Seattle, April 14 (U.S.): Amazon is taking a step to offset its rising costs, announcing Wednesday that it will add a 5% “fuel and inflation surcharge” to fees it charges third-party sellers who use the e-commerce giant’s fulfillment services.
The Seattle-based company said on its website that the surcharge, which takes effect April 28, is “subject to change” and will apply to both apparel and non-clothing, the AP reports.
The latest fee increase follows the announcement that was made in November and took effect in January. Amazon did not immediately respond to a request for more details about the latest move.
But in a notice sent to sellers on Wednesday, the company said its costs have risen since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic due to increases in hourly wages, hiring workers and building more warehouses.
She has internalized costs whenever possible, and has only increased fees to address standing costs and to compete with other providers, she said. Both FedEx and UPS, which compete on Amazon, have additional fuel surcharges.
“In 2022, we expected to return to normalcy with the easing of COVID-19 restrictions around the world, but fuel and inflation posed more challenges,” the company said in the notice.
Federal data released on Tuesday showed that inflation jumped 8.5% in March, its fastest pace in more than 40 years. Gasoline prices are up 48% in the past 12 months.
Although the company blames inflation and rising fuel costs for the surcharge, Stacey Mitchell, co-director of antitrust group the Institute for Domestic Self-Reliance, criticized Wednesday’s announcement, saying Amazon is taking advantage of the moment.
“Amazon continues to increase its fees for sellers who have to rely on its platform,” Mitchell said, adding that the new fees are a way to “pull more money out of the pockets of independent companies and put it into Amazon coffers.”
Amazon’s third-party marketplace, where independent merchants list millions of their products, is a big part of its business. It has about 2 million sellers, and more than half of the merchandise sold on Amazon.com comes from these sellers.
Last year, sellers paid Amazon about $103 billion in fees, which made up about 22% of the company’s revenue. The online retailer said the new fees will apply to products ordered before April 28 but shipped and delivered after that date. Amazon is also expected to release its earnings report for the first three months of this year on April 28.
Amazon has long faced accusations of undermining merchants who sell on its platform by making “fakes” or very similar products, and boosting their presence on the site.