Overview

Amazon has announced a significant change to its coupon fee structure on the Japanese marketplace, introducing a cap on variable coupon fees at ¥25,000 per coupon. The update, which applies to coupons created on or after February 6, 2026, is designed to give sellers greater cost predictability when planning promotional campaigns.

Key Points

• Variable fee capped at ¥25,000 — Approximately $165 USD per coupon, putting an upper limit on what sellers pay regardless of redemption volume
• Base fee structure unchanged — Upfront fee of ¥150 per coupon and variable rate of 1.5% per redemption remain the same; only the maximum variable fee amount is changing
• Effective February 6, 2026 — Cap applies exclusively to coupons created on or after this date; existing coupons created before this date are not eligible for the new cap
• Manual recreation required — Sellers wanting current active coupons to benefit from the new fee cap must manually deactivate them and create new replacement coupons after the effective date

How the New Fee Structure Works

• ¥150 upfront flat fee — Every coupon created on or after February 6, 2026 incurs an upfront flat fee at time of creation
• 1.5% variable fee per redemption — Each time a customer clips and redeems the coupon, seller pays 1.5% of the sale price
• Variable fees stop at ¥25,000 — Fees stop accumulating once they reach ¥25,000, even if coupon is redeemed thousands more times
• Example calculation — For a ¥5,000 product, variable fee is ¥75 per redemption; under new cap, fees would stop accumulating after approximately 333 redemptions (333 × ¥75 = ¥24,975)

Why Amazon Made This Change

• Response to seller feedback — Follows Amazon's 2025 introduction of new promotion structures; seller feedback indicated difficulty predicting costs for high-volume promotions
• Unpredictable cost escalation — Under previous uncapped variable fee, highly successful promotions could generate unexpectedly high coupon costs climbing well beyond initial budgets