Every seller plans the cost of getting inventory into Amazon. Far fewer plan the cost of getting it out. That gap became more visible in 2026, because Amazon changed how FBA removal fees hit your account: as of February 15, 2026, removal and disposal orders are billed per unit as each unit is processed, rather than in a single lump sum once the whole order completes.

Amazon has been clear that this is a timing change, not a price increase — the published rates themselves did not move. But the timing change matters more than it sounds. A 4,000-unit removal that used to appear as one charge weeks later now trickles across your transaction view in increments, often landing in a different settlement period than the one you budgeted for. Sellers who reconcile monthly have reported exit costs showing up in the wrong period and distorting their true cost of goods sold.

This guide covers what the fees are, what the change means operationally, and how to decide between removal, disposal and liquidation before aged inventory makes the decision for you.

What changed on February 15, 2026

The mechanics are straightforward:

• Before: fees were charged all at once after the full removal or disposal order was completed.
• Now: fees are charged per unit, as each unit is processed.
• Rates: unchanged. This is a billing-timeline change only.

Two practical consequences follow. First, charges post earlier and in smaller pieces, so cash-flow modeling for a large removal needs to assume the cost begins immediately rather than at completion. Second, you now get unit-level visibility: your transaction view shows what each FNSKU actually cost to remove, which makes per-SKU exit cost a number you can finally measure instead of estimate.

FBA removal and disposal fee rates

Removal and disposal are priced almost identically and both scale by size tier and shipping weight. The published per-unit structure looks like this:

These figures are indicative and change with Amazon's rate card; always confirm against the current FBA Removal Order Fee schedule in Seller Central before committing to a large order. Note also that removal does not include freight from the fulfillment center to your address — that is on you, and for large bulky items the inbound freight can exceed the removal fee itself.

Removal, disposal or liquidation?

The three exit routes have very different economics, and the right answer changes with unit value.

A simple rule of thumb: if the per-unit removal fee plus your freight and re-prep cost exceeds what you can realistically net reselling the unit, dispose of or liquidate. For a standard-size unit under half a pound, the $1.04 removal fee is almost always worth paying. For a 14 lb large-bulky item at roughly $18 per unit plus freight, the answer flips quickly.

Why removal costs are rising even when rates do not

Exit costs are climbing for most sellers because the fees that surround removal keep tightening. Aged-inventory overloads push you toward sooner removal. Storage utilization overloads penalize slow-moving cubic feet. The low-inventory-level fee pushes in the opposite direction, rewarding deeper stock. Sellers caught between those incentives end up overstocking, then paying both storage surcharges and removal fees on the same units.

The 2026 billing change makes this visible rather than worse. When you can see $2,800 of removal fees accumulating in real time across 1,400 units, the overstock decision that caused it becomes much harder to ignore.

Five ways to reduce FBA removal fees

1. Remove by weight band, not by instinct. Sort candidate SKUs by shipping weight and tier first. The cheapest units to remove are standard-size and light; heavy large-bulky units are usually better liquidated or disposed.
2. Act before the aged-inventory clock. Removal at 240 days is a decision; removal at 365 days is damage control after you have already paid the surcharge.
3. Consolidate removals. One removal order shipped to a single address, or to a prep partner, beats several small orders paying separate freight.
4. Route recovered units to FBM instead of re-inbounding. Paying removal plus inbound placement fees to send the same units back is a common and expensive loop.
5. Reconcile the new per-unit charges. Because fees now post incrementally, partial or duplicated charges are easier to miss. Match units processed against units charged on every large order.

Build the exit cost into the buy

The most useful habit this change encourages is simple: add a line for exit cost to every purchase-order model. If you are buying 3,000 units of a 1.8 lb standard-size product, the worst-case cost of removing all of them is roughly $6,800 — before freight. Knowing that number before you commit changes how much you buy, and how fast you discount when sell-through disappoints.

Removal fees are not the problem. Unplanned removals are. The sellers least affected by the February 2026 change are the ones who already treat inventory exit as a forecastable cost rather than an emergency.

Planning a removal, a channel shift or a wider fulfillment review? Talk to HereWeShip about your fulfillment and shipping costs and model the exit before it becomes urgent.