When managing your Amazon inventory across Amazon's United States, Canada, and Mexico marketplaces, it is important to understand the difference between the Global SKU and the marketplace-specific SKU in Seller Central.

A Global SKU uses a shared inventory pool between the United States, Canada, and/or Mexico. You can create a Global SKU by selecting "Existing Offer" when you go to create an offer in Seller Central. When using a Global SKU, the total amount of inventory applies to all marketplaces. For example, if you have 100 units of inventory, it will display that there are 100 units in the United States, 100 units in Canada, and 100 units in Mexico. The 100 applies to all three countries and DOES NOT add up to a total of 300 units. If an item sells in Canada, then all marketplaces would show 99 units available.

Note: Pricing is managed separately in each marketplace.

If you are shipping an order yourself, you should use a Global SKU to manage inventory across the United States, Canada, and/or Mexico. Inventory fulfilled by Amazon is not eligible to list as a Global SKU. If you change a Global SKU from seller-fulfilled to Amazon-fulfilled, this change will impact the SKU across every marketplace.

If you are shipping from the United States to Mexico, consider the following when choosing your shipping carrier. Not all shipping options deliver the transit speeds that Amazon customers worldwide have come to expect. For example, a recent study of orders fulfilled by sellers shipping from the United States to Mexico showed that approximately 69% of orders shipped via United States Postal Service (USPS), which uses Correos de México/Servicio Postal Mexicano (SEPOMEX) for delivery within Mexico, did not meet Amazon's international shipping transit time requirements.

To provide a great customer experience on shipments from the United States to Mexico, Amazon strongly recommends that you use other carriers (e.g., FedEx, DHL, UPS).

If you are using Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA), you can use a marketplace-specific SKU and manage your inventory in Amazon fulfillment centers in the United States, Canada, and Mexico as separate pools. Inventory going to U.S. fulfillment centers should be shipped from the Amazon.com section of your North America Unified Account, the Amazon.ca section for Canada, and the Amazon.com.mx section for Mexico.

A marketplace-specific SKU is managed as a marketplace-level inventory pool, which means you will manage distinct pools of inventory across the United States, Canada, and Mexico. You can create a marketplace-specific SKU by selecting Unique Offer when you go to create an offer in Seller Central. The listing is managed separately in each marketplace for both inventory and pricing.

Note: If you want to list a product on more than one marketplace, but you want to fulfill it yourself in one case and fulfill by Amazon in another, you need to create separate SKUs for your seller-fulfilled and Amazon-fulfilled listings.

If you are using Fulfillment by Amazon, you can use a marketplace-specific SKU and manage your inventory in Amazon fulfillment centers in the United States, Canada, and Mexico as separate pools. Please note that inventory going to U.S. fulfillment centers should be shipped from the Amazon.com section of your North America Unified Account and vice versa for Canada and Mexico. For example, if you have an FBA listing on the Canada marketplace, your "Ships from" address must be in Canada.

Note: When using inventory files in the North America Unified Account, it is critical to upload a value for the number of available inventory units. If the quantity column is left blank, it will be read as "0" by the system and will change the original listing to display "0" available units.