Overview

Amazon is warning sellers who use Amazon Freight that palletized inventory delivery appointments for the holiday season must be secured immediately. The company explains that receiving windows at fulfillment centers become tightly constrained from the last week of October through December as millions of sellers compete for the same slots. Early reservation helps avoid costly delivery delays, stockouts during peak events such as Black Friday (Nov 28) and Cyber Monday (Dec 1), and the cancellation fees—sometimes up to $50 per pallet—that Amazon imposes on late changes. By acting now, sellers can protect both their supply‑chain timeline and their advertising spend during the most lucrative quarter of the year.

Key Points

• Limited Q4 Slot Availability — Receiving windows shrink dramatically beginning in the final week of October, and by early December most high‑traffic fulfillment centers are booked solid, leaving only a handful of late‑night or weekend slots.
• Early Booking Required — Sellers who lock in appointments in early September can still choose preferred carriers and daytime windows, whereas those who wait until October often find only the least convenient slots remaining.
• Reschedule Instead of Canceling — Amazon charges a fee for outright cancellations, but allows a free reschedule up to 48 hours before the original appointment, making it cheaper to shift a shipment than to scrap it.
• Correct Pallet Labeling Critical — Pallets that lack a complete shipment ID, accurate unit count, weight, or the exact FBA reference number are routinely rejected at the dock, causing an average delay of two to three days per pallet.
• Stockout Ranking Damage — Products that run out of inventory during the holiday surge see a measurable dip in organic search ranking and Best‑Seller Rank, which can erode advertising efficiency by up to 15 % according to internal Amazon data.
• International Buffer Needed — Sellers shipping from overseas should add a 2‑ to 3‑week buffer to account for vessel congestion, port delays, and customs clearance that intensify in the fourth quarter.
• — Many freight carriers reduce the number of trucks they allocate to Amazon routes after mid‑October, so the number of available pickup windows drops by roughly 30 % compared with the summer months.