Effective February 16, 2026, the SAFE-T claim filing window for US seller-fulfilled orders was reduced from 60 days to 30 days. If you sell seller-fulfilled items and rely on SAFE-T claims to recover losses from customer damage or unjustified refunds, this change directly affects how quickly you need to act.
According to Amazon, the rates, eligibility rules, and claim process are unchanged. What changed is your deadline.
What exactly is changing?
Category | Before (up to Feb 15, 2026) | After (from Feb 16, 2026) |
Filing window | 60 days | 30 days |
Window start — returned orders | From return delivery scan or refund date (whichever is later) | Same, but now only 30 days from that point |
Window start — lost shipments | From last carrier scan event | Same, but now only 30 days from last scan |
Claims already in progress | Not affected | Existing claims continue as normal |
Eligibility criteria | Unchanged | Unchanged |
Action required | None previously urgent | Yes. Review all returns/refunds older than 30 days before Feb 16 |
Why does this matter for sellers?
If a buyer receives a refund on January 25 and the return arrives at your warehouse on February 1, your 30-day window will start on February 1. That takes you to March 3. Under the old system, you had until April. Under the new system, if you run a monthly review and catch it on March 5, it is already gone.
For sellers processing high volumes of seller-fulfilled orders, returns come in constantly. A single missed deadline on a $200 order is not catastrophic. But multiply that across dozens of eligible reimbursement claims per month, and you are losing your money simply because your SAFE-T claims miss the deadline.
How is the 30-day window calculated?
Amazon uses specific trigger dates depending on the situation:
For returned orders: The 30-day window starts from the return delivery scan at your warehouse or the refund issue date, whichever happens later. So if Amazon refunds the buyer before the item even arrives back at your facility, your clock does not start until the return lands and gets scanned.
For lost shipments: The 30-day window starts from the last carrier scan event on the tracking. If a shipment goes dark on February 5, you have until March 7.
Knowing which date triggers your window is critical. Log both dates the moment a return or refund hits your account.
What actions should sellers take?
This is urgent if you have open returns or refunds older than 30 days. Once February 16 passes, you cannot file claims for events that occurred more than 30 days prior. Go through your seller-fulfilled orders now and identify:
Returns received at your warehouse more than 30 days ago with no SAFE-T claim filed
Refunds issued more than 30 days ago, where you believe the refund was not justified
Lost shipments with last scan events older than 30 days
File those claims before February 16. After that, anything older than 30 days is ineligible.
How to stay on top of it going forward?
The sellers who get hurt by this change are the ones running monthly SAFE-T reviews. That cadence does not work anymore. Here is what a tighter process looks like:
Check refunds and return scans daily: With a 30-day window, every day of delay is a day off your deadline. A return that arrives on a Friday should be logged that day, not caught in the next Monday morning sweep.
Log trigger dates immediately: The moment a return delivery scan hits or a refund processes, record both dates and calculate your deadline.
Collect evidence at the time of return: Do not wait until you are filing a claim to gather photos of item condition, packaging damage, return labels, and buyer messages. Collect it when you process the return. Evidence gathered weeks later is harder to compile and easier to forget.
Set your internal deadline at 15 days, not 30: Filing on day 28 leaves no room for documentation issues, Seller Central delays, or anything else that can slow you down.
Know your exposure before it expires: If you are handling significant seller-fulfilled volume, it is easy to lose track of how much is actually owed to you across open returns, lost shipments, and unjustified refunds.
Use the Amazon reconciliation audit system: Refunzo, eStore Factory's Amazon reimbursement tool, shows you what Amazon owes you by category, so you are not manually searching through reports to find claimable amounts before the deadline hits.
Any SAFE-T claim already submitted and in progress will continue under the existing process regardless of this change. The 30-day window only applies to new claims filed on or after February 16, 2026. The shorter window does not change what you are owed.
It just means you need a faster process to collect it. Sellers who build tighter return-monitoring habits now will not notice the difference. Sellers running loose review cycles will start seeing eligible claims expire, and that adds up fast.
If you want help auditing your current seller-fulfilled returns for open SAFE-T opportunities before the deadline, our Amazon reimbursement specialist can help you identify and file before February 16.
