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Walmart Fulfillment Services (WFS)
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Multi-box means a single item that’s shipped in multiple boxes. It’s ideal for large, bulky items, such as a trampoline with a safety net, jump mat and legs. This not only gives you more flexibility in shipping items with WFS benefits, but it also gives customers a wider variety of products to choose from.
Guidelines and fees
At this time, multi-box items must be in one of these 6 categories: Baby Furniture, Furniture, Garden & Patio, Sport & Recreation Other, Storage, Toys. Here are some examples of multi-box items:
- Backyard play set
- Swing set
- Weight set
- Ride-on cars
- Trampoline sets
There are no extra handling fees for multi-box items! We charge fulfillment and storage fees by the box, just like other WFS items. Go to WFS Fees for details on how weight and dimensions affect pricing, or use the WFS Calculator to estimate.
Terms to know
A multi-box item has 2 levels of information:
- The sellable set is the item that customers will buy.
- Boxes are how the sellable set is broken up and physically shipped to customers.
Unlike seller-fulfilled items, you’ll set up the Walmart-fulfilled item and each box within it. That means you need a unique GTIN for the sellable set and separate GTINs for each box. This helps us track each physical component that’s being shipped. GTINs must be 14 numbers and have a leading zero. They also must be licensed from organizations such as GS1.
Sellable GTIN
The sellable GTIN is unique to the item, so make sure it’s accurate. Once you add a sellable GTIN to your catalog, you can’t change how it’s set up. If another seller has set up the same GTIN, you can reuse the same setup, or you can create a new sellable set if the setup is different.
Since a sellable set is shipped in multiple boxes, it must contain at least 2 box GTINs. There are some restrictions:
- A sellable set cannot be the same as a standalone item.
- A sellable set cannot be part of another sellable set.
- You cannot bundle regular, existing items together to create a sellable set. For instance, packaging a game console and controllers together wouldn’t count as a multi-box item.
- Review the WFS Prohibited Products Policy for other item restrictions.
Box GTIN
A box GTIN must be different from the sellable GTIN and cannot be sold as a standalone item. However, boxes can be shared with other sellable sets. In our earlier example, the same loveseat (00111111111195) could be part of both a living room set (00111111111112) and an office furniture set (00111111111113).
Add new sellable sets
1. Log into Seller Center and go to Items.
2. Select Add items.
3. Find the Walmart template link and select Create a WFS multi-box template.
4. Follow the steps to add GTINs for each sellable set and its associated boxes. You can add up to 10 sellable sets at a time.
5. When you’re done, select Build template. Then go to Activity Feed and download the template from the Downloads tab.
Use descriptive names for component titles (“Duhome Chair Cushions” and “Duhome Chair Back and Legs”) rather than “Box A” and “Box B,” so they’re easy to tell apart.
6. Upload the completed template to the Add items page.
Use the feed ID to track progress in the Activity Feed. If there are no issues, you’ll see all the sellable sets in the Items page. You can now start sending inventory to WFS and selling.
Hazardous materials
If your boxes contain regulated components such as battery, chemical, aerosol or pesticide, they’ll be put on hold until they’re reviewed. A compliance review can take up to 3 business days. Boxes with complete, correct compliance information will be assessed more quickly. Boxes with incomplete, inaccurate or conflicting compliance information will take more time.
Make sure the compliance information for each box is correct. Not disclosing that a box contains a regulated component — or incorrectly declaring that a box contains a regulated component when it doesn’t — may cause delays.
Look for your on-hold items in the WFS Compliance tab in the Items on Hold page. If there are errors, you’ll able to view them from this page. Make sure to submit a single, corrected file for the whole sellable set, rather than updating just a box GTIN in Seller Center. After 30 days, error files will expire.
If more than 1 box is on hold, wait until they’ve all been reviewed so you only have to resubmit once. Once you’ve corrected any errors, the boxes will go through a compliance review again to confirm changes. For more on the compliance review process, go to WFS Hazardous Materials Item Setup.
Convert from seller-fulfilled
If you’ve been fulfilling a multi-box item on your own but also want to use WFS, follow the same steps as adding a new multi-box item. The only difference is you’ll need to prepare new GTINs for each box.
Item conversion is permanent for multi-box items. Once you convert a sellable set, you cannot revert that GTIN to only seller-fulfilled. You’ll always need to manage inventory at the box level and not just the sellable level. The default fulfillment method will be Walmart-fulfilled, but it’ll automatically switch to seller-fulfilled if inventory for complete sellable sets runs out.
If you want to switch to only Walmart-fulfilled, you’ll need to back out the seller-fulfilled inventory to zero and then send inventory to WFS.
- Go to the Items page.
- Find the sellable set for your seller-fulfilled offer. Select View.
- Update the on-hand quantities for each box in each fulfillment center to 0.
You can also update items in bulk to change inventory for multiple items. Manage seller-fulfilled inventory on the Items page and WFS inventory on the Inventory page.
Packing setup for multi-box items
After you’ve set up a sellable set, you can’t change how it’s packed.
All boxes must be shipped as specified during item setup. For example, if your listing states that a sellable set will be shipped in 2 boxes, you cannot ship in 3 boxes.
In addition, you must ship the exact items described in your listing. You cannot substitute different sizes, colors, quantities or any other characteristics. For example, if you’ve indicated that a box has a 12 oz (355 ml) container of liquid, you cannot replace it with a 9 oz bottle. You’d need to create a new sellable set with new GTINs.
A sellable set GTIN must have the same box setup every time. For example: An item is listed with sellable GTIN 11111111111111. It’s made up of box GTINs 22222222222222 and 33333333333333. You cannot have another offer that’s sellable GTIN 11111111111111, but with different box GTINs of 33333333333333 and 44444444444444.
Send multi-box inventory to WFS
Once your sellable sets are in your catalog, you can send us inventory like you normally would. For the inbound order, you’ll add units at the box level (e.g., armchairs and loveseats rather than the living room set).
Send inventory for complete sellable sets. Make sure to account for boxes that are shared between sellable sets, so your items don’t go out of stock. For example, if a loveseat is part of both a living room set and office set, send enough loveseats to complete both sets. Our associates will then pick, pack and ship each box to fulfill the sellable set.
Customer orders and returns
When a customer buys a sellable set on Walmart.com, they’ll see that it’ll arrive in multiple boxes at different points in time. During checkout, the customer will see that their item arrives in multiple boxes and get a shipping estimate.
Customers can make partial returns, such as a single chair in a patio set. We’ll refund only the boxes returned and not the whole set. However, at this time, we can’t send replacements for specific parts. If any box in a sellable set is damaged or lost, we’ll ask the customer to send back the entire sellable set for a refund. They can then buy a new set from Walmart.com.
Track sales and inventory
The Inventory page is a catalog of all Walmart-fulfilled items. For multi-box, you’ll see all sellable sets and can even filter by just multi-box items. To view basic details about box GTINs, select the item name.
To track every unit of a box GTIN, select the 3 dots to open the Inventory Log.
Data tracking
On the Inventory page, you’ll see data at different levels for multi-box items. In general, data related to sales is available for sellable sets, while data related to physical inventory is available for box GTINs. Here’s a snapshot of how data is broken up:
Sellable set | Boxes |
|---|---|
|
|
Some columns in the Inventory page will have additional data for multi-box items. For example, we show how many units of each box GTIN you have available to sell, but also a max available to sell that counts how many units of complete, sellable sets can be sold.
Reports
For in-depth sales and inventory tracking, download these reports:
- View just multi-box information in Multi-Box Items.
- Track sales for all WFS items, including multi-box, through Orders. Each box has its own line in the spreadsheet. Use the Bundle Item ID column to check which sellable set it belongs to.
- Find in-stock rate and restock recommendations in Inventory Health.
- View net inventory movement in Inventory Reconciliation.
The information found within this article, and the related hyperlinks, is for general informational purposes only, and is not considered legal advice. This article may contain links to third party content, which Walmart does not warrant, endorse, or assume liability for and your reliance on such content is solely at your own discretion.
