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Hello,
I'll try and keep this pertinent. Apologies though as this will be a long initial post to try and give all the relevant information that I am likely to be asked.
SUMMARY.
On 6th December, we received an email from Amazon at 02:18 GMT stating that one of the comments in one of our product listings breached their policies and that we should remove 'prohibited language' or the account will be suspended.
12 hours 20 minutes later our account of 4 years standing was suspended with no reason given. They have enjoyed in the region of £50,000 in fees over those 4 years.
We currently have in excess of £21,000+ of stock across their fulfilment centres. Despite numerous emails, they will not respond and give a valid reason nor tell us when we will get our stock back or if the account will ever be reinstated.
This has driven me to the edge and we are going to have to lay staff off on Xmas Eve if this does not get resolved which it is unlikely to in the time available.
DETAIL.
This is the initial email we received from Amazon.
"Greetings from Amazon.co.uk.
As you may know, sellers at Amazon.co.uk are not permitted to direct buyers or transactions away from the Amazon Payments system.
A seller's listings may not contain email addresses, URLs, phone numbers, and references to external web sites in their comments. We have closed the listing(s) in your storefront which violate this policy and have listed them for your reference at the end of this email.
As stated in our Policies, any attempt to circumvent the established Amazon.co.uk sales process or to divert Amazon.co.uk users to another Web site or sales process is prohibited.
More information about our Policies can be found in Seller Central here:
Help > Learn More About... > Policies and Agreements > Policies
To avoid the suspension of your account, please remove all prohibited language from your listing comments prior to relisting these items on our site.
Please note that this e-mail was sent from an address which does not accept incoming mail. In order to contact us please visit our help pages on Amazon.co.uk under Help > Marketplace Selling FAQs > "Contact Seller Support by e-mail" and select > "Respond to Seller Performance" from the subject line drop down menu.
Thank you for your business on Amazon.co.uk.
-------------------------------------
Cancelled Listings
-------------------------------------
ASIN SKU TITLE
B002MRRRNC NANO-5-BLUE-B--UnboxedDing Apple iPod nano with Camera 16GB - Blue - 5th Generation"
This email was not even seen by us until after the account was suspended at 14:38 hours 06/12/2013.
"Greetings from Amazon.
We are writing to let you know that we have removed your Amazon.co.uk selling privileges, cancelled your listings, and placed a temporary hold on any funds in your seller account. Any new selling accounts you open will be closed.
We took this action because your seller account has failed our review process.
Note that we reserve the right to limit or remove selling privileges as we deem appropriate. This is in accordance with the selling agreement you entered into with Amazon Services.
We encourage you to take appropriate steps to resolve any pending orders. Note that any amounts paid as a result of A-to-z Guarantee claims and chargebacks may be deducted from your seller account.
After 90 days, the hold will be removed and any remaining funds will be available per your settlement schedule. In addition, balance and settlement information will be available in the Payments section of your seller account. If you have questions about these funds, please write to payments-investigate@amazon.co.uk.
Regards,
Seller Performance Team
Amazon Services"
We were given an option to appeal but the issue was how could we appeal what we do not know what we have done wrong.
These are the comments in the item that caused Amazon to suspended our account.
"Very good condition: Grade B This iPod is used but in very nice condition, the front is perfect but there is a slight ding on the back of the iPod. Nothing serious at all but it cannot go without mention. Comes unboxed with brand new genuine Apple USB cable and brand new genuine Apple earphones. If you are unhappy with the item upon receipt, please contact us to arrange a return for full refund in line with the Distance Selling Regulations. (For internal use only: 380502317077)"
Remember they stated, "A seller's listings may not contain email addresses, URLs, phone numbers, and references to external web sites in their comments".
I see none of those attributes in the listing comments.
Anyway, we appealed at 16:19 that day including a contact number in the box provided for someone to contact us and we received a reply.
"We've received your appeal
Our Seller Performance team will review your appeal, and you should expect a reply by 7 Dec 2013 16:19:47 GMT.
Things you can do while awaiting our response:
Confirm all the items you have dispatched and provide tracking information.
Update your inventory.
Monitor customer contacts and resolve any customer issues.
Solicit feedback from your customers.
Learn more about how to improve your selling performance."
Within 16 minutes, our appeal was off-handedly rejected.
"Greetings from Amazon.
Upon careful consideration, we have decided not to reinstate your selling privileges.
Once the hold is removed from the funds in your account, balance and settlement information will be available on the Payments page in the Reports section of Seller Central (https://sellercentral-europe.amazon....t-summary.html). If you have questions about these funds, please write to payments-investigate@amazon.co.uk.
Regards,
Seller Performance Team
Amazon Services"
We emailed the managing director after we got his email from the SellerCentral Forums asking why, where and when noting that they still have some stock of ours at their Fulfilment Centres. Thank God they only control a small proportion of our stock and that we did not send all our stock in for Fulfilment by Amazon which was our intention a year or so ago.
We received this response which is incredulous.
"Dear Mr. Widdowson,
Thank you for contacting Christopher North with your enquiry. I am the manager of the Seller Performance team and your email has been passed to me for review. Mr North has been advised of the outcome of my investigation.
Please be advised that your selling privileges were removed because your account failed our review process. Due to the proprietary nature of our business, we do not provide detailed information about this process. After a further review today, the decision has been taken not to reinstate your account.
I regret that I am unable to provide further information on this situation at this time.
Regards,
Thomas
Seller Performance Team
Amazon.co.uk
http://www.amazon.co.uk"
Now to the nitty gritty.
The Participation Agreement is here and I believe that this is the one we originally signed up to but they will have altered some provisions since the original agreement.
It states in Section 18 Miscellaneous. The laws of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg govern this Agreement and all of its terms and conditions, without giving effect to any principles of conflicts of laws.
My basic question is how can we force Amazon to give us a definitive reason for suspension of our account, to either tell us if and when our account will be reinstated and if and when our stock will be returned to us.
Every email I send is met with the same non-plus response.
If you search the internet for the term, Amazon Account Suspension, it comes up with no end of YouTube videos where this has happened to many other sellers.
I typed Boycott Amazon into Google and a local-ish MP is backing a campaign against Amazon as they are guilty of not paying reasonable corporation tax. £3.2 million on a £4.3 billion turnover. That really makes me angry.
I am pretty sure that I do not want to continue to deal with Amazon purely on the basis that they could treat a business 'partner' in this manner.
It really has knocked us for 6.
Any advice please gratefully appreciated but go easy on me, I'm in a dark place at the moment.
I'll try and keep this pertinent. Apologies though as this will be a long initial post to try and give all the relevant information that I am likely to be asked.
SUMMARY.
On 6th December, we received an email from Amazon at 02:18 GMT stating that one of the comments in one of our product listings breached their policies and that we should remove 'prohibited language' or the account will be suspended.
12 hours 20 minutes later our account of 4 years standing was suspended with no reason given. They have enjoyed in the region of £50,000 in fees over those 4 years.
We currently have in excess of £21,000+ of stock across their fulfilment centres. Despite numerous emails, they will not respond and give a valid reason nor tell us when we will get our stock back or if the account will ever be reinstated.
This has driven me to the edge and we are going to have to lay staff off on Xmas Eve if this does not get resolved which it is unlikely to in the time available.
DETAIL.
This is the initial email we received from Amazon.
"Greetings from Amazon.co.uk.
As you may know, sellers at Amazon.co.uk are not permitted to direct buyers or transactions away from the Amazon Payments system.
A seller's listings may not contain email addresses, URLs, phone numbers, and references to external web sites in their comments. We have closed the listing(s) in your storefront which violate this policy and have listed them for your reference at the end of this email.
As stated in our Policies, any attempt to circumvent the established Amazon.co.uk sales process or to divert Amazon.co.uk users to another Web site or sales process is prohibited.
More information about our Policies can be found in Seller Central here:
Help > Learn More About... > Policies and Agreements > Policies
To avoid the suspension of your account, please remove all prohibited language from your listing comments prior to relisting these items on our site.
Please note that this e-mail was sent from an address which does not accept incoming mail. In order to contact us please visit our help pages on Amazon.co.uk under Help > Marketplace Selling FAQs > "Contact Seller Support by e-mail" and select > "Respond to Seller Performance" from the subject line drop down menu.
Thank you for your business on Amazon.co.uk.
-------------------------------------
Cancelled Listings
-------------------------------------
ASIN SKU TITLE
B002MRRRNC NANO-5-BLUE-B--UnboxedDing Apple iPod nano with Camera 16GB - Blue - 5th Generation"
This email was not even seen by us until after the account was suspended at 14:38 hours 06/12/2013.
"Greetings from Amazon.
We are writing to let you know that we have removed your Amazon.co.uk selling privileges, cancelled your listings, and placed a temporary hold on any funds in your seller account. Any new selling accounts you open will be closed.
We took this action because your seller account has failed our review process.
Note that we reserve the right to limit or remove selling privileges as we deem appropriate. This is in accordance with the selling agreement you entered into with Amazon Services.
We encourage you to take appropriate steps to resolve any pending orders. Note that any amounts paid as a result of A-to-z Guarantee claims and chargebacks may be deducted from your seller account.
After 90 days, the hold will be removed and any remaining funds will be available per your settlement schedule. In addition, balance and settlement information will be available in the Payments section of your seller account. If you have questions about these funds, please write to payments-investigate@amazon.co.uk.
Regards,
Seller Performance Team
Amazon Services"
We were given an option to appeal but the issue was how could we appeal what we do not know what we have done wrong.
These are the comments in the item that caused Amazon to suspended our account.
"Very good condition: Grade B This iPod is used but in very nice condition, the front is perfect but there is a slight ding on the back of the iPod. Nothing serious at all but it cannot go without mention. Comes unboxed with brand new genuine Apple USB cable and brand new genuine Apple earphones. If you are unhappy with the item upon receipt, please contact us to arrange a return for full refund in line with the Distance Selling Regulations. (For internal use only: 380502317077)"
Remember they stated, "A seller's listings may not contain email addresses, URLs, phone numbers, and references to external web sites in their comments".
I see none of those attributes in the listing comments.
Anyway, we appealed at 16:19 that day including a contact number in the box provided for someone to contact us and we received a reply.
"We've received your appeal
Our Seller Performance team will review your appeal, and you should expect a reply by 7 Dec 2013 16:19:47 GMT.
Things you can do while awaiting our response:
Confirm all the items you have dispatched and provide tracking information.
Update your inventory.
Monitor customer contacts and resolve any customer issues.
Solicit feedback from your customers.
Learn more about how to improve your selling performance."
Within 16 minutes, our appeal was off-handedly rejected.
"Greetings from Amazon.
Upon careful consideration, we have decided not to reinstate your selling privileges.
Once the hold is removed from the funds in your account, balance and settlement information will be available on the Payments page in the Reports section of Seller Central (https://sellercentral-europe.amazon....t-summary.html). If you have questions about these funds, please write to payments-investigate@amazon.co.uk.
Regards,
Seller Performance Team
Amazon Services"
We emailed the managing director after we got his email from the SellerCentral Forums asking why, where and when noting that they still have some stock of ours at their Fulfilment Centres. Thank God they only control a small proportion of our stock and that we did not send all our stock in for Fulfilment by Amazon which was our intention a year or so ago.
We received this response which is incredulous.
"Dear Mr. Widdowson,
Thank you for contacting Christopher North with your enquiry. I am the manager of the Seller Performance team and your email has been passed to me for review. Mr North has been advised of the outcome of my investigation.
Please be advised that your selling privileges were removed because your account failed our review process. Due to the proprietary nature of our business, we do not provide detailed information about this process. After a further review today, the decision has been taken not to reinstate your account.
I regret that I am unable to provide further information on this situation at this time.
Regards,
Thomas
Seller Performance Team
Amazon.co.uk
http://www.amazon.co.uk"
Now to the nitty gritty.
The Participation Agreement is here and I believe that this is the one we originally signed up to but they will have altered some provisions since the original agreement.
It states in Section 18 Miscellaneous. The laws of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg govern this Agreement and all of its terms and conditions, without giving effect to any principles of conflicts of laws.
My basic question is how can we force Amazon to give us a definitive reason for suspension of our account, to either tell us if and when our account will be reinstated and if and when our stock will be returned to us.
Every email I send is met with the same non-plus response.
If you search the internet for the term, Amazon Account Suspension, it comes up with no end of YouTube videos where this has happened to many other sellers.
I typed Boycott Amazon into Google and a local-ish MP is backing a campaign against Amazon as they are guilty of not paying reasonable corporation tax. £3.2 million on a £4.3 billion turnover. That really makes me angry.
I am pretty sure that I do not want to continue to deal with Amazon purely on the basis that they could treat a business 'partner' in this manner.
It really has knocked us for 6.
Any advice please gratefully appreciated but go easy on me, I'm in a dark place at the moment.
)
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