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All the items were eligible for free shipping, according to Amazon. Some of the items were from individual merchants, but all of those were FBA (so they were wa

All the items were eligible for free shipping, according to Amazon. Some of the items were from individual merchants, but all of those were FBA (so they were warehoused at an Amazon facility). It's possible that even though they were eligible for free shipping, they weren't all in the same facility. If that was the case, I would understand why they were put into separate boxes. What doesn't make sense is removing one item in a box by itself causing the shopping cart to reshuffle so a different item was placed in a box by itself. I was irked enough that I want to find alternatives.

jfoster 11y ago
Even if they weren't in the same facility, why would that make it understandable? How are you, as a customer, supposed to be concerned with which Amazon facility has what stock? (information you don't even have)
- blowski 11y ago
  Agreed. Feels like Amazon outsourcing part of its shipping algorithm to customers.
  - cwilkes 11y ago
    +1 I've had the same experience trying to get $35 of "qualifying goods" into my cart to only see that they weren't really telling the truth and having to pay for shipping with Prime for next day. Oh and through some weird ability to rename time "next day" now means 2 days and "2 day" means 3 day delivery. Same day usually does mean same day -- which used to have a lot of items available for that but recently has seemed to have gone down. Still impressed that it can be done.
  - fweespeech 11y ago
    They already outsource fixing the errors made by their algorithms to customers and the businesses that ship for Amazon. Lol. "Hey, lets merge these two colors, what could possibly go wrong?" is an algorithmic decision made by Amazon that happens far too frequently after I've gone home or to bed. :p
  - gherkin0 11y ago
    It sounds to me like the algorithm is deliberately trying to outsource some of the "free" shipping cost to customers. It's sort of like that bank transaction-ordering scandal from a few years ago, where banks ordered transactions unintuitively to maximize overdraft penalties.
- dheera 11y ago
  They could also just tell you "the items you want to buy cost $X for shipping" where X just happens to drop to 0 under certain circumstances. This is what everyone except Amazon does. Charging for shipping is entirely understandable. I too love free shipping, but it's actually us that have been spoiled by Amazon. And with Amazon's low prices and 5% cashback I'm pretty sure even if they started charging for shipping that it would be still cheaper than anywhere else ...
pbreit 11y ago
If they were "Prime" you should have gotten free shipping. FBA doesn't matter and I don't know what "eligible for free shipping" is. This story sounds fishy.
- jkestner 11y ago
  He doesn't have Prime.
Sir_Substance 11y ago
>All the items were eligible for free shipping, according to Amazon. What amazon says on their main page is very disconnected from reality. What it says on checkout is what matters. When I buy stuff from Amazon, they have a little checkbox on the side that says "only items that ship to Iceland". Never the less, when I get to the checkout 90% of the stuff they show won't ship to Iceland.
- wodenokoto 11y ago
  If that's the case, then it is false advertisement. Don't blame that on the consumer.
  - Sir_Substance 11y ago
    Settle down sunshine, I'm warning him and giving him advice on where to get real info, not blaming him. Put your bush laywering back in your pocket.
    - dang 11y ago
      This comment breaks the HN guidelines badly, and you've posted many uncivil comments before this as well. Please stop doing that. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html
      - Sir_Substance 11y ago
        Oh jesus buddy, there's always one of you. If you care that much go find a mod to ban me (or are you a mod? I don't care), and I'll go find some other corner of the internet. You're welcome to slowly turn this place into a dustbowl by bitching at people for having conversations if that's what you enjoy doing in a community, don't let me stop you, but let me remind you of this: You weren't involved in the conversation, and your comment history is nothing but wandering around sticking your nose in robust discussion and whining that people aren't talking to each other via the predefined rules that you like, as if human conversation is based on your two favorite links. You're not contributing here, and there's not a single post in the last several pages of your comments that implies you care about, understand or have an opinion on anything posted here, so please shush and let the rest of us get on with our sharing. edit: http://joshldavis.com/2014/10/03/heavy-handed-hackernews/ http://joshldavis.com/2014/10/03/heavy-handed-hackernews/ Looks like you've been doing this for at least 16 months, congrats or something?

jfoster 11y ago

Even if they weren't in the same facility, why would that make it understandable? How are you, as a customer, supposed to be concerned with which Amazon facility has what stock? (information you don't even have)

blowski 11y ago
Agreed. Feels like Amazon outsourcing part of its shipping algorithm to customers.
- cwilkes 11y ago
  +1 I've had the same experience trying to get $35 of "qualifying goods" into my cart to only see that they weren't really telling the truth and having to pay for shipping with Prime for next day. Oh and through some weird ability to rename time "next day" now means 2 days and "2 day" means 3 day delivery. Same day usually does mean same day -- which used to have a lot of items available for that but recently has seemed to have gone down. Still impressed that it can be done.
- fweespeech 11y ago
  They already outsource fixing the errors made by their algorithms to customers and the businesses that ship for Amazon. Lol. "Hey, lets merge these two colors, what could possibly go wrong?" is an algorithmic decision made by Amazon that happens far too frequently after I've gone home or to bed. :p
- gherkin0 11y ago
  It sounds to me like the algorithm is deliberately trying to outsource some of the "free" shipping cost to customers. It's sort of like that bank transaction-ordering scandal from a few years ago, where banks ordered transactions unintuitively to maximize overdraft penalties.
dheera 11y ago
They could also just tell you "the items you want to buy cost $X for shipping" where X just happens to drop to 0 under certain circumstances. This is what everyone except Amazon does. Charging for shipping is entirely understandable. I too love free shipping, but it's actually us that have been spoiled by Amazon. And with Amazon's low prices and 5% cashback I'm pretty sure even if they started charging for shipping that it would be still cheaper than anywhere else ...

pbreit 11y ago

If they were "Prime" you should have gotten free shipping. FBA doesn't matter and I don't know what "eligible for free shipping" is. This story sounds fishy.

jkestner 11y ago
He doesn't have Prime.

Sir_Substance 11y ago

>All the items were eligible for free shipping, according to Amazon. What amazon says on their main page is very disconnected from reality. What it says on checkout is what matters. When I buy stuff from Amazon, they have a little checkbox on the side that says "only items that ship to Iceland". Never the less, when I get to the checkout 90% of the stuff they show won't ship to Iceland.

wodenokoto 11y ago
If that's the case, then it is false advertisement. Don't blame that on the consumer.
- Sir_Substance 11y ago
  Settle down sunshine, I'm warning him and giving him advice on where to get real info, not blaming him. Put your bush laywering back in your pocket.
  - dang 11y ago
    This comment breaks the HN guidelines badly, and you've posted many uncivil comments before this as well. Please stop doing that. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html
    - Sir_Substance 11y ago
      Oh jesus buddy, there's always one of you. If you care that much go find a mod to ban me (or are you a mod? I don't care), and I'll go find some other corner of the internet. You're welcome to slowly turn this place into a dustbowl by bitching at people for having conversations if that's what you enjoy doing in a community, don't let me stop you, but let me remind you of this: You weren't involved in the conversation, and your comment history is nothing but wandering around sticking your nose in robust discussion and whining that people aren't talking to each other via the predefined rules that you like, as if human conversation is based on your two favorite links. You're not contributing here, and there's not a single post in the last several pages of your comments that implies you care about, understand or have an opinion on anything posted here, so please shush and let the rest of us get on with our sharing. edit: http://joshldavis.com/2014/10/03/heavy-handed-hackernews/ http://joshldavis.com/2014/10/03/heavy-handed-hackernews/ Looks like you've been doing this for at least 16 months, congrats or something?