Amazon India is killing free Prime shipping of groceries by moving it all to Pantry

Amazon seems to be slowing removing grocery items from regular Prime and making them available through Pantry. I might be mistaken but a lot of products that were easily available to order directly through Prime nowadays only seem to be listed under Pantry.

This was not a big issue because Pantry orders were free for Prime users. But they no longer are. You have to create a box with value of Rs. 599 to get the Pantry delivery free. Otherwise you pay Rs. 20. This is more than what you need to order from Amazon regular to get a free delivery afaik.

There is another thing. Pantry boxes are supposed to have a uniform size. When you add products, you are told that x% of the box is now full. You get an idea on how many boxes would arrive at your place for the products you are ordering.

I wanted to order a certain product that was only in stock under Pantry. To get free delivery, I checked with mom and added a few more products. Crossed Rs. 599. The box was barely 20% full. I paid.

I got the delivery today and the box is much smaller than what it should be. It seems like a regular box that they would have used for a regular delivery without Pantry.

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This kind of sends an impression that eventually groceries and maybe more articles might end up becoming Pantry exclusive. Rendering Prime useless for such purchases (unless you are willing to pay Rs. 20 per box for home delivery).

This is my personal experience right now. Nishant has ordered a Pantry box which is also partially filled. Would be fun to see what sized box he gets for his delivery. I suggested him to use Pantry for the product he wanted to buy because of the larger box filled with air pouches to better protect the grocery item being shipped. He got a messed up package during a non-pantry delivery from Amazon recently because package was all crushed up during shipping.
 
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My Pantry box is shipped and should arrive tomorrow. Will share the picture and experience upon delivery.
 
Another fun thing I noticed this week. A product that I routinely order... Has a minimum order quantity requirement. I cannot order a single unit. Under Prime or without it.

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This is not a big deal for me really as I generally order 4-5 units of this. But this further indicates that Amazon Prime could be on its way to become another Flipkart First like joke.
 
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Yesterday I was looking for Prestige cookware and Perfumes on Amazon. Both were not applicable under Prime, and needed extra Rs 50 delivery charge.
Why like this?
 
well that is a different issue. not all products are covered by prime. that's why i tend to filter results whenever i search for something to avoid such disappointment. the problem with pantry is that i cannot filter out pantry products from within prime. Amazon show mixed results. which is pretty annoying. as products in these segments do not go into the same cart and they have different free shipping requirements.
 

Forgot about this. It was a much smaller box than what I expected so Sushubh was right. They are using different boxes as per orders. My pantry box was just 22% full and the box that I got was 80% full.

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so basically they are asking you to pay rs. 20 (more for non prime members) if you want to order grocery items below rs. 600.
 
heh. my experience with now has been mediocre. product range is limited. same day delivery is never available. most of the times it ask me to run the app the next day to order something because the store is closed for the day.
 
Nishant said:
Forgot about this. It was a much smaller box than what I expected so Sushubh was right. They are using different boxes as per orders. My pantry box was just 22% full and the box that I got was 80% full.
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If they send a box which is 78% empty they will have to use shit load of cushioning. Still, by the time it reaches customer, it would have looked like it has gone through nuclear apocalypse.
 
that's the thing. as a customer, what is the use of pantry to me? Amazon saves money on packaging and delivering multiple items in one box. next day delivery is one benefit but they failed to deliver next day to nishant. earlier prime users had free shipping on all orders. now have to collect items worth 599 rupees otherwise it costs me rs. 20. more and more products are only available through pantry nowadays. they have turned it into a loophole to charge for shipping from prime customers.

even worse is the fact that i cannot filter out pantry products from Amazon Prime listings. amazon bundle them both even though they go into separate carts. so shopping becomes even more messier as i have to always check if a product is excluded from pantry or not.
 
i guess it has something to do with the fact that a lot of grocery items are low value and they would probably end up losing money if they were to ship them out individually
 
which brings me back to the question again. what is the point of prime if i cannot get free delivery on products under rs. 599. grocery products are one of the few product types that you would order regularly that would cost below rs. 599. i renewed my prime on october 1. one more year to see if Amazon is intentionally removing products from prime while moving them to pantry. prime would soon cost 1000 bucks. it might end up becoming another flipkart first type fiasco for me personally.
 

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