Amazon MWS sandbox

Question

I intend to develop a client for Amazon's Marketplace webservices (MWS). My requirements would be to update the order, synchronize the order status, get the order details using the APIs they have.

However, I could not find a Sandbox environment to test these scenarios. Amazon has a payment Sandbox I understand, but is there a sandbox available to test these web-services? If not, any pointers on how to go about testing the above mentioned scenarios with Amazon MWS?

Solution 1

UPDATE

As seen in the comments to this post, Amazon no longer provides a staging / test environment.

---

i just had a conversation via sellercentral ticket with an amazon employee.

they say:

"We can provide you with a free Seller Central test account to be used in ungated categories only, which are the Amazon categories that do not require approval to sell in. For a list of ungated categories, please scroll down to the middle of the page here: http://www.amazonservices.com/content/sell-on-amazon.htm."

For orders:

"After you’ve logged into the staging site, you then need to log into a real Amazon buyer account (not your staging account) to buy items. Then, navigate to the offers you’ve created. If you want to buy anything from your staging account (in order to test MWS order functionality) you will be using real credit card data, so make sure your offers are priced at only one cent, and your shipping is also set to one cent. These offers will not be visible on Amazon .com. Do not buy from any other sellers on the staging site."

So (conclusion): Just file a ticket** and tell them you want a seller central test account like this!

First register** for an account that you can access seller central with (please note, that some kind of accounts have a monthly fee, so choose a "per sale" plan. This fee won't be charged with your test account), then you can file the ticket (click the link above).

All resources about the MWS API are here.

** Replace .com with your local Domain for the Amazon Site you want a test (staging) account for.

Hope that helps :-)

Solution 2

You can use the scratchpad of Amazon:

scratchpad

good luck

Comments

[Trisped]

You can no longer use the individual Selling or "per sale" plan to access MWS

[Stefan]

Since when? Is this new? Any resources on this?

[Trisped]

Not sure, not sure, there is a link in my comment to the FAQ which states ... sellers must have at least one of the following: a non-individual Selling on Amazon account, an Amazon WebStore account, a Checkout by Amazon account, or an Amazon Product Ads account. Sellers with only individual Selling on Amazon accounts are not eligible to register for or use MWS. (Then individual sellers are instructed to get a Pro Merchant seller account.)

[Stefan]

I see, thanks for the hint, that's not new, but it's good to know :-)

[Mike Averto]

Any hint on how to get to the staging URL where I can purchase these items with my real account?

[Menno Bieringa]

I just got an e-mail from Amazon stating that the staging environment no longer exists. As a ProMerchant you can hide orders etc. from specific buyers which allow you to do tests supposedly.

[user3338098]

no matter what you do amazon requires actual credit card info and tax information, there is NO WAY i'm paying a dollar per test order... it's absurd!

[user3338098]

took over half an hour of explaining and transferring to 3 different people and being told "we don't offer staging accounts", "we don't offer test orders", "you can't avoid your closing fee, you MUST pay your fees","fake products are against the terms of use, your account WILL BE CLOSED", before I could get someone that understood that "test product"!="fraudulent product", lol, finally I was told to call the corporate office and maybe they may have an engineering department that is will to help me. Bottom line: don't believe a word they say, because they have NO IDEA what you want.

[user3338098]

"Thank you for writing to the Marketplace Web Services (MWS) specialty group. [...] Though we have had sandbox or staging accounts in the past, it is no longer offered [...] As you can imagine, bad information added for a product could impact your seller account or other seller accounts. Bad information on an order could also impact your sellers account or your buyer account. Due to these risks we no longer offer test accounts at this time." In other words because a lack of testing is extremely risky they don't offer us any testing abilities. Amazon WANTS us to make mistakes! It's absurd!

[Soorajlal K G]

I checked 'I want to use an application to access my Amazon seller account with MWS'. It asks Application Name and Application's Developer Account Number. How do I create MWS Application's Developer Account ?

[Stefan]

@SoorajlalKG you need to have a merchant account with full access to SellerCentral. You can get the developer account number by choosing MWS for your own account. You'll get the credentials then and can use those with other merchant accounts.

[stschindler]

Indeed the best way of "testing" your connectors is by working with real-life data. Thankfully my client granted access so I got plenty of data. If you don't have that, you can at least check out the mock-ups they provide with the "SDKs", e.g. here: developer.amazonservices.com/doc/bde/reports/v20090101/php.h‌​tml

[JVG]

@Tank So I'm a little confused here. There's no sandbox accounts available at all? If I want to develop for MWS I have to set up an account (done) and work on live (paid) listings? That seems like very, very bad practice and expensive for development...

[Stefan]

@Jascination correct. no staging environment. you need an account, but you can set your listing status to "inactive", so they won't be displayed on the website. Just login to seller central, hit Settings (top right corner) and then Listing Status (left box) to set your listings to inactive.

[stschindler]

@Jascination Your assumption is fully correct. Biggest marketplace on earth, but no sandbox. Even if you can enlist your products in inactive categories, you still have to pay the fees. And if you do what steve suggests, then you still miss the "normal" and complete order flow. Best thing you can do is getting some real data and write an emulator yourself.

[MC9000]

I'm in the same boat on this. Amazon's response is ridiculous - how they think bad data on a staging account is somehow a risk (it's a staging account - there is zero risk - duh!). Idiots!

[joeshmoe301]

scratchpad does help some, but only if you already have orders. scratchpad uses live data, so all responses in regard to order requests will return no data. a true testing environment with test orders, etc. would be nice.

[ZORRO_BLANCO]

actually, yes, and no :) , yes for some operations (not all of them) you need to have some data on your account to start testing with scratchpad, and the reason for that is that you need an interactive testing solution, because the data should be in live online, and no because it is not that big issue to have an account with data,and there were these sandbox accounts,you can create a sandbox test account,the only thing you have to do is to add some data,if you can't do that at least then you would never get a real testing interactive environment for a real online data..

[user2924019]

I am working with an independent fulfilment centre to help automate their work flow. One of the requirements is to integrate Amazon with their own Warehouse Management System, however as you've all realised, Amazon is making this as hard as possible. I'm sure their reason is to try and get people using FBA as much as possible, while making it difficult for everyone else.