
Amazon’s UK FBA operations will be split from the EU - raattgift
https://tamebay.com/2020/07/amazon-fba-brexit-bombshell-efn-and-pan-european-fba-ends-for-uk.html
======
intsunny
I fail to see the "bombshell" here. This is what everyone expected when
leaving the EU single market.

The only bombshell would be if the UK negotiators managed to prevent a hard
Brexit. Given the current track record of their leading political party, this
seems unlikely.

~~~
SideburnsOfDoom
In context of Brexit, the inevitable consequences of the UK's actions is quite
often a "bombshell" to the UK. The denial is strong.

~~~
headmelted
This. You really have to be here to believe the extent to which the average
Joe on the street believes they'll be able to have their cake and eat it after
this is settled.

What's bizarre is that when challenged on how ridiculous that is, they'll
immediately accept it as rational before saying "well we voted out anyway so
it doesn't matter".

~~~
eeh
Is it the average Joe, or is it the 95th percentile idiot that happens to get
attention?

~~~
rsynnott
Polling has repeatedly shown very widespread public confusion over what Brexit
will actually do. Even many remain voters don’t realise all the downsides.

~~~
eeh
> Polling has repeatedly shown very widespread public confusion over what
> Brexit will actually do.

I can believe that.

> Even many remain voters don’t realise all the downsides.

I can believe that, but what makes the confusion one-way? i.e. do leave voters
realise all the upsides?

~~~
rsynnott
I mean, not being funny, but, what upsides?

The upsides of Brexit are generally, at best, very subjective and ephemeral
(‘sovereignty’ in the sense of passport colour change) or outright imaginary
(the EU is banning kettles and jam).

~~~
eeh
As a remain voter, I'm not best to advocate for the strengths of leave. As I'm
sure you're aware, debate between remain and leave is difficult.
Characterising sovereignty concerns as "passport colour change" won't start
the conversation on the right path, however.

[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29607906-why-vote-
leave](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29607906-why-vote-leave) was a good
book for understanding some benefits of Leave.

Please don't discredit the positions or the book solely from my my hazy memory
of the book, but here goes:

* EU is a weakening trade bloc, so we're better off out of the customs union, and making trade deals that work for UK, rather than that work for the EU (example: cheaper tomatoes from Africa, that the EU will not make, since it'll make Spain/Italy worse off)

* UK's voting patterns within EU was anomolous: UK voted against policies far more than other countries anyway.

* UK public seems to have a max acceptable rate of immigration, and we may prefer more selective immigration policies (e.g. target the high skilled workers in India, China, Australia)

Those are meant to pique your interest in the book. I don't think starting a
debate on HN will be productive, at least because I barely remember the book.

~~~
rsynnott
> Characterising sovereignty concerns as "passport colour change" won't start
> the conversation on the right path, however.

By that I meant that the Brexiter conception of sovereignty is heavily based
on surface symbolism; the archetypical Brexiter is fine with taking US rules
on food safety, in which they have no voice in making, if it means they can
change the colour of the passport (which, of course, they could do within the
EU anyway, but never mind). That is, Brexit is not generally actually
concerned with sovereignty in any real sense, and Brexit Britain will lose
control, not gain it.

~~~
eeh
By responding solely to a minor part of my comment, and doubling down on your
caricatures, I don't think you're willing to actually discuss this.

------
acd
This is an example why exiting global cooperation such as the European Union
is bad for the economy. Another side effect may be that For example the real
estate market in London goes lower due to less foreign professionals competing
for housing. Plus the price of vegetable at the supermarket will be higher due
to more expensive imports from Holland the gardeners of Europe and Spanish
fruits being more expensive. There is a benefit less carbon emissions from
transport. Amazon selling less may be good for the local economy in that local
producer can sell more local made products. Consumers will be hurt as they can
buy less goods for the same amount of money.

As a European I hope UK will want to rejoin the EU. This will take time. I see
price inflation in UK due to less foreign trade will lead to price increases.
Inflation will make central banks raise interest rates which will make it more
expensive with mortgages. I guess this was not the story UK brexit politicans
sold to the UK people. And yes less income less income to UK national health
service in form of taxes which was also not what was sold by politicians. Hope
UK will rejoin EU soon. Frankly post Covid-19 the question is if UK can afford
to exit EU.

~~~
toyg
_> As a European I hope UK will want to rejoin the EU._

As a European living in the UK, no mate, you really don't want these folks to
rejoin. Their class system is pathological and their mass-media are
fundamentally corrupt. I say this against my best interests, but England in
particular should never be allowed back in. They made their bed and they
should lie in it.

~~~
easytiger
I hear Italy is an enlightened political paradise with ample job creation and
flawless social structures. No wonder you are so enlightened to make these
entirely rational remarks

Can you list what interaction you've had with the "class system" in the UK? Is
the media in your home country any different? What about the media is
"corrupt"?

~~~
toyg
I have kids and live in an area where the class divisions are pretty stark.
Italy has many problems, but at least they don’t enforce classism (and
religious separation, which inevitably becomes ethnic division too) from
primary-school age.

As for media, UK tabloids are beyond the pale. Nowhere on the continent I’ve
ever seen a situation where most of the population is bombarded every day by
outright racism and hate. The British upper classes make a joke of it (the
“daily heil” etc), because they think it doesn’t really affect them - which is
only true until it isn’t, and eventually you get a “brexit moment” when
chickens come home to roost. In Italy, newspapers can be partisan or
influenced by industrial interests like anywhere else, but tabloid-like hate-
speech can only be found in a well-defined small minority of titles. You don’t
have a Murdoch-like figure - Berlusconi had his moment and was dealt with like
any other political figure. The revolving door between journalism and politics
is much worse in the UK, because most people employed in both fields come
effectively from the same few classes. You have journalist wives writing
excuses for their politician husbands, and nobody bats an eyelid. Somebody
like Boris Johnson is free to write lies for decades until he gets where he
wants to get.

UK tv is better, I’ll give you that, and the BBC is excellent at being the
last bastion of decency in a depressing landscape.

~~~
easytiger
> I have kids and live in an area where the class divisions are pretty stark

How do you mean? I was asking for an illustration of the "class system" that
you find oppressing to your person.

> most of the population is bombarded every day by outright racism and hate.

Well that's not true is it.

> The British upper classes make a joke of it

What might be considered Victorian upper class constitutes practically no one.
If you don't like the media don't consume it.

Honestly I do not understand this unhealthy fixation on class that you have
and frankly reject your assertions regarding it. At a guess you are using it
as a simplification to understand a landscape you can't fully understand
without it.

~~~
DanBC
Class is still a big thing in the UK:
[https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/mar/25/too-poor-
to-p...](https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/mar/25/too-poor-to-play-
children-in-social-housing-blocked-from-communal-playground)

~~~
easytiger
I don't think you understand what class is. I'm familiar with the above story
and it is beyond nonsense.

A communal facility maintained and paid for by some people doesn't necessarily
have to be made available to anyone else.

If your back garden was in sight of someone living in social housing ought
they be able to make use of your property?

~~~
rich_sasha
Something like 60% of people going to Oxbridge went to private schools,
despite 93% attending state schools, and this is after decades of campaigns,
outreach, and adjusting entry criteria by school type. And this is new, the
fraction from state schools used to be more like 10-20% if that in living
memory.

That’s just one example of class.

------
m0xte
I’m in the UK. I can see this is going to mean a huge chunk of products
disappearing from amazon here. A lot of stuff I order comes from Europe. So
supply chain problems for months here we come!

Fun times ahead. And no I didn’t vote for this shit show.

~~~
ChuckNorris89
At least now you get to keep those 350 million GBP a week. /s

~~~
smcl
I really wish someone bothered to hold his feet to the fire on that one. He
just got to chuckle and shrug it off, and the reaction from most seems to be
“lol oh that’s our Boris”

~~~
ChuckNorris89
The way my British friends told me, nobody really took the brexit vote
seriously and treated it like a Lord Buckethead, Boaty McBoat Face joke.

At least until the mic dropped and the consequences of their joke vote became
clear.

~~~
dariosalvi78
They confirmed they wanted Brexit in the last elections. They had no excuses
when Boris was elected. If that is what people want, that is what people
deserve.

~~~
rwmj
That's more a consequence of our terrible electoral system combined with the
most incompetent / most poisonous opposition leader ever.

~~~
threatofrain
From the outside it looks as if Brexit is at most slightly unpopular, so it's
not unimaginable to believe that in fluctuation we might occasionally find it
to be the marginally popular position.

------
Havoc
Exiting single market means no longer being in the single market. Who could
have predicted that?

This whole thing is an embarrassing own goal

~~~
d4rti
Dan Hannan and a bunch of the other dishonest brexiteers deliberately misled
people into thinking they could be.

~~~
corty
It is a politician's modus operandi/job to mislead in order to achieve
political goals. It would have been the job of the press to point out the
problems and the job of the public to form a qualified opinion.

Only the politicians did their jobs, unfortunately...

(And yes, I'm a cynic)

~~~
pjc50
The press were largely campaigning for Brexit. Including one of the highest
paid journalists in the entire campaign, Boris Johnson.

~~~
corty
The press pushing an agenda for either side and not remaining an impartial
observer is a huge part of the problem, not only with Brexit.

I'm not sure if in former times the press was just as opinionated and noone
noticed. But now, people notice that the press isn't impartial and therefore
just do not trust even the rare instances of impartial facts being presented.

~~~
pjc50
British press has never really pretended to be impartial; the Daily Mail under
Lord Rothermere ran pro-Hitler editorial until the war broke out.

(My point about Johnson was that he was genuinely paid more for a while as a
Times "columnist" than as Prime Minister)

~~~
rjsw
He was most recently a Telegraph columnist, he was sacked from the Times.

------
gdrift
BFA (Fulfilment by Amazon) EFN (European Fulfilment Network)

~~~
bufferoverflow
FBA, not BFA.

------
Reason077
So stupid! The UK voted to keep Europeans from coming over here and taking our
jobs and seducing our women with their sophisticated accents. There was
nothing about blocking European goods and European fulfilment centres. Boris
Johnson even assured us that it was going to be easy to get a "great deal" on
free trade. This is not the Brexit we voted for!!

~~~
williamgrant
> The UK voted to keep Europeans from coming over here and taking our jobs and
> our women with their sophisticated accents.

This comment expresses an appalling amount of xenophobia and classism. This
warped, cartoonish portrayal of "Brexit" voters on HN is not unexpected, but
it is disappointing it seems to escape moderation.

~~~
nickserv
Pretty sure OP is being sarcastic.

~~~
thatguy0900
He knows it's sarcastic, he said it's a cartoonish portrayal of brexit voters

~~~
monodeldiablo
I'd have thought so, too... except that I regularly speak with Brexiters.
Cognitive dissonance is very real.

------
Ambroos
This is not going to be fun for Ireland. Ireland doesn't have its own regional
Amazon, but the UK one would have great fast shipping. I wonder if shipping
from Amazon DE or FR will be more popular in the future.

~~~
netcan
There are services that take delivery in newry (northern ireland) and deliver
to dublin. Presumably, they'll still work. Shipping to ireland often costs
more anyway, and not everything ships outside the UK.

~~~
Symbiote
I don't know how it would work, but the legal border of the EU customs union
would be the NI/RoI border, but with some extra paperwork meaning, in
practise, the border is the Irish Sea.

Maybe asking a friend in Belfast to forward a parcel to Dublin will continue
without any checks, but a parcel forwarding service is unlikely to go
unnoticed.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brexit_and_the_Irish_border#20...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brexit_and_the_Irish_border#2019_renegotiation:_New_Protocol)

~~~
netcan
I'll bet a fiver it will.

------
AnssiH
> In reality you might find impacts of the Amazon FBA Brexit bombshell start
> to impact you earlier. For instance, if you already have stock in Pan-
> European FBA it is feasible that Amazon will repatriate your stock before
> the end of the year and certainly are likely to stop sending your stock to
> Europe at an earlier date.

I am very sceptical that they would do something like above, as there does not
seem to be any reason to do so:

\- Amazon encourages you to have stock on both sides of the border to allow
selling to continue as-is after the transition - repatriating stock
automatically would run counter to that.

\- There is no legal reason to repatriate stock. The sellers that use Pan-
European fulfillment already have to be VAT-registered in all countries that
hold their stock, and those registrations will continue to be valid regardless
of the EU membership of the seller's home country.

\- Amazon has not communicated that it is planning to do so (it has only said
that it will stop transfers and fulfillment cross-border on 2021-01-01).

~~~
raattgift
There is no agreement between the negotiators as yet on the repatriation of
"stranded" goods after 1 January; the default will depend on any tax
agreements between each of the member-states and the UK, virtually all of
which pre-date the Single Market Act, and many of which predate the Single
European Act (which will cease to grant any rights or impose any obligations
on the UK at the end of this year).

In general it is likely that moving goods of any sort -- including one's own
personal property -- from a member-state to the UK will from 1 January incur
formalities, with a risk of substantial financial liability to the UK's
revenue & customs agency by the UK person importing the goods even if that
person is conceptually "re-importing" property.

Amazon also will want relief from liability under the law of bailment in
England & Wales, and other specific contractual and statutory liability to the
UK persons using the systems discussed in the article. The most obvious way to
do that is for Amazon ("the bailee") to return the goods to any vendor in
England or Wales ("the bailor"). The most obvious time to do that is well
before 1 January after which either Amazon is exposed direct liability for
import formalities or indirect liability to the (England-and-Wales) bailor.

Another obvious approach is to convince the bailors to waive their rights,
effectively writing off their interest in the goods that are in the EU in
Amazon's control, possibly for some financial consideration. However, Amazon
cannot be certain that it can sell on any such goods because there is as yet
no agreement on e.g. Origin (and documentation via certificate of origin)
requirements, nor on the continued validity of safety marks and other product
labelling. Although it's unlikely that anyone seriously wants existing
arrangements to suddenly halt at the end of this year, there remains a risk
that a substantial number of UK-sourced goods in the EU prior to the end of
December may simply become unsellable in the single market in January (I am
less sure about goods (esp. "Mode 5") sourced in the non-EU SM member-states
or states that are non-EU&non-SM members of the European Customs Union (EUCU),
or the bilateral CU states, and unfortunately somewhat failed at avoiding the
trap of calling it all "EU" in this comment, and the trap of thinking the
legal positions are _probably_ homogeneous, i.e., there won't be operative
side-deals between UK and Turkey before the end of December).

One very open set of questions involves "Mode 5" goods, wherein services are
bundled with physical items. That includes warranties and guarantees for
repairs, upgrade support including the upgrading of software that controls the
physical items' operations, subscriptions bundled in with electronic book
readers or the like, access to App Stores and similar. So far the UK
government in particular has been focused on _goods_ , not on services,
including "Mode 5" services.

Flipping things around, Single Market vendors with bailments in England (and
Wales) may be unable to guarantee the continuation of "Mode 5" commitments on
goods in E&W. In E&W the _retailer_ would be liable for making good on those
commitments or on making the retail customer whole (e.g. by issuing a refund
or replacement). FBA does not provide clear legal immunity from retail
liability in E&W, and it is easy to imagine litigation brought by e.g. the
Consumers Association and other bodies under the super-complaints procedure in
the (UK) Enterprise Act 2002 if FBA goods purchased after 1 January cannot
have software upgrades or lose access to SM-based customer support. (They are
likely safe from liability for such goods if sold _before_ the end of this
year.)

(The law is somewhat different, and in relevant ways, in Scotland and Northern
Ireland, but going into that would take too many characters :-) )

ETA: the issue here is the law of frustration of contract -- the expiration of
the transition period in the withdrawal agreement may create _frustrations_
notwithstanding careful drafting of contracts, and one possible result of a
frustrated FBA contract is that the goods in question become _involuntary
bailments_ with Amazon as the bailee. This is a concrete risk for goods
managed under contract with entities outside the UK.

Single Market sellers with goods pre-positioned in the UK would by default
have access to UK courts if needed to exercise (or clarify) their rights as
involuntary bailors. Thus it is possibly in Amazon UK's interests to move SM-
vendor goods from the UK to an Amazon EU facility in the Single Market or
return it to the SM-based person who is the vendor, and to do so before the
end of the year and with the consent of the SM vendors.

------
tannhaeuser
Of all things implied by Brexit, making business harder for AMZN and their
sellers might end up boosting UK retail. Or maybe not, as everyone has to do
the customs themselves. To me, characterizing this as a "bombshell" sounds
like satire, ie mocking a proverbial Brexiteer sitting at home all day and
ordering things on Amazon. OTOH, it's not plausible that this undertone
could've been missed by Brits of all people.

------
viraptor
Does anyone know what could be a specific reason leading to this change? I
mean, deeper than "no single market", what would prevent Amazon from running
the same operation, potentially with slightly higher fees to offset relevant
transport/import taxes. They ran marketplaces at crazy prices before, like
shipping to Australia before local distribution centres.

~~~
Hamuko
Doesn't Amazon not deliver to Switzerland or something? I think I heard that
Swiss people for example can't order from Amazon.co.jp. Meanwhile I can order
from Amazon.co.jp to Finland and Amazon (or DHL) handles everything from
shipping to VAT and to customs declaration.

~~~
CaptainZapp
I could be off, but here's what I recall:

A couple years ago Switzerland changed the rules that companies shipping to
Switzerland must collect and administer Swiss VAT and companies the size of
Amazon said fuck it! and thus don't ship from the US any more. I suspect that
the same goes for Amazon Japan.

~~~
nottorp
Weird... in Romania, I can order from Amazon US with expedited shipping and
they'll charge me for VAT and DHL will handle customs for me.

Or I can order with slow cheap shipping and stand in line and pay VAT myself
at the post office.

Either way, they will (mostly) ship. What's different with Switzerland?

------
webscout
Near a UK fulfilment center ca. 2031:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJ2Sgd9sc0M](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJ2Sgd9sc0M)

------
wayanon
...brexiteers please remind me how this benefits the UK ?...

~~~
cm2187
One immediate benefit. Not being on the hook for that shitshow:

[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/18/eu-leaders-
rec...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/18/eu-leaders-reconvene-
after-stormy-talks-over-750bn-recovery-package)

------
topbanana
It'd be more noticeable if Chinese imports were curbed

------
wayanon
..remind me how this is good for the UK?...

------
atemerev
That’s all Brussel’s fault! (/s, obviously, but many Brits really think this
way).

------
nightcracker
Another americentric post, seeing the upvotes it gets. This really isn't
newsworthy.

Amazon in Europe is small, having <10% of the e-commerce marketshare (compared
to >50% in the US). For example, in the Netherlands people are much more
likely to shop at Bol, Coolblue or Wehkamp.

~~~
drogon50
It's more about not being able to sell as easily as now, from the UK to the
EU, which has a population of 443m.

It's yet another headwind for smaller UK companies, that will see their
potential serviceable available market (SAM) get smaller, unless they spend
extra. This will also significantly increase the time for the goods to arrive
to EU destinations.

You calling this "americentric" is also weird. It's going to be the same
situation for all other e-commerce sites, no?

