Once a customer has placed a purchase request customers and merchants often like to follow the status of the order fulfillment. The TransactionLookup operation provides this functionality.

Every time a customer purchases the items in their shopping cart, Amazon generates a Transaction ID. This alphanumeric token identifies a purchase and remains valid on the Amazon web site for at least a year. This functionality enables a customer to look at their purchases over the course of the previous year.

On the Amazon's retail web site, the Transaction ID is called the Order Number. To find one, go to www.amazon.com and click on the following links: Your Account>Where's My Stuff?>Open and recently shipped orders. If you have not purchased anything recently, you can use the See More dropdown list to select, for example, Orders placed in an entire year. On the page that lists the transactions, use the Order Number for the Transaction ID.

This chapter discusses how to track transactions in the following sections.