Amazon and Temu Shipping Loophole

I saw a video on Instragram–a guy explaining this Amazon and Temu shipping loophole that you can take advantage as a shopper. Amazon is the go-to online marketplace mainly because of its reputation of offering a 2-day or even same-day delivery to customers. Customers are known to be impatient so the faster they get their orders, the satisfactory the shopping experience will be which then translates to a high possibility of them becoming a return customer. Rinse and repeat.

So if you need a product as soon as possible and got no time to go to the store, it’s a no-brainer that you’d instantly order on Amazon. However, prices on Amazon are significanly higher as compared to other (new) marketplaces such as Temu or Aliexpress.

So what is this shipping loophole?

Apparently, what you do is order identical items on Amazon and Temu. After a day or two, you’ll receive your order from Amazon and you’d get the same item from Temu after 2-3 weeks. Once your Temu order arrives, you can then request for a return/refund on Amazon using the same item you got from Temu since these items are supposedly identical. Once you returned the item, you’ll get a full refund as long as your request is within Amazon’s 30-day return policy.

Honestly, as a shopper, this loophole is ingenious. Imagine paying for a product for a fraction of the cost and receiving it in a matter of days instead of weeks–who wouldn’t want that?

How it affects Amazon sellers?

If you’re an Amazon seller and experiencing unusually high returns, this could be one of the reasons and it’s obviously not good for your business. First, your return rate and NCX rate will be increasing–both of which can put your account at risk of deactivation. Second, the costs that Amazon charges you for all customer returns have a significant impact on your margins. And third, most of the products returned by customers go into unfulfillable inventory which means you also lose money on these products.

Can this be avoided?

Yes. It’s simple–don’t launch a product that can be easily copied or bought from other suppliers and sold elsewhere. Don’t give shoppers the opportunity to find more loopholes and take advantage of your business. Selling on Amazon is complicated enough and if you combine that with shoppers who are always on the look out for the best deals or ways to save money–it makes building and sustaining a successful Amazon business so much harder.

My advise? Focus on developing products under your own brand. If you have a trademark or patent, much better. Don’t just order from Alibaba and sell the exact product on Amazon without doing any improvements or innovation. If you do, you’re just setting yourself up for failure.

Got questions or suggestions? Drop a comment or send me an email.