Lever 1: The “Overstock” Trap

• The Issue: Excess inventory is often the single biggest drag on your IPI. If Amazon flags stock as having more than 90 days of cover, your score will suffer.

• The Strategic Fix: Run promotions, adjust pricing, or use Outlet deals. You can also use the Liquidation programme or simply reduce your next shipment to let levels naturally come down.

Lever 2: The “Velocity” Gap

• The Issue: A low sell-through rate means your stock is sitting idle. This is a combination of how quickly you sell versus how much you hold.

• The Strategic Fix: Drive more traffic through advertising or run limited-time deals. If you aren’t a high-volume seller, avoid “maxing out” every replenishment; sending in smaller, frequent shipments can drastically improve this ratio.

Lever 3: The “Stranded” Leak

• The Issue: Stock sitting in a warehouse that can’t be sold due to listing errors or pricing alerts. This is “dead” space that Amazon hates.

• The Strategic Fix: This is low-hanging fruit. Check your stranded inventory report weekly and resolve issues immediately. It is the fastest way to see an overnight score bump.

Lever 4: The “Out-of-Stock” Penalty

• The Issue: Amazon penalises you for going out of stock on your best-sellers. It’s counterintuitive, but “efficiency” also means being reliable.

• The Strategic Fix: Focus on your “Hero” products. Refine your reorder triggers and lead times to ensure your top 20% of ASINs are always buyable.

   

   

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  📊 IPI Score vs. FBA Capacity Limits — How They Interact

  It’s worth understanding that Amazon operates two overlapping systems here:

  • IPI score — the ongoing efficiency metric, assessed weekly.

  • FBA capacity limits — the actual cubic footage or unit caps assigned to your account each month.

  Amazon moved from storage limits to capacity limits in 2023, giving sellers more flexibility in how they use their allocated space across different product types.

  Your IPI score is one of the factors that influences what capacity you’re offered — but it’s not the only one.

  Sales volume, fulfilment history, and Amazon’s own warehouse constraints all play a role.

  The key takeaway: a healthy IPI score doesn’t guarantee unlimited capacity, but a poor one almost certainly restricts it.

   

   

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  🎯 The Strategic View

  Chasing your IPI score week to week is a reactive approach. The brands that get this right are the ones that treat inventory management as a strategic discipline — not just a Seller Central admin task.

  That means planning your replenishment calendar around your sales forecast, not just your stock levels.

  It means understanding which products are driving your score down and making deliberate decisions about what to do with them.

  And it means not waiting until you’re under 400 to start paying attention.

  Brands that consistently sit well above the threshold — 550, 600, higher — aren’t just ticking a compliance box.

  They’re operating more efficiently, spending less on storage fees, and putting themselves in a position to scale without running into avoidable capacity ceilings.

  Your IPI score is, in many ways, a reflection of how well you understand your business on Amazon.

  It rewards the brands that know their numbers, plan ahead, and make intentional decisions about their inventory.

  That’s exactly the kind of Amazon operation worth building.