Amazon Vendor Central differs fundamentally from a conventional Seller Central model. In a typical Vendor or first-party process, Amazon creates a purchase order, the vendor confirms and ships the goods, and the vendor then invoices Amazon. Amazon matches the order, receipt and invoice, applies agreed commercial terms or claims where relevant, and pays the remaining amount.

In practice, however, the financial flow is far more complex than issuing a B2B sales invoice and receiving full payment. An Amazon Vendor payout almost never equals the face value of the original invoice. Amazon routinely offsets numerous positive and negative positions on the remittance advice. These deductions include marketing allowances (Werbekostenzuschuss / WKZ), co-op fees, damage allowances, freight allowances, price protection adjustments, return credit notes, shortage claims and operational chargebacks.

For tax advisers and accountants, Amazon Vendor accounting presents two core challenges:

Gross vs. Net Accounting: Deductions made by Amazon must be split into taxable marketing services, expense reimbursement, price reductions or uncollected claims rather than net-reducing sales revenue.
Open-Item (OPOS) Reconciliation: Tracking hundreds of invoices against batch remittance payments requires item-level matching of invoice numbers, credit note IDs and deduction codes.

This guide explains how merchants and accounting firms can set up an audit-proof workflow for Amazon Vendor Central accounting, classify every deduction code correctly for VAT and DATEV, and automate remittance advice matching.

Seller Central (3P) vs. Vendor Central (1P) Accounting

Understanding the legal and tax differences between Amazon Seller Central (3P) and Amazon Vendor Central (1P) is essential for correct bookkeeping:

Accounting Parameter	Seller Central (3P)	Vendor Central (1P)
Legal Relationship	B2C sales to end-consumers; Amazon is agent/marketplace	B2B wholesale sales directly to Amazon (Amazon EU S.à r.l.)
Invoicing Entity	Merchant issues invoice to end-buyer	Merchant issues B2B invoice to Amazon (or self-billing)
Primary Revenue Account	B2C Sales (19%, 7%, OSS)	B2B Sales / Intra-Community Supplies
Main Settlement Document	Settlement Report (Flat File V2 / XML)	Remittance Advice (Payment Advice / Payment File)
Deduction Mechanism	Referral & FBA fees deducted from customer funds	Co-op, WKZ, allowances & shortage claims deducted from B2B payout

In Vendor Central, Amazon EU S.à r.l. (Luxembourg) is your B2B customer. However, because Amazon operates from Luxembourg, certain promotional fees and allowances charged by Amazon trigger reverse-charge VAT obligations under Section 13b UStG.

Common Vendor Central Deductions and Their Accounting Treatment

When Amazon issues a payment remittance advice, it provides a list of paid invoices alongside credit notes and deduction codes. The primary deduction categories include:

1. Co-op Fees and Marketing Allowances (WKZ)

Amazon charges mandatory or negotiated fees for placement, promotions, catalog maintenance and marketing campaigns:

Tax Treatment: Co-op fees billed by Amazon EU S.à r.l. are B2B services rendered by a Luxembourg entity. Under Section 13b UStG, these fees must be accounted for under the reverse-charge mechanism (19% output VAT and matching 19% input VAT deduction).
Posting: Debit Advertising / Marketing Expense (SKR03 4600 / SKR04 6600 with Reverse-Charge Tax Key 19) ➔ Credit Amazon Vendor Clearing / Debtor.

2. Freight and Damage Allowances

Freight Allowance: Deductions for transportation services provided by Amazon.
Damage Allowance: Agreed percentage offset covering damaged or defective returns.
Posting: Freight and damage allowances represent agreed cost reductions or purchasing deductions. Depending on contractual structure, they are booked as distribution costs or sales deductions with proper tax adjustments.

3. Shortage Claims (Quantity Discrepancies)

If Amazon claims that fewer units arrived at the fulfillment centre than billed on the invoice, Amazon issues a shortage claim deduction.

Accounting Rule: Shortage claims must be tracked as disputed open items. If accepted, issue a credit note adjusting revenue; if disputed, maintain the open receivable until resolved or written off.

4. Vendor Returns and RTV (Return to Vendor)

Unsold, damaged or customer-returned items shipped back by Amazon generate a Return to Vendor credit note.

Posting: Debit Sales Returns / B2B Revenue Adjustment ➔ Credit Amazon Vendor Debtor Account.

The Remittance Advice Reconciliation Workflow

To maintain a GoBD-compliant general ledger, tax firms must follow a structured four-stage reconciliation pipeline for Vendor Central:

[Invoice Issued to Amazon] ➔ [Remittance Advice Received] ➔ [Deduction & Tax Split] ➔ [DATEV OPOS Clearing]

Stage 1: Post B2B Outgoing Invoices

When goods are delivered to Amazon, post the full invoice face value to the Amazon Vendor Debtor Account (e.g. SKR03 10000 / SKR04 10000).

Stage 2: Parse Remittance Advice Data

Download the EDI 820 or CSV Remittance Advice file from Vendor Central. The remittance connects bank deposits with specific invoice numbers, payment discounts (early payment discounts / Skonto), credit notes and deduction codes.

Stage 3: Separate Fees, Taxes and Net Payouts

Split every deduction into its legal category:

Invoice balances cleared.
Early payment discounts (Skonto) posted with Section 17 UStG tax adjustments.
Reverse-charge marketing fees posted to expense accounts with BU 19 keys.
Shortage claims carried as open items.

Stage 4: Clear Open Items in DATEV

Import the structured EXTF posting batch into DATEV Kanzlei-Rechnungswesen. Match invoice numbers in Belegfeld 1 to clear the Amazon Vendor debtor balance to zero.

Transferring Amazon Vendor Data to DATEV

For German tax advisers using DATEV Kanzlei-Rechnungswesen, Vendor Central data must be structured into valid EXTF posting batches:

Belegfeld 1: Must contain the exact Amazon Invoice Number or Purchase Order Number (PO Number).
Belegfeld 2: Store the Remittance Advice ID for audit traceability.
Tax Keys (BU-Schlüssel): Apply BU 19 for Luxembourg reverse-charge co-op fees and BU 3 / BU 11 for B2B sales revenue.

How KudTax Automates Amazon Vendor Central Accounting

Manually unravelling complex Vendor Central remittance advice files and matching hundreds of deduction codes in Excel is extremely slow and error-prone.

KudTax provides specialized Amazon Vendor accounting automation:

Automated Remittance Parsing: Ingests Vendor Central EDI and CSV remittance advice files automatically.
Automated Deduction Splitting: Categorizes co-op fees, WKZ, allowances, shortage claims and returns with correct Section 13b reverse-charge tax keys.
Automated OPOS Matching: Clears Amazon B2B invoice receivables against net payouts using clean Belegfeld 1 mapping.
DATEV EXTF Exports: Generates 100% compliant DATEV EXTF posting batches with digital document links for DATEV Kanzlei-Rechnungswesen.

Online vendors and tax advisers can test KudTax for free to automate Amazon Vendor Central accounting and streamline B2B payment reconciliation.

Official and further sources

This article provides general information for tax professionals and businesses and does not constitute formal legal or tax advice.

Amazon Vendor Central Accounting: Credit Notes, Co-op Fees, Allowances and Payouts