Guide · Amazon Business
Amazon Business is the B2B side of the marketplace: registered businesses, schools, hospitals, and government buyers purchasing with quantity discounts, tax exemptions, purchase order numbers, and, for Business Prime accounts, invoice payment terms. Those orders arrive through the same Orders API as consumer orders, flagged as business orders, and they need to be handled differently in an order management system: the PO number has to travel to the label and the invoice, the tax-exempt status has to reach the books, and pallet-sized quantities have to route to the right dock. This page covers what Amazon Business orders look like on the wire and what a warehouse and finance team do with them.
What Amazon Business is
Amazon Business is a buyer-side program. Organizations register a business account, add users and approval rules, enroll tax exemptions, and get access to business-only pricing, quantity discounts, and, at higher Business Prime tiers, Pay by Invoice terms. On the seller side there is no separate storefront to manage: you enable business pricing and quantity discounts on your existing offers, choose whether to participate in the tax exemption program, and the orders show up in your normal order flow, marked as business orders. The Amazon Business integration page covers the connection; this page covers what the orders demand.
On the wire
In the current Orders API (v2026-01-01) a business order carries AMAZON_BUSINESS in its programs attribute, and the buyer's purchase order number sits in buyer.buyerPurchaseOrderNumber when you request buyer data. Older report and v0 integrations see the same thing as IsBusinessOrder and PurchaseOrderNumber fields. Everything else about the order, items, quantities, ship-to, shipping service, looks like a consumer order, which is exactly why integrations that ignore the flag lose the PO number and treat a pallet of 200 units like a single-unit gift.
| Field | Where | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| programs contains AMAZON_BUSINESS | Order object | The switch for every downstream difference on this page |
| buyer.buyerPurchaseOrderNumber | Buyer data on the order | Must appear on the packing slip, the shipping label, and the invoice, or the buyer’s AP department cannot match it |
| Business price / quantity discount | Item pricing | Reconciles differently from the consumer price on the same SKU |
| Tax collected = 0 with exemption | Order totals | Signals an ATEP-exempt buyer; the certificate is available to the seller through Amazon |
| Quantity | Order items | Business orders skew large; cartons and freight instead of parcels |
| Is Prime / shipping service | Order object | Business Prime orders carry Prime delivery expectations |
Amazon's own tutorial on passing the PO number to UPS, FedEx, and USPS exists because buyers reject receipts without it. Labels bought through Amazon Buy Shipping include it automatically; labels from your own carrier account need the OMS to place it in a reference field.
The PO number
A business buyer's purchase order number is how their accounts payable team matches what arrived, what was billed, and what they authorized. It needs to be on the shipping label's reference field, printed on the packing slip inside the carton, and carried onto the invoice or the order record you post into your accounting system. Consumer order flows have no field for it, so an OMS that treats business orders as consumer orders drops it at the first step, and the seller hears about it as a returned shipment or a payment hold weeks later.
Tax exemption
The Amazon Tax Exemption Program lets qualifying organizations enroll their exemption once and have it applied at checkout to purchases from Amazon and from third-party sellers who participate. Participation is the seller's choice. When an exempt buyer purchases from a participating seller, no tax is collected and Amazon provides the exemption certificate to the seller on the buyer's behalf. That certificate, and the fact that the order was exempt, has to reach your books: in NetSuite or QuickBooks the order posts as tax-exempt with the certificate reference, not as a taxable sale with zero tax, which is how audits go badly. Sellers who do not participate simply collect tax on those orders and the buyer sees a message saying so.
Payment
Business Prime accounts at the Small tier and above can qualify for Pay by Invoice, typically 45 to 60 day terms, subject to Amazon's credit approval. That is a buyer-facing arrangement: Amazon extends the credit and collects from the buyer, and the seller is paid on the normal settlement schedule. The OMS and accounting implication is that these orders are not receivables you chase; they are Amazon orders like any other. What is different is volume and cadence: institutional buyers often order on a schedule, in quantity, against standing POs.
In the warehouse
| Situation | Consumer order | Business order |
|---|---|---|
| Typical quantity | 1 to 3 units | Case, pallet, or recurring bulk |
| Packing | Single parcel | Multi-box, LTL, or freight with carton-level labels |
| Documents | Packing slip | Packing slip with PO number; invoice with PO and tax status |
| Routing | Nearest warehouse | Warehouse with case stock and dock access |
| Inventory effect | Small, frequent | Large, lumpy; buffers on other channels matter |
| Reporting | B2C revenue | Separate B2B revenue and margin, business price vs consumer price |
A 300-unit business order pulled from the same pool as consumer offers on Walmart and your own store is the classic oversell event. Allocation at order time, a buffer on SKUs with business volume, and routing rules that send bulk orders to the warehouse holding case stock are what keep the other channels honest.
Automation
InfiPlex reads the business flag and the buyer PO number on every Amazon order, prints the PO on the packing slip and passes it into the label reference field whether the label comes from Buy Shipping or a connected carrier, routes bulk orders to the warehouse or 3PL that can ship them, keeps consumer and business pricing distinct on the order record, posts exempt orders to NetSuite or QuickBooks Online as exempt, and reports B2B and B2C separately. Set-up and pricing details are on the Amazon Business set-up overview and the Amazon Business FAQs.
Frequently asked
The questions sellers ask when Amazon Business orders start arriving.
In the current Orders API the order's programs attribute contains AMAZON_BUSINESS and the buyer object carries buyerPurchaseOrderNumber when you request buyer data. Older report and v0 integrations see IsBusinessOrder and PurchaseOrderNumber fields.
On the shipping label reference field, on the packing slip inside the carton, and on the invoice or order record posted to your accounting system, so the buyer's accounts payable team can match all three.
Yes. Labels bought through Seller Central or Buy Shipping via SP-API include the PO number automatically. Labels from your own carrier account need the OMS to place it in the carrier's reference field.
ATEP lets tax-exempt organizations apply their exemption at checkout. Sellers choose whether to participate; for participating sellers Amazon collects no tax on exempt orders and provides the exemption certificate to the seller. Non-participating sellers collect tax normally.
As exempt sales with the certificate reference, not as taxable sales with zero tax. The distinction is what an auditor looks for.
No. Pay by Invoice is Amazon extending 45 to 60 day terms to qualifying Business Prime buyers. Amazon carries the credit and pays the seller on the normal settlement schedule.
If you have set business-only pricing and quantity discount tiers on the offer, the buyer sees and pays the tier price. The order arrives with that price, which is why business and consumer revenue on the same SKU should be reported separately.
By allocating inventory at order time from one shared pool, applying per-SKU buffers on items with business volume, and routing bulk orders to the warehouse holding case stock, so Walmart and your own store only ever see quantity that is actually available.
Resources
PO numbers on every document, exempt orders posted as exempt, bulk orders routed to the right dock, consumer channels protected. Live in 1–3 business days.
We connect Amazon Business alongside Seller Central for brands and 3PLs every week. Tell us how your business orders flow today and we will show where the PO and the exemption are being dropped. Contact us, email info@infiplex.com, or call 888‑770‑0857.
InfiPlex™ is a trademark of InfiPlex. Amazon, Seller Central, Seller Fulfilled Prime, Amazon Business, Amazon Warehousing and Distribution, Selling Partner API, FBA, and Prime are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates. InfiPlex is an independent integration provider and is not endorsed by or affiliated with Amazon. Program rules, thresholds, and fees are set by Amazon and change; verify current terms in Seller Central before relying on them. ©2026 InfiPlex. All rights reserved.
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