This assumes that by investigating you will determine the truth. Often times, even if they spent a ton of time investigating, they aren’t going to be able to determine who was at fault.

Idk, if the tracking doesn't say "picked up by recipient", a refund should be given no questions asked. It's then up to the seller and shipping company to figure out who screwed up amongst themselves.

You can purchase package insurance if you’re willing to go that far.

How do I purchase package insurance on something Amazon ships to me?

In theory, Amazon's T&C's attempt to pass on the risk of loss to me after delivery of the item to a carrier. In practice, this is far less clear, because of merchant agreements / cardholder agreements and overall FTC regulation of goods sold directly to consumers.

But it may be moot, anyways: if Amazon decides to screw me, they have a bunch of digital assets that they hold hostage and will remove my access to if I initiate a legal dispute or chargeback, even if I'm in the right.

Is there anything preventing you from having separate amazon account for digital assets and physical orders? That seems like almost a requirement give what I've heard about them in many comments throughout this thread.

Amazon routinely disables 'related accounts' when suspending an account. In practice, they know who you are on each, because of payment verification, etc. So I'm not sure how surefire of a solution this is.

oof, that's some distopic shit right there! How haven't they gotten sued over that?? (rhetorical question, the answer is obviously money)

I can't get package insurance as the recipient - only the sender can do that. And I wouldn't want to - the sender is the one picking the packaging, delivery provider and all of that, so it is their responsibility to get insurance. If they don't, it is their responsibility to cover for a lost package out-of-pocket.

And I'm not just using the term "responsibility" im a moral sense here - consumer protection laws in many places agree with this. The seller is an "informed market actor, taking on the risks of the transaction". The consumer is not an "equal market actor" and is therefore afforded protections from the risk.

So you are saying all deliveries need to require signatures?

No, signatures are a stupid relic of the past that needs to die out as soon as possible. But anything delivered in-person should be authorised with a one-time code that you get with your order confirmation and everything else (if small enough value) should be placed in a secure area (like a mailbox).

At the end of the day your remedy is to sue someone. Everything else is a courtesy shortcut.

I don't know about you, but where I'm from, consumer protection laws exist specifically so consumers don't have to sue in these cases. Providing a fair refund process is their legal duty, not a courtesy.

Why is Amazon allowed to conflate inventory (Fulfilled by Amazon) without any legal issues? It almost seems they’re above the law. Why would they be legally required to follow customer protection laws?

To me about how these infractions can be enforced without suing though?

The point is that it shouldn’t be the aggrieved consumer filing the lawsuit, it should be the powerful regulator with potential fines tied to a percentage of company revenue.

I wasn’t trying to suggest otherwise at all. I literally just don’t understand how consumer protection laws are supposed to work, and was wondering if the parent knew of some way to enforce what’s right without having to take them to court.

I don't see regulation being the issue here.

The law will oblige either of the two sides to carry the burden of proof. Either Amazon has to proof the package was delivered, or the customer has to proof it wasn't. If the other sides does not accept the proof received, it has to sue.

You can't prove a negative. There's effectively no way for a customer to prove a package wasn't delivered.

Update: I should be clear, the shipper can prove it. The customer themselves can't without the shipper's acquiescence.

Nobody can really prove it. But each side can have some supporting evidence.

The shipper might be able to prove that the transport company picked up a package. Beyond that it's all hearsay if we are talking about fraudulent sellers.

The transport company might have evidence of a tracking number and thus most probably an actual package making it through the system. Shipments do get lost or stolen though. No way to prove anything really.

The customer can't prove it either. There are enough cases of packages with a tracking number having arrived at my and other people's doorsteps without the tracking ever showing that it happened. Why wouldn't the opposite be true? Driver just needs to scan package arrival not actually deliver. Of course there can be repercussions and I'd gather it's easier for a package to be stolen off other parts of the delivery chain. Anyway in this case both the shipper and customer have 'proof' / no proof to various degrees and in reality something 'fell off the truck'.

It's all about being convincing enough to whoever will be adjudicating this but 100% proof is impossible. The closest the customer could get I think would be 24h Video surveillance of their front entrance. No motion detection, just 24h continuous tape.

If they make you sue when the case is clear-cut, good regulatory regimes charge punitive damages to discourage the customer-hostile behavior.

You report them to the relevant regulatory body.

Most states' Attorneys General offices have Consumer Protection branches, as well.