point of the thread, apparently. No one is complaining about the speed of the shipping. What they are complaining about is the potential shadiness of purposefully slowing down the processing time, in order to lengthen the ship time and motivate people to pay for shipping. After Amazon got rid of the price protection policy, it wouldn't surprise me if they were also trying to save some more money by discouraging people from using free shipping on protects that they want within a week, which use to be a very realistic goal.[/QUOTE]

Yeah, sorry about that, sounded more annoyed then I actually was. I was sort of responding to this and some posts in another thread concerning amazon and people getting annoyed about slow shipping or something else.

I also made that less then friendly post since I see simliar topics about their free shipping pop up from time to time on various forums and I've looked up my past purchase and shipping emails from amazon and the turn around has always been about the same. Sometimes it takes a little longer, sometime it's out the door the same day.
 
I've noticed it recently too. Normally I had items ordered through free shipping in 3 days (1 process day, 2 ship days.) Now, my items stay in shipping soon for almost a full week, followed by extremely slow shipping from a distribution center no where near my local one.

My last order went from item not yet shipped to shipping soon in 2 days, took another 3 or 4 days at shipping soon status, then took 4 days to arrive from KY to PA. Normally items ship from PA or DE for me and arrive in a day or two.

If they get any slower, they will be at DeepDiscount speed, which is utterly terrible.



And, it's not a matter of complaining about free shipping, its just that they set a standard for their free shipping and now they are way slower than the previously were. If it were always slow for free shipping I would complain, but, this is a recent change for the worse.
 
I’ve been noticing the same thing in the recent months. I wonder if at the heart of the frustration is this assumption. I had always assumed, maybe incorrectly, that two day and next day shipping were costs for faster shipping, not faster processing (or at least not the difference in processing time of a few days).

I’ve used amazon a lot over the past few years. Generally items that I ordered with free super saver shipping were shipped within a day or two and arrived a few days later. But free super saver shipping has become quite a bit more inconsistent, even on items that showed in stock. 90% of the time I don’t care, an extra week or two doesn’t bother me. But because of the generally good service I also use free super saver shipping for gifts and few other items that I was hoping to receive faster.

I recently order a new receiver from amazon, despite a slightly lower price from another seller because of my past experience with amazon. I figured I could trust amazon to ship it relatively quickly. But a week has gone by and it still hasn’t shipped, despite it being in stock and available for next day shipping on the product page.

It won’t make me stop using amazon, but it will make me think twice about some of my orders.
 
Ive noticed the same thing. But really I can go into walmart and get most of the things I order on amazon for the exact same price plus a tiny bit of tax. So yeah
 
ordered 2 dvd box sets at 2 different times Both came next day with free shipping


Shipped on thursday got them friday... glad i never paid for overnight

now games take forever to get to me .. DVDS ship fast though
 
My orders have always had a 2 or 3 day processing time, but have always been sent out the next day.

As the holidays approach though you can expect the free shipping to at least be delayed another day or two.
 
My last couple of orders have been hit or miss. One order was slow and the other shipped the day after the order. If I wanted the items really quickly though, I would pay for shipping. The free shipping is still as fast as advertised though, I'd be angry if it missed when they said it would be there.
 
I am a prime member, and my main problem with their shipping is that they hand off their 2-day shipping from UPS to a shitty 3rd party courier called A-1, and I almost never get my stuff in 2 days from those fools. Anytime I see that Amazon sent something through A-1 I often just cancel or return the late order.
 
[quote name='Nibi']I am a prime member, and my main problem with their shipping is that they hand off their 2-day shipping from UPS to a shitty 3rd party courier called A-1, and I almost never get my stuff in 2 days from those fools. Anytime I see that Amazon sent something through A-1 I often just cancel or return the late order.[/quote]

My Amazon Prime two day orders always come from UPS. Maybe it's UPS passing them on for some reason?
 
I use their basic free shipping and 9 out of 10 times, it arrives in 5-7 days for smaller stuff as they use USPS first class and for bigger items it only takes 3-4 days by UPS ground.

I've only had one package come really late, via USPS first class (over 10 days) and they credited me the shipping costs when I complained. Yeah, I know, it doesn't make sense to refund me for free shipping but I'm not complaining about getting $5.49 back for nothing.:D

I hear a lot about this though but it's almost always from people who've used the free Prime trial... maybe it's just you guys getting spoiled with the free 2 day shipping that when going back to the regular free shipping, you forget how slow it really was?
 
[quote name='MrDubbs']My Amazon Prime two day orders always come from UPS. Maybe it's UPS passing them on for some reason?[/quote]

Yeah, it's on UPS' end.
 
I preordered the BD version of Iron Man from Amazon back in July and selected the free Super Shipper option. When I checked the status a few days prior to the release, I noted that the ship date was estimated a full week after release and the expected delivery date was a full week after the ship date. I emailed to ask about it and they gave me a BS form letter. I took that as a response that they don't appreciate my business and took my business to a local B&M Fry's where I got the same version for a dollar less.
 
I ordered a few games and movies tuesday and arrived joday so its not to bag, I guess different people have different views as a whole they have always been ok for me..


____________________________
Dont be too quick to judge
0266e33d3f546cb5436a10798e657d97.gif
 
[quote name='scorpiolaw']I preordered the BD version of Iron Man from Amazon back in July and selected the free Super Shipper option. When I checked the status a few days prior to the release, I noted that the ship date was estimated a full week after release and the expected delivery date was a full week after the ship date. I emailed to ask about it and they gave me a BS form letter. I took that as a response that they don't appreciate my business and took my business to a local B&M Fry's where I got the same version for a dollar less.[/quote]

In all fairness, the estimated ship dates on free shipping orders are always off, more than likely so Amazon can cover their own behind. I always get crazy estimated ship dates, but the items generally shipped out on time.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Yeah, they always way underpromise and overdeliver on those estimated dates. Seems like I've never had an order that didn't beat the estimate by at least a week.
 
[quote name='Nibi']I am a prime member, and my main problem with their shipping is that they hand off their 2-day shipping from UPS to a shitty 3rd party courier called A-1, and I almost never get my stuff in 2 days from those fools. Anytime I see that Amazon sent something through A-1 I often just cancel or return the late order.[/QUOTE]

Amazon has been doing this to me lately, too. A1 is complete garbage. They can never find my address, so they always call me up with attitude - as if it's somehow my fault that they don't know where I am - and to make it worse, the packages don't come until 7 or 8pm. Useless.

I've submitted multiple complaints to Amazon regarding them - I hope you've done the same.
 
I ordered an xbox live subscription card from them last Thursday and used the free shipping option, and was told it was shipped on Monday, and it still isn't here on Friday.

I've never had an order with them take more than 3 days to get here.

(Plus I thought they would just email me the code anyway...)

Still not as bad as Toys-r-us though. Those Jokers took 5 business days just to process my order...
 
I got sick of FSSS always taking a week to ship and then varying delivery dates. A week and a half was what I averaged until I said fuck it and got prime.

I love Amazon but they purposefully slow down your shipment so that you buy prime. For such a great company, they have the worst free shipping I've ever seen.
 
My FSSS stuff always ships out right away, and I wind up getting it like two or three days later. Might have something to do with living in NYC, though. When I lived in TX, it would take like two weeks to get stuff.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
bread's done
Back
Top