After closing off their Amazon retail site to Australian customers back in July over changes to GST collection on international orders, Amazon has back-flipped and begun offering a limited range of items for sale to Australian customers from their US site.
The range of items is limited however with the US e-tailer announcing this week that they will only be offering products which Amazon stocks and sells itself, not items available from third-party sellers on the Amazon Marketplace.
The change is due to customer feedback said the company in a statement
Earlier this year, Amazon assessed changes to the Australian GST law… and, in order to remain compliant with the legislation, made the difficult decision to suspend exports from our international stores to Australia. Following the announcement of these changes, we listened to the customer feedback and assessed how we could respond. Since that time, our teams have continued to focus their efforts on building the complex infrastructure needed to enable exports of low-value goods to Australia and remain compliant with GST laws.
The ban on sales from third-party sellers may also be lifted soon, with Amazon reportedly investigating how they can comply with Australian law to collect the 10% GST on those items.
A massive disparity exists between the catalogue of items offered by Amazon in the US against the Amazon Australia site which only commenced trading late last year, with a single Victorian based distribution centre, but quickly opened a second Sydney based distribution hub this year.
Amazon offers a large amount of their own stock, however the attraction for many shoppers is in the third-party Amazon Marketplace which offers items at better prices than currently offer here in Australia, so we’ll be watching in anticipation of those items being re-added to the US site.
No Fire Tablet despite being a product that Amazon stocks and sells itself.
Amazon has really damaged their brand here in Australia, the local offering is absolute crap and filled with extremely over priced third party sellers. I used to spend $3-4k a year on Amazon US, I have not bought a single thing from Amazon AU and since they blocked us from the US site I’ve moved on. I make most of that spend on eBay and B&H now. It will take a long time for Amazon to win back Aussie consumers, if it’s not already fatally wounded in this market.
Exactly, in its current state its just a bad version of ebay. Its difficult sometimes to figure out if something is coming locally or from overseas. I havent found any bargains on there either other than the $10 welcome credit.
I also really hate how they dont always have the product reviews on the Aussie site.