Amazon - ever increasing diff. between ordered and shipped

[andrew_m]

Looking at my amazon associate reports I see that the difference between items ordered and items shipped is constantly increasing over time. I asked this question to the amazon support, but have not heard back yet.

Anyone experiencing the same?

Is it because people are cancelling or changing their orders but it's not reflected in reports?

It's nothing serious, I'm just curious because it does not make sense to me.

[2oddSox]

I get the same quite often. I don't think it's due to cancellations but rather due to the lag between the order and the actual shipping of the item. In many cases people order more than one item, so the whole package may be on hold until it can ship as one unit. Additionally in some cases the item may not be in stock and therefore the order is in the system, but they are waiting on stock before shipping. Of course, I'm only speculating on all this, but it all washes out in the end.

2odd...

[ThomasB]

Orders = Items ordered
Shipped = Items ordered - cancellations - items sent back

It's the same in every account I'd guess

[andrew_m]

Still does not make sense to me.
If it's a lag in shipment -- then it should stabilize over time, not increase.

Somehow I doubt that if I remove links to amazon now (effectively stopping selling), in two weeks or so the numbers will catch up and equal each other.

Anybody tried that? :)

[andrew_m]

ThomasB -- I guess you're right, that's my feeling too. But items ordered I can see, items returned/refunded -- too. Is there a way to find out cancelled? Have not seen one.

It would be logical to just reduce the number of ordered items retroactively at least.

[ThomasB]

The cancelled is just a guess, but I think somebody from the associates team told me that it exists some months ago. Maybe I'm wrong.

and I'd like to add:
- items not yet shipped (not in stock, delivery all items in 1 package)

should be complete now ;)

[PatrickDeese]

I contacted them once about it because I had an order pending for a high-dollar MP3 type widget and I was one non-Amazon widget short of the next tier and it sat in orders for a long while and never fulfilled.

The response was that often credit cards refuse the charge, the order gets cancelled, etc etc.