It seems that expiration dates on products are one of the areas that keep sellers confused and in the dark. Many sellers choose to just avoid products that have expiration dates all together just because they don’t know what to do with them. Today, I would like to share some of my tips on making the best of items with expirations. First, let’s go over the rules that Amazon has set in place for selling items with expirations.
- A product that has an expiration date may be listed with FBA as long as the unit is lot-controlled and the remaining shelf life is greater than 90 days from the time of receipt by Amazon.
- Units that are within 50 days of the expiration date will be removed for disposal by Amazon.
- Units that are disposed of will not be available for return.
This means that when you are sending products into Amazon fulfillment centers, they have to be checked in and still have more than 90 days left on the shelf life. If you are cutting it close, you will want to account for time for the item to ship to Amazon as well as time for it to be fully checked in. The items must sell before there is less than 50 days left on the shelf life. Once there is less than 50 days left, Amazon will dispose of the products and you can not get them back after that point. When I am scouting for items, I keep a 4 month time frame in mind. That way I have enough time to get the items shipped out to Amazon as well as plenty of time for them to sell before being removed. Since it is July now, I am looking for products that expire later than November (even though technically mid October would work). You just never know if you will get the shipment right out, or if there will be delays when it hits the warehouse. So, better safe than sorry. Products that can expire must have the expiration date printed on the master carton in 36+ pt font AND on individual/retail display unit.
- Expiration dates must be displayed in the format MM-DD-YYYY. If the expiration date is printed in a different format, a sticker with the correct format must be applied, covering the original expiration date. Lot numbers alone are insufficient.
- Note: Products that are printed with a “manufactured date” must have this date covered and labeled with an Expiration date in the above format. Failure to cover the manufactured date on a product may cause delays in receiving your products, or may cause your products to be received as “Expired.”
The first line of this rule is actually a little confusing when you read it. The word AND makes it seem like the individual products need 36pt font expiration dates. BUT, if you watch the video Amazon has provided, it clearly states that only the master carton needs 36pt font and the individual items need to be “human readable”. This is 36 point font, not too feasible for small items right? The next point is very important. They want all of the dates to be in the format of MM-DD-YYYY. So, if the product you are sending in, does not have that format, you would need to add a new label to it so it matches the format above. If an item has a lot code, or manufacturer date, you need to do a little bit of homework! You need to call the manufacturer or check their website to find out what the actual expiration date is for the item in question and then add it to the product. If you don’t feel up to figuring out the dates, it is best to just skip products without a clearly labeled expiration date.
Here is the last section of the rules for expiration dates:
Products that expire and are contained in packaging that requires additional prep, such as glass jars or bottles, must be prepped to ensure that the expiration date is accessible for Amazon associates during the receive process.
- You are required to include the expiration date on the outside of the prepped product. The expiration date must be printed on a label in a human-readable font, in the required format, MM-DD-YYYY. For example, if the product is bubble wrapped and the barcode is obscured and no longer scannable, a label with the expiration date must be placed on the outside of the bubble wrap along with the product label.
- Units that are labeled with the incorrect expiration date may lead to increased customer returns for your units, or negative customer reviews.
- Failure to include the expiration date on the outside of the prepped unit may cause the unit to be relabeled at your cost.
This comes into play when you are doing multipacks of items because you need to put the expiration date on the outside of the packaging. Or, if you are bubble wrapping an item, then you would need to have the date on the outside of the product. If you don’t do this, Amazon can either refuse the items, or charge you for labeling them for you. I print out sheets of labels that say: Best By: __/__/____. Then I fill in the blanks with the appropriate date. You need to make sure that you print in a way that can be read by anyone. Some people have very hard to read handwriting, so it may be hard to read. Or, that really bubbly writing might be to hard to read. If you have those types of handwriting, it would be best for you to print the date with the printer. I use the same Avery Address labels that are used for printing the Amazon product labels. Avery 5160 Labels. Here is the template that I use for the dates: Best By Template Here is the video that Amazon has made to help understand expiration dates: I hope that I was able to explain some of the rules to make them easier to understand and not so “scary”. In my next post, I will give some of the ways that you can keep track of the expiration dates for your items, so you don’t have any go bad before selling.
**All of the content above in orange, was taken directly from the Amazon help pages here**
What about products that just have “Expires 10-2013” ? How should that be labeled?
Shirley, in that case, it would be 10/01/2013. When there is no day of the month, it always defaults to the first of that month.
I have been labeling everything for the LAST day of the month if it was MM/YEAR. I’m glad I read this!!
I’ve been using the last day of the month also! .. Jessica, Curious – do you use the the first to be conservative good seller or is this from direction from Amazon?
I just read the entire blog… see the answer at bottom on why you use the 1st as the date! Sorry for repeat qeustion 🙂 I am very curious – How do you manage tracking your items’ expiration dates… For example if one is coming up soon better to lower price than get a returned expired item?
I put the expiration dates in the comments section so I can check it while repricing. If it gets to 60 days I start to lower the price. Some money back is better than none 🙂
This is what I was told to do by Amazon
Thanks so must Jessica
The template helped so much. And it is a little clearer now.
You are a great help to everyone. Thank you.
Edie
When you say master carton, does that mean the box I shipped everything in? Let’s say I send in a box of loose candy bars. The candy bars have a human readable expiration date on them, then I put the 36 pt font sticker on the shipping box??
A master carton is from the factory originally. So, if the loose bars were in a manufacturer box then it would need to say it on there. Because the warehouse would just keep them all in that box until they sell.
Gotcha. So if I just sent in loose candy bars without the manufacturers box, I would need to label each one?
You only need to label them if the date is not easy to read on the individual bars, or if they are in the wrong format.
Thank you for your article! I just bought some food products this morning and need to label and prep them correctly. This is so helpful. Thank you also for the expiration date template.
A very helpful post! Thank you so much! I will now do this correctly–oops!
Thank you for the article, Jessica! It clears up a lot of confusion I was having! Plus the template is great! I only want to mention, though, for anyone else that might be having trouble with printing the labels, is that they print correctly on the address label sheet if you uncheck the “Fit to page” option in the print dialogue box.
Thanks Jessica for the article and especially for the Amazon link. I was surprised to see that the date format (MM-DD-YYYY) was different from the one that I have been using (MM-DD-YYYY or MM-YYYY) which is given here: https://sellercentral.amazon.com/gp/help/help-page.html/ref=ag_201003420_cont_scsearch?ie=UTF8&itemID=201003420
It also states “The expiration date must be printed on a label in a human-readable font, in the required format, MM-DD-YYYY or MM-YYYY’ so it’s not clear if hand-written labels are allowed. For those with Dymo printers, it is very easy to set up a template in the desk-top software and simply edit it each time with the correct date.
Again thanks for the helpful content that you publish here. It is greatly appreciated.
Darwin
This is really helpful information. I was unsure that I would ever figure out the expiration-date thing (and decided to shy away from anything with a date…period)
But maybe now I can reconsider.
Jessica,
Thank you! You are contributing a priceless world of assets to the FBA’ers of the world. Kudos to ya, gal ! Keep up the good work 😉 !
This is an entirely new section of products for me, so excuse my simple question: what does lot-controlled mean?
It is when the manufacturer just puts a code on the product instead of an expiration date.
If there is ever a problem with it, they can let people know based on the lot code. It can tell them things like the date it was made, or which plant it was at.
Jessica, I had a debate with a friend over expiration dates and ended up calling three companies to find out what the actual expiration date for a item labeled 10/2013. All three said it was the last day of the month.
Hi Shirley! I’ve also heard both ways for the dates. Although, wen I asked amazon directly they told me to use the first day of the month. Which is why I do it this way 🙂
Hi Jessica,
I hope this question hasn’t been answered, but I was wondering if you could help me out with something. We recently were informed by Amazon that one of our product was expired. We were able to get the product back. When we got it, the date was clearly Dec 2014, no where near expired, but it had been sent in Sept 2013. I was wondering if you knew how amazon decides to remove products and how something like this might happen?
Thanks so much for your help 🙂
My guess would be that they misread the label. The format they would like is MM/DD/YYYY if it isn’t in that format, I would add a label to it with that format and re send it in 🙂
What happens when you have a product without a limited shelf-life? I called the manufacturer with the lot number and was told it does not expire. It’s a face cream. I learned the product was manufactured over three years ago, though. Can I send it in with no exp date label?
Thanks in advance!
I am sending dietary supplement to fba. the manufacturer of the product has include the expiration date as :-
02-2017
So can i send the product as it is without relabeling it with correct format?
Please help…….
Yes, it should be fine.
Hi Jessica,
Would an item like this require an expiration date on the product?
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00B4201PW/ref=im_xx_cont_xx
The product has a lot number on it but doesn’t have expiration date info. Would you call up the company just in case or do these types of products normally not have expiration dates?
Thanks!
What is the Expiration date Policy for Merchant fulfilled?
is that also 50 days?
I cannot get a clear answer.
In regards to expiration I have went back and forth with Amazon in the last week or so. It seems either the policy has changed or the 2 reps I have emailed don’t fully understand. My issue was because I had some grocery items that were 60 days from expiration and Amazon marked them as unfulfillable. note: I have read and re-read the policy many times and it is a bit vague on what happens between the 50 and 90 day mark. Here was the latest response I received from Amazon:
“Upon investigation I found that a product that has an expiration date may be listed with FBA as long as the unit is lot-controlled and the remaining shelf life is greater than 90 days from the time of receipt by Amazon. Units that are within 50 days of the expiration date will be removed for disposal by Amazon. If an item has 90 days left for expiration then the item will go under unfulfillable. Until 50 days of expiration sellers has to create removal orders to take the item back, after which the items (if not taken back by the seller) it automatically gets disposed.”
Ughh…..
Hi Jessica,
I have read an expires date format, I bit confuse with this statement “Each cartoon can only have one expiration date per ASIN. Multiple ASINs can be shipped in the same cartoon as long as each ASIN has only one expiration date.” whether that mean we must put ASIN & expire date onto one label or separate on the master?
Please advise.
Thanks, Novi
Hi Novi,
If you are shipping a multi-packed item and the items have different expiration dates, you have to label on the outside of the packaging the date that is “closest” to expiring.
Hi Jessica,
I have put the FNSKU barcode in every unit item, should I put ASIN/UPC barcode in every box?
Please advise.
Thanks, Novi