Amazon has just announced a change coming soon for Prime subscribers: the ability to share Prime’s shipping benefits with members outside your household is ending soon.
Prime Invitee program will be discontinued October 1
Amazon Prime’s fast, free shipping has long been the tentpole benefit of the subscription program.
But until now, even non-Prime subscribers could benefit from free Prime shipping as part of an ‘Invitee’ program.
In Prime’s earlier days, subscribers could invite several friends or family members outside the household to benefit from free, fast Prime shipping too. This was called the ‘Prime Invitee’ program.
No other Prime benefits were included—so no Prime Video support, for example. But free shipping was a huge perk nonetheless.
Over time, Amazon scaled back the Prime Invitee program to be more restrictive as a way to encourage additional Prime signups.
But now, per an updated support page about sharing your Prime benefits, that program is officially being discontinued October 1.
Until now, if you had been invited to share the free Prime shipping from a Prime subscriber, you could still enjoy that benefit. But starting October 1, that will no longer be the case.
Top comment by Joel
My 97-year-old mother has been getting free shipping through the Invitee program for years. She’s enjoyed it quite a bit. I always thought it was a very cool perk of my Amazon Prime membership. Ending the program isn’t the end of the world, but it is kind of odd that Amazon would bother canceling the program. Amazon hasn’t allowed new invitees for many years… so I can’t imagine that this free shipping perk is was a large financial burden for the company. I wonder if it is more of an effort to simplify their membership technical debt.
Amazon has started notifying users who will be impacted by the change. Email notices include an offer for a discounted first year of Prime subscription to those who sign up.
I’ve been a Prime subscriber for years, but had no idea that the Invitee program was still technically being supported.
Though it’s a very different type of program, Amazon is using this opportunity to remind Prime subscribers that its ‘Amazon Family’ plan exists for sharing benefits with users in the same household.
Will you be impacted by Amazon discontinuing its Prime Invitee program? Let us know in the comments.
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