TL;DR
The downloadable “Transaction View” reports in Seller Central are point-in-time only. They show the deferred status as of the moment you export, not what was deferred vs. released within a given month. That makes them poor for revenue recognition.
Link My Books builds the correct monthly view directly from Amazon’s APIs.
Why the old instructions don’t work
Seller Central’s reports:
Reflect the current deferred status, not how it changed during a month.
Don’t tell you what was deferred and released within the month, nor what was deferred to future months, nor what past deferrals were released this month.
Result: You can’t do accurate, period-based revenue recognition from those files.
Because of this, we’re retiring the old “How to download deferred transactions reports from Amazon” article. Those exports aren’t appropriate for validating monthly recognition.
What you actually need for proper monthly recognition
For each month, you need a report that shows:
Deferred & released this month
Transactions that were initially deferred and also released within the same month.Deferred this month, released in a future month
Transactions newly deferred during the month that will release later.Previously deferred, released this month
Transactions that were deferred in prior months and released in the current month.
This is exactly what Link My Books constructs from Amazon’s APIs. Unfortunately Amazon Seller Central doesn't currently provide any such report.
What Link My Books provides
A monthly, audit-ready breakdown aligned to recognition periods:
New deferrals (this month)
Releases of prior deferrals (this month)
Deferrals that stay outstanding at month-end
Automated posting (if you use Auto-Post) and a clear trail you can reconcile.