Reduce Losses Due to INR Scams with Amazon’s Signature Confirmation

Have you ever issued a refund to a false Item Not Received (INR) claim? 🤔

INR scam, or Lost Parcel scam, is when an abuser submits false claims for a refund or replacement order – for example, claiming that the product they bought online did not arrive (although it did), which gives them a reason to ask for a refund.

Unfortunately, sellers bear the cost of refunds and/or replacements. And to add insult to injury, abusers may also leave a negative review, which can put a ding on their Order Defect Rate report.

So, to help reduce lost parcel claims, Amazon launched a new service called Signature Confirmation.

Starting June 23, 2022, you can pay for this service in Buy Shipping when you choose shipping for items at risk of being reported as “lost” or “not received”.

Signature Confirmation Core Capabilities

• Amazon spots orders that qualify for signature confirmation by assessing the value of the item ordered, delivery issues, and delivery address.
• Orders that are likely to be reported as lost will show up on your account’s Manage Orders page > Order Status > Signature Confirmation Recommended. This recommendation feature comes free of charge.
• Should you decide to follow Amazon’s recommendation, an additional fee, between $3 and $6 per order, will be applied to your shipping cost to cover the implementation of the service.
• Signature-confirmed orders reported as INR or lost parcel will undergo additional checks by Amazon. If the buyer can’t prove otherwise, he or she won’t get a full refund or replacement order. However, if a refund is granted without your involvement and you disagree with Amazon’s decision, you may file an appeal to resolve the issue.

Downsides of Signature Confirmation

While Signature Confirmation serves as an extra layer of protection from abusive claims, some sellers think that Amazon’s current shipping services already provide the coverage they need for delivery issues.

With rising shipping costs and Amazon fees, it is perfectly understandable why some would be reluctant to pay for another service. Unless, of course, the buyers themselves feel the risk of loss justifies the cost of the additional signature confirmation fees.

However, a few sellers are worried about receiving complaints or negative feedback from customers who don’t want signature confirmation on their orders, either because it is inconvenient (delivery point might be too far from home or they weren’t at home) or it prevented those with malicious intent from carrying out their INR abuse scheme, so they might retaliate by leaving a 1-star rating. Although you can do something about the negative feedback, Amazon may still refuse to delete it.

What the eComm giant could do to deal with this fairly is to:

• Give sellers the option to cancel orders identified as high risk without it affecting their account health.
• Set a specific minimum dollar amount for orders that must have signature confirmation to ensure seller INR protection so as not to require signature confirmation on lower value items.
• If a buyer is identified as a high risk, obligate them to pay for signature confirmation.
• Automatically notify high-risk buyers of their signature confirmation requirements. This way, sellers won’t have to message them directly and risk sending/receiving messages too late, causing an upset buyer and ultimately negative feedback.
• Protect sellers from INR claims and negative feedback without the need for appeal.

There’s no denying that the new service could benefit third-party sellers, in that it would help reduce INR claims by identifying high-risk orders and allowing them to add signature confirmation to those orders. 👏

However, it is not cheap and it doesn’t 100% protect you from customers who might blackmail you with negative feedback if you refuse to remove signature confirmation. Your metrics might even take a hit if you cancel orders. 😓

Until these concerns are addressed, it would be best to limit the use of signature confirmation to extremely high-value items for added protection.