Amazon is introducing a new delivery-performance requirement for U.S. seller-fulfilled orders shipped to Amazon Business customers. Beginning September 30, 2026, sellers will need to maintain a Business Hour Delivery Rate of at least 90%. The metric measures the share of seller-fulfilled shipments that reach Amazon Business customers during their operating hours over a rolling 14-day period.
The rule matters because the possible consequence is narrow but commercially meaningful: if a seller is below 90% on September 30, Amazon says it will notify the seller and provide recommendations. If the rate does not improve by October 30, the seller’s offers may be deactivated for Amazon Business customers. Amazon says Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) offers and retail offer eligibility are not affected by this specific requirement.
Amazon’s Seller Central announcement says the goal is to help business customers receive packages securely and on time, with fewer re-delivery attempts. For merchants, the practical task is not simply to watch one score. It is to make sure the delivery promise, carrier choice, cutoff process and exception handling agree with how their B2B orders actually move.
What Amazon changed
The new standard applies to seller-fulfilled shipments in Amazon’s U.S. store when the customer is an Amazon Business customer. Amazon describes Business Hour Delivery Rate as an existing metric that measures delivery during customer operating hours across a rolling 14-day window. The required threshold will be 90% from September 30.
Amazon has also identified several operational levers: reliable carriers, accurate handling and transit times, Automated Handling Time, Shipping Settings Automation and Amazon Buy Shipping. The announcement says shipments fulfilled using all three of those Amazon tools are guaranteed to meet the Business Hour Delivery Rate requirement. That statement is useful, but it should not replace a merchant’s own review of costs, carrier coverage and customer experience.
Why B2B delivery needs a separate operating view
A consumer delivery can often succeed when it reaches a residence at nearly any daytime hour. A business address has a different failure pattern. Receiving hours may be limited; a receptionist, dock team or security desk may be required; and a missed delivery can create a second attempt, delay a job or leave the buyer unsure where the parcel is. The delivery event can therefore be “on time” against a generic transit estimate while still failing the operating-hours expectation that matters to the customer.
That is why this requirement should be treated as a service-design check, not just an account-health alert. A seller with a mixed consumer and B2B catalog should separate its Amazon Business shipments in reporting where possible. Look for recurring combinations of destination type, carrier service, handoff day and SKU. A small cluster of avoidable misses can have more impact on the 14-day score than a broad average suggests.
The dates that should shape the work plan
- Now through September: establish a baseline, identify lanes and carriers that create off-hours deliveries, and decide which process changes are realistic.
- September 30, 2026: Amazon says sellers must be at or above the 90% Business Hour Delivery Rate threshold. Sellers below it will be notified and given recommendations.
- October 30, 2026: Amazon says seller-fulfilled offers may be deactivated for Amazon Business customers if the rate has not improved.
Do not wait for a notice to discover whether the metric is relevant. Amazon directs sellers to Account Health to review Business Hour Delivery Rate. Teams that own shipping operations should make that view part of their weekly control cadence before the effective date.
Start with a 14-day shipment audit
Pull the most recent two weeks of seller-fulfilled Amazon Business shipments and give every record an operational owner. Confirm the promised handling time, ship date, carrier, service level, destination type, delivery date and—where available—whether the delivery landed inside the receiving window. The aim is not to recreate Amazon’s internal calculation. It is to find repeatable causes that are within the merchant’s control.
Look especially at Friday dispatches, rural or hard-to-access commercial addresses, deliveries to campuses or industrial parks, and products that require a non-standard carrier service. Then compare the orders that miss business hours with the promise shown at checkout. If a customer is routinely offered a service that arrives after their building is closed, a faster warehouse handoff alone may not solve the underlying problem.
Match handling settings to the warehouse reality
Amazon points sellers toward accurate handling and transit times. Those settings deserve a fresh review before an automated change is enabled. A warehouse may ship most orders the same day but have later cutoffs for oversized items, made-to-order SKUs or orders routed through a different facility. A single account-level setting can conceal those exceptions and make the customer promise unreliable.
Start by identifying the SKUs and order profiles with consistently different pick, pack or handoff times. Use SKU-specific handling settings when the operational reason is genuine and document who reviews the exceptions. If you use Automated Handling Time, monitor the outcome after enabling it rather than assuming it fits every product mix. The objective is an accurate customer promise that the operation can sustain, not the shortest possible number in a settings screen.
Test carrier decisions against business addresses
Carrier performance is not universal. A service that works well for residential deliveries can behave differently at office parks, warehouses, schools or facilities with receiving windows. Review the delivery patterns by carrier, service and destination segment. Ask the carrier or account representative how business deliveries, appointments, access restrictions and delivery exceptions are handled in your main lanes.
When an issue is concentrated, use a controlled test: change one carrier service or cutoff rule for a defined set of orders, record the expected effect, and review the next 14-day result. Avoid a broad change across all products without a baseline. The added shipping cost, late-shipment implications and buyer experience must be evaluated together.
Use Amazon’s automation tools deliberately
Amazon identifies Automated Handling Time, Shipping Settings Automation and Amazon Buy Shipping as tools that can help sellers meet the new requirement, and it says shipments using all three are guaranteed to satisfy it. That makes the combined workflow worth evaluating for eligible operations. Still, sellers should verify whether the services cover their product constraints, shipping zones and cost model before making them the default.
Assign one person to own the test, another to validate the customer-facing promise, and a third to check financial impact. For a small merchant, those roles may be one person on different days; the point is that delivery configuration should receive an explicit review instead of becoming an unattended setting.
A practical seller checklist
- Open Account Health and record the current Business Hour Delivery Rate before making changes.
- Segment the last 14 days of Amazon Business, seller-fulfilled shipments by carrier, service, destination type and weekday.
- Identify the top recurring reasons deliveries land outside operating hours or require another attempt.
- Reconcile account-level and SKU-level handling times with the warehouse’s actual cutoff and handoff data.
- Run a limited carrier or configuration test for the highest-risk lane; capture cost, promise and delivery outcome.
- Evaluate Amazon Buy Shipping, Shipping Settings Automation and Automated Handling Time together if they fit the operation.
- Review the score weekly through October, with an owner and a written escalation path for a declining result.
The merchant takeaway
This is a targeted rule for U.S. seller-fulfilled Amazon Business orders, not a change to every Amazon offer. But the deadline gives affected sellers a reason to improve a familiar weak point: the gap between a shipping label being created and a business customer actually being able to receive the package. Merchants that make the delivery promise operationally honest now will be better positioned to protect their Amazon Business availability when the requirement begins.
For the complete rule and Amazon’s current guidance, review the official Seller Central announcement.