Amazon’s passkey rollout ends the shared-login workaround
The problem is not the passkey itself. It is every employee, agency, and virtual assistant still using the same primary Seller Central credentials when Amazon activates the requirement. Amazon is notifying sellers that passkeys become mandatory on a rolling, account-specific basis beginning in late September.
What Changed
- Users sign in with a fingerprint, facial recognition, or device PIN.
- Passwords remain available for account recovery, but not regular login after activation.
- Amazon recommends registering passkeys on at least two devices.
- Anyone sharing the primary login must be added as a separate secondary user with individual credentials and permissions.
Why It Matters
A shared login can stop working with little warning once the account enters the rollout. That can lock agencies, employees, and Q4 support staff out of advertising, inventory, customer service, and account-health workflows.
What Is Not Changing
Seller Central User Permissions remain the proper way to provide access. Existing secondary users still need to configure their own passkeys, but the account owner does not need to share a device or passkey with them.
What to Do Now: Immediate operational check
- Inventory everyone who accesses each Seller Central account.
- Replace shared credentials with named secondary users.
- Confirm permissions against actual responsibilities.
- Register at least two recovery devices for the account owner.
- Document who controls the primary email, phone number, and recovery process.
- Test agency and employee access before Amazon activates the requirement.
Bigger Picture Signal
Amazon is moving Seller Central access from shared credentials toward individual identity and device-level authentication. Access governance is becoming an operational requirement, not just a security preference.
Sources: Amazon starts requiring Seller Central passkeys – Amazon seller email repost
October 6 becomes a three-retailer traffic collision
Amazon, Walmart, and Target are concentrating their October promotional events into the same week. Amazon and Target directly overlap on October 6 and 7, while Walmart runs from October 5 through October 11.
What Changed
- Amazon Prime Big Deal Days runs October 6 and 7.
- Amazon introduces three daily deal drops at midnight, 8 a.m., and 1 p.m. Pacific.
- Alexa for Shopping can monitor prices, send deal alerts, and automatically purchase a selected product when it reaches the shopper’s target price.
- Walmart’s event runs October 5 through October 11.
- Target Circle Deal Days run October 6 and 7, with select early access for Circle 360 members.
- Amazon extended Best Deal and Lightning Deal submissions through September 22.
- Prime Exclusive Discounts can be submitted until 12 hours before the event ends.
- Prime Big Deal Days promotional pricing is excluded from Amazon’s Black Friday and Cyber Monday lookback window.
Why It Matters
Brands are competing for inventory, advertising budget, and customer attention across three retailers at once. Waiting to move budget after one platform underperforms may be too slow when the highest-intent traffic concentrates into the same 48 hours.
Amazon’s timed deal drops also create multiple demand surges instead of one event launch. Inventory and advertising pacing need to account for three merchandising windows each day.
What Is Not Changing
Each retailer still operates its own eligibility, inventory, pricing, and promotional rules. Participation on Amazon does not create placement on Walmart or Target, and inventory cannot be shifted between channels once the event begins.
What to Do Now: Immediate operational check
Submit eligible Amazon Best Deals and Lightning Deals by September 22. Finalize channel-level inventory, promotional pricing, PDP readiness, ad budgets, branded defense, and daily pacing rules this week. Protect enough inventory and budget for Black Friday and Cyber Monday instead of treating October as the entire holiday season.
Bigger Picture Signal
The holiday calendar is compressing. Major retailers are no longer waiting for November to compete for peak-season demand.
Sources: Prime Big Deal Days returns October 6–7 – Amazon extends the deal-submission deadline – Walmart, Target and Amazon announce October deal events
FedEx adds another international shipping charge before peak season
FedEx’s new international demand surcharges take effect September 21 and remain in place until further notice. The per-pound charges affect imports into the United States from Canada, Europe, China, Hong Kong, India, Latin America, and several additional markets.
What Changed
Selected US-bound surcharges include:
- Canada: $0.14 per pound.
- Europe and Israel: $0.25 per pound.
- China, Hong Kong, and Macau: $0.54 to $0.91 per pound.
- India: $0.89 per pound.
- Several Asia-Pacific markets: $0.54 to $0.73 per pound.
- US exports to several major regions also receive a $0.30-per-pound surcharge.
The final charge varies by origin and service level.
Why It Matters
These fees arrive on top of tariffs, fuel charges, and previously announced holiday surcharges. A 40-pound priority shipment from China can incur an additional $22.40 before fuel surcharges, creating meaningful landed-cost exposure for heavier products and expedited replenishment.
What Is Not Changing
The surcharge does not apply uniformly to every FedEx shipment. Domestic parcels and unaffected origin-service combinations follow their existing rates.
What to Do Now: Immediate operational check
Review shipments scheduled from September 21 forward by origin, service level, and chargeable weight. Update landed-cost models and compare economy, express, air, and ocean options before approving emergency Q4 replenishment.
Bigger Picture Signal
Cross-border transportation costs remain volatile enough that brands need shipment-level cost modeling, not quarterly freight assumptions.
Source: FedEx levies fees on US imports from Canada, Europe and others
Skip the Scroll: Ecommerce Updates That Matter in 10 Minutes
The latest episode of Selling on Giants: Weekly eCommerce News & Updates covers the marketplace and retail developments that could affect your Q4 planning:
🎧 Listen now on Buzzsprout or watch on YouTube.
- Prime Big Deal Days, Target Circle Deal Days, and Walmart’s October promotion
- Amazon advertising during deal season
- Quebec’s French-language packaging requirements
- Amazon blocks Meta’s Muse AI shopping agent
- Pinterest’s new Visual Search Ads
- Gen Z and AI
- FedEx international surcharges and continued retail spending
Walmart turns Listing Quality into a catalog-wide workflow
Walmart now generates personalized Listing Quality recommendations across a seller’s catalog. Sellers can pair those recommendations with bulk spreadsheet updates instead of reviewing and correcting each listing individually.
What Changed
- Seller Center identifies listing improvement opportunities across the catalog.
- Recommendations are personalized to the seller’s items.
- Sellers can use bulk spreadsheets to address multiple recommendations at once.
- Walmart positions the tool as a way to improve Listing Quality scores while reducing manual work.
Why It Matters
Large catalogs often contain missing attributes, incomplete content, and inconsistent product data that never receive attention because listing reviews happen one item at a time. The new workflow makes it easier to prioritize high-impact catalog corrections before peak traffic arrives.
What Is Not Changing
A higher Listing Quality score does not guarantee better rankings, Buy Box ownership, or conversion. Price competitiveness, fulfillment speed, reviews, availability, and advertising still influence performance.
What to Do Now: Light preparation recommended
Export the recommendations and group them by issue type. Prioritize high-revenue items, promoted products, and listings participating in October deals before addressing the long tail. Review bulk updates before uploading them so Walmart’s recommendations do not overwrite stronger brand copy or accurate attributes.
Bigger Picture Signal
Walmart is shifting catalog optimization from individual listing maintenance toward automated, portfolio-level management.
Source: Get personalized recommendations to improve your listings at scale
Amazon’s Prime settlement expands to more customers and larger refunds
A federal court has approved expanded consumer redress under Amazon’s 2025 Prime settlement. Amazon has already distributed more than $845 million, and automatic payments to an additional group of consumers begin October 1.
What Changed
- The maximum total consumer payment rises from $51 to $200.
- Consumers who used between 11 and 20 Prime benefits during a qualifying period can now receive refunds.
- Future payments become automatic, removing the claims process.
- Additional payments of up to $149 may begin by April 2027 if earlier payments do not meet the settlement threshold.
Why It Matters
This does not change seller operations, but it shows where regulatory pressure is landing. The focus is moving from financial penalties toward automatic consumer reimbursement and more restrictive oversight of enrollment and cancellation practices.
What Is Not Changing
The settlement does not alter FBA eligibility, Prime badge requirements, seller fees, or marketplace policies. Sellers do not fund or administer the refund program.
What to Do Now: No action required, monitor only
Watch for secondary changes to Prime enrollment messaging, subscription programs, and cancellation workflows. Brands running Subscribe & Save or other recurring-purchase programs should continue using clear enrollment and cancellation language.
Bigger Picture Signal
Regulators increasingly expect platforms to make customer restitution automatic. That standard may eventually influence subscription, membership, and recurring-order practices across ecommerce.
Source: FTC announces additional payments from Amazon Prime settlement
Amazon blocks Meta’s shopping agent, opening a new fight over who controls AI commerce
Amazon blocked Meta’s new Muse AI agent from shopping on Amazon, saying the agent accessed its store without authorization, did not properly identify itself and raised concerns around customer credentials. Meta has maintained that Muse cannot access sensitive login or payment information.
What Changed
Consumers using Muse can no longer have the agent complete Amazon shopping tasks. Amazon has taken similar positions against other external AI agents that attempt to browse or transact on its platform.
Why It Matters
The next commerce gatekeeper may be the AI agent deciding which products a customer sees before the customer ever reaches a marketplace. But this dispute shows that marketplaces intend to control which agents can access their catalogs, customer accounts and checkout systems.
For sellers, that could determine whether products are visible inside third-party AI experiences and whether those agents can complete a purchase.
What Is Not Changing
There is no new Seller Central rule or immediate seller action. Customers can still shop through Amazon’s approved experiences, including Amazon’s own AI discovery tools.
What to Do Now
Action: Monitor. Track where referral traffic and assisted conversions originate. Keep product information consistent across Amazon, your own storefront and any approved feeds so external discovery does not depend entirely on access to Amazon.
Bigger Picture Signal
Agentic commerce is becoming a platform-control battle over product data, customer relationships, attribution and checkout.
Source: Amazon blocks Meta’s Muse AI agent
TeamPassword