Short answer: in the United States, Amazon usually holds the money from a sale until 7 days after the order is delivered. Amazon calls this paying based on delivery date, or “DD + 7”. Until then the sale is a deferred transaction: it counts towards your total balance, but it is not available to pay out yet, so it is not in the next payment either.
Everything below is from Amazon’s US help page on payments based on delivery date and its Business Solutions Agreement, as of 6 October 2026. Amazon marks the help page as applying to selling in the United States, and we have not found an official page for other marketplaces.
How the delivery date reserve works
Amazon says it reserves your funds until a shipment is delivered, plus a reserve period. The standard period is 7 days after the delivery date, and Amazon says the reason is to make sure there is enough money to cover things such as refunds, claims and chargebacks.
Amazon’s own example: an item sold on 1 January and delivered on 6 January becomes available for disbursement from 14 January. Amazon does not explain why its example lands on the 14th rather than the 13th, so treat “seven days after delivery” as approximate and check the release date Amazon shows for each transaction.
It can be longer. Amazon says your reserve period may be extended after an assessment of your overall risk and historical performance.
New sellers often see everything held. Amazon says that if you have just started selling, or the policy was recently applied to your account, it is normal for all of your funds to be held in reserve, because the reserve is based on shipments delivered within the reserve period.
Which delivery date Amazon uses
If you ship with a carrier that is integrated with Amazon, Amazon uses the actual delivery date. Without valid tracking, it uses the latest estimated delivery date instead, which Amazon notes is typically later than the actual delivery. That is why Amazon’s own advice for getting paid sooner is to dispatch quickly, confirm dispatch, give valid tracking numbers, use an integrated carrier and offer faster delivery.
Where to see what is held
- Payments Dashboard. Held transactions appear as Deferred transactions, and their total is part of the Deferred transactions line in the Total Balance tile.
- Transaction view. Under Payments, open the Transaction view, filter the transaction status to Deferred transactions and update. Amazon says this lists every transaction currently held, with the expected release date for each. When a transaction is released its status changes to released, and the money can be transferred to your bank.
- A downloadable report. In the Payments Reports Repository, request the report type Deferred transactions for a detailed list.
The reserve clause in Amazon’s agreement
The delivery date reserve is not the only reserve Amazon can apply. Its Business Solutions Agreement, in the section on paying out your sales proceeds, says Amazon may establish a reserve on your account based on its assessment of the risk your actions or performance pose, and may change the amount “at our sole discretion”. The same section says Amazon pays out your available balance every 14 days, or more often at its option, and that this can vary by country. What it pays is after fees, taxes it collects, and any amounts it requires you to keep in your account.
A worked example
Illustrative numbers, made up for this guide to show the idea, in US dollars. They are not from a real account, and they leave out fees.
| Order, on the day you look | Amount |
|---|---|
| Order A, delivered 2 days ago: deferred | $40.00 |
| Order B, delivered 5 days ago: deferred | $25.00 |
| Order C, delivered 10 days ago: released | $60.00 |
| Sold across the three orders | $125.00 |
Of the $125.00 sold, $65.00 is still deferred because those two orders were delivered less than seven days ago, and $60.00 has passed its release date. So on that day only $60.00 of these sales could reach your bank, and the other $65.00 follows once each order’s reserve period ends.
What Amazon does not say
- How a reserve looks in a settlement report. Amazon’s help pages that we could find do not describe which rows, labels or amounts a reserve produces in a settlement report, and its developer documentation for the Flat File V2 settlement report lists the columns but not the values that go in them. So we do not name any settlement row as Amazon’s word for a reserve.
- Marketplaces outside the US. The help page applies to selling in the United States.
- How long an extended reserve lasts, or how Amazon assesses the risk behind it.
When it is worth a look
- A transaction still deferred after its expected release date in the Transaction view.
- A reserve period longer than 7 days that nobody told you about. Amazon says it can be extended; it is fair to ask Seller Support why.
- Orders released later than you expected, which can happen when there is no valid tracking and Amazon uses the latest estimated delivery date instead of the real one.
- Everything held for weeks on an account that is not new and has not just had the policy applied.
How PayoutCheck shows it
PayoutCheck reads Amazon’s Flat File V2 settlement report, not the Payments Dashboard or the Deferred transactions report, and it does not apply the 7-day rule or check release dates. What it has is a reserve check:
- It looks for lines it reads as a reserve being held back or paid back, using its own list of descriptions from the amount-description column. That list is PayoutCheck’s, not one Amazon publishes. A line it does not recognise is still counted, and is listed under data quality with the file’s own words.
- If the file shows money held back and nothing paid back, the report says so, with the amount, and marks it as undetermined rather than as a discrepancy, because the release may be in a later settlement you have not uploaded.
- Otherwise it notes the amounts held and paid back, and the net effect on that settlement, for your information.
- Every line, reserves included, is added up and compared against the total the settlement file declares in its first row.
It checks one currency at a time and never adds currencies together. If you are moving to Flat File V2, our guide to the V2 settlement report covers the change.
Questions
What does DD+7 mean on Amazon?
Delivery date plus seven days. In the United States, Amazon's standard is to hold the money from a sale until 7 days after the order is delivered, and only then add it to the balance it can pay out. Amazon's own example: sold on 1 January, delivered on 6 January, available from 14 January.
Where can I see which sales are being held?
On the Payments Dashboard they appear as Deferred transactions. In the Transaction view you can filter by the Deferred transactions status to see each held transaction and its expected release date, and the Payments Reports Repository offers a Deferred transactions report to download.
Can Amazon hold my money for longer than 7 days?
Yes. Amazon says the reserve period may be extended after an assessment of your overall risk and historical performance, and its Business Solutions Agreement lets it set and change a reserve on your account at its sole discretion.
What if my orders have no tracking?
Amazon uses the actual delivery date when you ship with an integrated carrier. Without valid tracking it uses the latest estimated delivery date, which Amazon notes is typically later than the actual one, so the money is released later.
Does this apply outside the United States?
Amazon's help page on payments based on delivery date is marked as applying to selling in the United States. We have not found an official page describing the same policy for other marketplaces.
Sources
- Payments based on delivery date (applies to selling in the United States): sellercentral.amazon.com
- Amazon Services Business Solutions Agreement, section S-5: sellercentral.amazon.com
- Settlement reports, Flat File V2 columns (Selling Partner API): developer-docs.amazon.com
This guide describes Amazon’s own published documentation as of 6 October 2026, which can change. It is not accounting, tax or legal advice, and PayoutCheck is not affiliated with Amazon.