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Shipping & fulfillment

Walmart Fulfillment Services (WFS)

Points to Keep in Mind

Required	Prohibited
You must choose an appropriate lag time, shipment method and carrier to deliver the order to the customer on or before the Expected Delivery Date (EDD). You must configure your Standard Processing Schedule in Seller Center to define the timeframe in which you will stop receiving orders on a given day. You’re required to support shipments for at least five days a week and must have your preferred days selected in your Standard Processing Schedule. You must schedule Additional Days Off to your calendar once your business is closed, such occasion may include holidays or severe weather conditions. Tracking numbers must be accurate, valid, and only communicated to Walmart once a package has been tendered to the carrier for shipment. For more information, review our Valid Tracking Standards All attempts to increase the sale price of a purchased item after a Walmart order has been completed are prohibited and may result in suspension or account termination. Sellers located outside of Canada must be the importer of record and ship all products into Canada DDP (duties delivered paid).	You may not purchase products from another retailer and have the order shipped directly to a Walmart customer. Orders can't be shipped in competitor boxes or packaging. Sellers should not use FBA or any service that will deliver items purchased through Walmart in competitors' packaging. Don’t knowingly mark an order as Shipped without physically shipping the item. If you mark an order as shipped without shipping the items, you'll be responsible for all shipping-related charges, refunds, or adjustments. Packages may not contain any seller or third-party promotional or marketing materials (including but not limited to, customer surveys, requests for product reviews, promotional offers, coupons, or similar marketing items). For more information, review our Packaging Rules. Having inaccurate inventory in your catalog which results in cancellations of customer orders. Walmart reserves the right in its sole discretion to suspend, terminate, and/or take other immediate action against sellers who purchase a product from another online retailer and have that other retailer ship the product directly to the customer (also known as Retail Arbitrage), if the packing slip or materials, invoice, and/or external packaging for the product includes the name or other identifier of any entity other than you and if an exception has not been granted. Such other actions may include, without limitation, suppressing your listings from search results, imposing selling limits, and withholding all funds. A single violation may result in action against you.

Required

Prohibited

You must choose an appropriate lag time, shipment method and carrier to deliver the order to the customer on or before the Expected Delivery Date (EDD).
You must configure your Standard Processing Schedule in Seller Center to define the timeframe in which you will stop receiving orders on a given day. You’re required to support shipments for at least five days a week and must have your preferred days selected in your Standard Processing Schedule.
You must schedule Additional Days Off to your calendar once your business is closed, such occasion may include holidays or severe weather conditions.
Tracking numbers must be accurate, valid, and only communicated to Walmart once a package has been tendered to the carrier for shipment. For more information, review our Valid Tracking Standards
All attempts to increase the sale price of a purchased item after a Walmart order has been completed are prohibited and may result in suspension or account termination.
Sellers located outside of Canada must be the importer of record and ship all products into Canada DDP (duties delivered paid).

You may not purchase products from another retailer and have the order shipped directly to a Walmart customer.
Orders can't be shipped in competitor boxes or packaging. Sellers should not use FBA or any service that will deliver items purchased through Walmart in competitors' packaging.
Don’t knowingly mark an order as Shipped without physically shipping the item. If you mark an order as shipped without shipping the items, you'll be responsible for all shipping-related charges, refunds, or adjustments.
Packages may not contain any seller or third-party promotional or marketing materials (including but not limited to, customer surveys, requests for product reviews, promotional offers, coupons, or similar marketing items). For more information, review our Packaging Rules.
Having inaccurate inventory in your catalog which results in cancellations of customer orders.
Walmart reserves the right in its sole discretion to suspend, terminate, and/or take other immediate action against sellers who purchase a product from another online retailer and have that other retailer ship the product directly to the customer (also known as Retail Arbitrage), if the packing slip or materials, invoice, and/or external packaging for the product includes the name or other identifier of any entity other than you and if an exception has not been granted. Such other actions may include, without limitation, suppressing your listings from search results, imposing selling limits, and withholding all funds. A single violation may result in action against you.

Shipping Methods

The table below outlines our fulfillment and shipping expectations of sellers on our marketplace.

	Basic	Superior
Order Processing (Fulfillment Lag Time)	Order processing exceeds next day.	Same day processing.
Shipping Methods	Paid standard shipping. Expensive expedited upgrade options.	Free expedited shipping on core assortment Free standard shipping on the rest of your assortment Affordable expedited upgrade options.
Carrier Selection	Mix of supported and unsupported carriers. Non-trackable carrier methods (e.g. brown envelope, first class mail). Slow mail consolidation services.	WISMO supported carriers only: 17TRACK ASL Canada Post Canpar CEVA DHL FedEx Globegistics Inc. Loomis Purolator Inc. SameDay SWW Express via FedEx SWW Ground via Purolator Swyft TForce UPS USPS
Total Transit Time by Country of Origin	Canada: 5 business days. US: 10 business days. China: 13 business days.	Canada: 3 business days. US: 6 business days. China: 9 business days.
Shipping Price	Mostly paid shipping.	Free shipping across your whole catalog; no thresholds.
Fulfillment Network	Significant reliance on your external vendors/suppliers; no guaranteed inventory levels.	All products in stock and ready to ship in your own warehouses or a Canada 3PL warehouse.

Special Requirements for Shipping Food Items

In addition to the above expectations, food items must be shipped with a minimum of 90 days shelf life remaining. If items are received by customers with less than 90 days of shelf life and returned under the reason of "Too Close to Expiry", sellers are expected to honor that return.

Walmart Canada Marketplace offers the following shipping methods to Sellers: Standard and Express. Sellers must support a minimum of 1 shipping method.

Restrictions for Shipping to a Walmart Store

Some items are not eligible for shipping to a Walmart Store location based on price, size, or weight. Review our Shipping Orders to a Walmart Store article for full details.

Standard & Express shipping

Standard and Express (optional) shipping can be enabled or disabled through Seller Center.

Express shipping is optional.
Review the above chart for expected transit times by country of origin when selecting Standard or Express shipping. However, the Seller can make any adjustments to their transit times as necessary to reflect their average ship times to the same regions.
The shipping price for Standard and Express shipping is up to the Seller. Sellers can charge customers for these faster methods or offer any of these methods for free.
The shipping or order price must cover all costs for delivery of the item/s. The total cost during Checkout on Walmart.ca should be all-inclusive for the customer.
Sellers located outside of Canada must be the importer of record and ship all products into Canada DDP (duties delivered prepaid). For more info, see Shipping and Refunds FAQs.

We highly recommend offering both shipping options to customers so they can select the shipping time that best suits their needs. Customers will also be pleasantly surprised if you offer Standard or Express shipping for free, especially during holiday or promotional seasons.

Fulfillment Time

Total Fulfillment Time determines the Expected Delivery Date that the customer sees on product detail pages and at checkout. It is calculated based on 3 key components:

Each component has specific guidelines in the new Shipping Standards for Marketplace Sellers, detailed in the sections below.

Order Cutoff Times

Order Cutoff Time determines if a Seller is expected to start processing the order on the same day as it was placed:

If the order was placed before the cutoff hour, order processing starts the same day.
If the order was placed after the cutoff hour, order processing starts the next day.

Order Cutoff Time must be configured for each day enabled in your Processing Schedule. We recommend setting the Order Cutoff Time to no earlier than 8:00 AM PST and no later than 1:00 PM PST, even if your business works longer hours. This will provide a sufficient processing time buffer for orders that may be delayed (i.e. due to fraud checks performed by Walmart.ca) and will reduce the risk of missing the order's Expected Delivery Date.

Pro tip

Please do not set your cutoff time to 12:00 AM, as this will cause systematic issues when calculating your warehouse availability time. We recommend setting your latest cutoff time in between 1:00 AM and 8:30 PM PST.
For information on how to configure Order Cutoff Times, read Partner Profile Settings.

Fulfillment Lag Times

Fulfillment Lag Time is an item-level attribute that determines the number of days it takes the Seller to prepare an order for shipment. Unless your items involve special processing (i.e. personalized or custom items, LTL items, items that are temporarily on backorder), your fulfillment lag time must not exceed 2 days.
You should open a Partner Support Case to request approval if you feel that your fulfillment lag time must exceed 2 Days.

It is extremely important to Walmart.ca to provide timely order status updates to customers. When Sellers ship the item, we pass the tracking information on to the customer. Lengthy processing times may trigger Customer Care contacts, order cancellations and create a negative customer experience.

While we understand that some items may require additional processing time, we strongly encourage Sellers to look into opportunities to offer compliant Fulfillment Lag Times on their core selection. If this is not possible, we expect Sellers to clearly set expectations with the customer by calling out extended handling times on the Item Page.

For information on how to configure Fulfillment Lag Times, see Navigate the Manage Items Page in Seller Center and Update Inventory in Seller Center.

Note: The Fulfillment Lag Time field is updated only once a day. Any changes to this field may take up to 24 hours to be reflected on Walmart.ca.

Transit Times

Order Transit Times determine the number of business days it takes the carrier to deliver an order to the customer after it is shipped. The transit time requirements are specific to each shipping method and region supported by the Seller.

**Note: The Walmart Canada Marketplace shipping regions can be found here.

We don’t require Sellers to use any specific carriers or carrier service levels to support the specified transit times within each shipping method. It is important, however, that Sellers meet customer expectations regarding the Expected Delivery Date. Sellers must choose appropriate carrier service levels to deliver the order to the customer on or before the Expected Delivery Date indicated on the Walmart.ca Marketplace orders. Repeated failures to meet the Expected Delivery Date may result in selling privilege restrictions.

To learn how to configure Transit Times, read Partner Profile Settings.

Expected Ship Date and Expected Delivery Date Assignment

When a customer orders a Walmart Canada Marketplace item, Walmart provides the customer with an Expected Delivery Date. Walmart also sends the Expected Ship Date (ESD) and Expected Delivery Date (EDD) to the Seller so they can monitor the order fulfillment progress.

Expected Ship Date (ESD)

ESD is the date a Seller must provide Walmart with an order shipping confirmation, including valid tracking information. Once the shipping confirmation is received, Walmart will send the shipment notification to the customer. If the shipping confirmation is received on or before the ESD, the order is considered "shipped on-time”. ESD is assigned based on a combination of the Order Cutoff Time and Fulfillment Lag Time.

If an order is placed before the Order Cutoff Time:

and Fulfillment Lag Time is set to 0 days, Walmart expects the Seller to ship the order on the same day
and Fulfillment Lag Time is set to 1 day, Walmart expects the Seller to ship the order the next day
and Fulfillment Lag Time is set to 2 days, Walmart expects the Seller to ship the order the day after next

If an order is placed after the Order Cutoff Time, an additional day is added to the Fulfillment Lag Time. If the Expected Ship Date is continually not met, it may negatively impact your On-Time Shipping Rate. To learn more, read The Seller Scorecard.

Pro tip

Please Note:
Orders without updated shipping details are automatically cancelled 7 days after their Expected Ship Date (ESD). To prevent these automatic cancellations and ensure correct payment, update your order status to Shipped and provide valid tracking for all orders by the Expected Ship Date (ESD). Please ensure that orders are marked as shipped and physically shipped prior to the Expected Ship Date (ESD). Orders that have not been shipped more than 7 days past the ESD will be cancelled.

Expected Delivery Date (EDD)

EDD is the date the shipped order must reach the customer. This is the same date shown to the customer on the Item Page page and at checkout. If the first delivery attempt takes place on or before the EDD, the order is considered “delivered on-time”. EDD is assigned by adding the maximum transit time for a given method and region to the ESD.

Sample Calculations

The examples below illustrate the ESD and EDD based on the following shipping settings:

Seller’s operating schedule is set to Monday through Friday with 12:00 PM PST set as the cutoff time for each day.
Seller requires 1 day to prepare the order before it ships (Fulfillment Lag Time = 1)
Order is shipped to the address via Standard shipping, with 2-5 business days of transit.

Example 1: Customer placed an order on Friday, January 6 at 9:00 AM PST.
The order was placed 3 hours before the Order Cutoff Time on an operating day, and the Seller saw the order on the same day. Since the Seller indicated that he/she needed 1 full day to prepare the order for shipment, ESD was assigned to the next operating day and EDD was scheduled for 5 days after the ESD.

Example 2: Customer placed an order on Friday, January 6 at 3:00 PM PST.

The order was placed 3 hours after the Order Cutoff Time on an operating day. The Seller already left for work and did not see the order until the next operating day. In addition, the Seller indicated that he/she needed 1 full day to prepare the order for shipment. The ESD was assigned to 2 operating days and EDD was scheduled for 5 days after the ESD.

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About Walmart Canada

Walmart Canada helps Canadians save money and live better. Quality products at everyday low prices - that's the promise Sam Walton made when he started Walmart and it's as true today more than 50 years later. We believe in innovation and continue to grow by adding new services like pickup, online grocery, and mobile app shopping. Walmart.ca is visited by more than 1.5 million Canadians daily, who can choose from millions of items sold by Walmart and third-party sellers to fit their needs. We make sure their service experience is as amazing as it is in our stores around the world.