Want a Second Amazon (AMZN) Seller Account?

Multiple seller accounts are prohibited by Amazon’s selling policies. If you have a legitimate business reason, you can open a second account, but it must be kept separate.

The Correct Way to Open Multiple Amazon Seller Accounts

To open a second Amazon seller account, you must have a legitimate business reason.   Whether or not the reason you give is legitimate is up to Amazon in its own discretion. If you have a legitimate business reason for a multiple seller account, then you must also follow these strict parameters:

• You must have a separate bank account for each Seller Central account. Amazon will not approve multiple seller accounts that use the same bank account within the same region. If you sell across regions (for example in North America and Europe), you may use the same bank account for your Seller Central accounts as long as your accounts are linked though Amazon Global Selling.
• Each account must have a separate email address.
• The products and services sold in each account must be different.
• Your Performance Metrics and your account must be in good standing.

Once you are ready:

1. Go to Contact us and open a case (to state your case).
2. Click Selling on Amazon, then select Your account, and then select Other account issues.

If you are refused, don’t despair, that is where the services of a good Amazon lawyer comes in. In fact, it is probably a good idea not to even try it without the assistance of an Amazon attorney.

Opening Multiple Amazon Seller Accounts Without Approval

This is not recommended. If Amazon catches you, they will suspend both of your accounts and reinstatement is extremely difficult. However, if you choose to take the risk (which is not a good choice), make sure you do absolutely everything on this list. Amazon’s artificial intelligence is getting very good at matching data to make a determination that an account may be related. Even if you use your mobile phone at the wrong business location, it could spell doom for both of your accounts.

• IP addresses
• Computers
• Telephones
• Points of contact
• Management
• Employees
• Tax ID numbers
• Entities
• Domains and hosting companies
• telephone numbers
• Email addresses
• Physical locations
• Warehouse addresses
• Product spreadsheets
• Branding
• Product lines

 

There must be no crossover of management or employees between the two accounts.

 This is why we suggest entirely separate staffs and separate locations for each of your companies. There should be zero crossover.

This includes you. Do not be the point of contact for both businesses; hire someone you trust to be the POC for your other company. You must keep spotless metrics, so as not to put either account into review or jeopardy. This means that solid business practices must be put into place to make sure your customer service, inventory intake and maintenance, packing and shipping runs seamlessly and you do not collect complaints. Amazon is 100% customer satisfaction oriented and will not hesitate to give both of your accounts the axe if they don’t think you are providing a good buying experience for their customers.

What if You Get Caught?

If you get caught, don’t try to appeal the suspension yourself. Call an expert. Only about 50% of these cases succeed, so it is important to give Amazon a solid plan of action. Don’t trust a template or a non-attorney. Call a qualified Amazon seller attorney.

Amazon (AMZN) Legal Issues

With the advent of e commerce and e commerce giants, the law has been forced to change and adapt.  With a giant e commerce retailer like Amazon, many of the “legal shots” are called by Amazon itself, who is protected from many legal issues by law and their own “business solutions agreement” that every third-party seller adheres to when they open an Amazon seller account.  This means many of the “bad actors,” the cutthroat competitors who will stoop low to conquer their online competition, often go unpunished, while, at the same time, many legitimate products are restricted and prohibited because of the actions of other “bad actors.”  Some of the most common legal situations which never see the inside of a courtroom are whether a product can be legally sold online and whether a product infringes another seller’s intellectual property.

Is this product legal?

Amazon has its own internal system for determining whether a product is restricted by law to be sold or not.  Oftentimes, they misinterpret the regulations or take a legal position that is just plain wrong, which can not only stop a best-selling product from being sold, but crush entire ecommerce businesses.

For example, the seller support division at Amazon which is responsible for determining whether a product is legal to be sold online or not often misses the mark completely.  I have had literally dozens of clients who have had their products removed from sale because they are classified as “medical devices” which must be “FDA approved,” when in they are exempt from FDA approval and even from premarket registration under Regulation 510(k).  As a result, an ecommerce seller who has done his or her homework and made a signficant investment in a product which is perfectly legal to sell online, may have their doors shuttered due to an Amazon clerk’s or worse yet, a robot’s misinterpretation of the law.

IP Infringement

Amazon has an internal department who takes copyright, trademark and patent infringement complaints and often removes products from sale and even suspends entire ecommerce stores based on lies from cutthroat competitors.  From outright lies of competitors who knock their competition out of the ballpark by claiming the copyrights to images which Amazon must remove under the DMCA to unwarranted patent claims, to bogus trademark claims, a seller can easily become a victim of a ruthless competitor who uses Amazon’s Kanagaroo Court to knock their product or store into cyber-oblivion.  Competitors will also “cry wolf,” posing as customers making counterfeit claims.  Enough of these claims will cause Amazon’s AI to pop out a counterfeit alert, which means the seller is guilty until proven innocent while the fate of their store or product hangs in Amazon suspension.

Kenneth Eade is a lawyer who helps ecommerce sellers through an international website, www.amazonsellers.attorney

Avoid Amazon Seller Suspension

Many clients come back to me after a successful Amazon appeal and Amazon reinstatement of their Amazon seller account and ask, “What can I do to avoid suspensions in the future?”  They think that, because I’m an Amazon sellers lawyer, I hold the secret; the “magic beans” that will give them the extra edge they need to become a successful seller on Amazon without fear of losing their account overnight.   You can see more information about suspensions and appeals by clicking here.

The truth is that the answer is right before their eyes: in the Amazon plan of action.  It is what they were missing all along – sound business practices to follow for maximum customer satisfaction.  To Amazon, the customer is the king, and for the millions of third-party sellers out there, it is your responsibility to make sure the customer’s shopping experience on Amazon is seamless and enjoyable.

The most common Amazon suspension is for inauthentic items. In Amazon lingo, this can one of two things: 1) You are selling a knock-off or counterfeit item; 2) You are selling an item that you cannot sell without the permission of the brand owner.  For those conventional sellers, the main way to avoid an inauthentic item suspension is to buy from an authorized wholesale distributor of the brand owner.  Many brands are “brand-gated” by Amazon.  These restricted brands on Amazon require advance permission to sell.  However, once a seller obtains permission, they still must purchase from a supplier who is an authorized distributor of the brand.  For retail arbitrage, I usually recommend using a program like “Check Permission” to ascertain if the brand is restricted or not.  That will tell you whether you are safe buying at retail or not (most of the time.)  Inauthentic item complaints from customers

Closely related to inauthentic item suspensions are seller suspensions for intellectual property complaints.  These come into play when a brand owner complains to Amazon that a third-party seller is violating their intellectual property.  When a seller uses an image or sells a product that is copyrighted, or sells a product that infringes on a patent or trademark of another seller or brand owner, this can result in the loss of your listing or Amazon selling privileges and is also against the law.  The way to prevent both suspensions is to have an adequate business practice to quality control your inventory intake – to check if the product is restricted, and to ascertain if your supplier is authorized to convey resale rights to you.

The next most common reason for Amazon seller account suspensions is poor selling performance.  This results from poor business practices in order fulfillment and shipping that lead to an increase in a seller’s order defect rate, pre-fulfillment cancellation, late shipping rate, or the closely related valid tracking rate.  These problems can be prevented by an adequate order fulfillment plan and shipping quality control plan.  I often recommend shipping control software such as ShipStation, which keeps track of your orders and enters tracking numbers into Seller Central in real team.  For order fulfillment, a strong quality control program by management to ensure products match the order exactly, are in their proper packaging that matches the detail page, and are packaged securely to avoid damage is imperative.

There are many other reasons for suspensions, including violations of policy such as opening more than one seller account, or having an account that is related to another seller account, falsification of documents, such as invoices, and many more.  The exercise of common sense can help you avoid these and the other common suspensions we have covered in this article.

And, as always, if you do find yourself in trouble with Amazon, don’t write your own appeal letter or use a template, and don’t contact them with an emotional Amazon appeal letter.  They don’t care how bad you feel about losing your account or listing; only that their customers are taken care of.  Take a deep breath and call Amazon Sellers Attorney.  www.amazonsellers.attorney

AMAZON HAS DENIED YOUR APPEAL AND REMOVED YOUR SELLING PRIVILEGES. NOW WHAT?

Seller Performance rejects your Amazon Appeal and Plan of Action

If your Amazon selling account has been suspended, you have written a well thought out and comprehensive Amazon Appeal Plan of Action and you get back something like this: “We have reviewed the material you sent and decided you may no longer sell on Amazon…We may not respond to this email” your first reaction may be to just give up.  But you don’t have to.  There are several avenues of higher appeal you can pursue if you Amazon account is suspended and then your selling privileges are revoked.

Resend  your appeal for a review by a senior investigator or manager

Amazon is a huge bureaucracy, which means that there are levels of management above the investigator who considered your case.  If you get back a terse response such as the above, and too quickly, you may want to resend your appeal with a request that a manager or senior investigator review your file.  Make it clear in the first paragraph of your new appeal that you responded fully to all of their questions, supplied all the materials requested and presented a comprehensive appeal plan of action, but did not receive a meaningful response.

Bezos Escalation

Jeff Bezos, the billionaire head and founder of Amazon, has a lot on his plate as you may imagine, but he does have a team who goes through his emails and he is the final stop before arbitration.  If you feel that Amazon’s Seller Performance or Product Quality department’s decision is wrong, send your appeal to Jeff Bezos at jeff@amazon.com with a personal plea to have your appeal reconsidered.

Arbitration

Amazon is a private company and you signed a seller agreement with them that states that they may revoke your selling privileges at any time.  Seems pretty cut and dried, right?  Well, that contract also contained an arbitration clause that stated that any dispute between you and Amazon must be arbitrated.  While you have given up your right to sue Amazon in court to reinstate your account, you do have the right to arbitration before an independent arbitrator of the American Arbitration Association, who is usually an attorney or retired judge.  You also have the right to an attorney to represent you at the arbitration, and it can be performed in the state or country in which you live or by telephone.  An Amazon sellers lawyer is recommended.  I have over 30 years of litigation experience, including countless trials and arbitrations and can guide you through the process.  An arbitration is not cheap, but losses of an Amazon seller account due to suspension can amount to thousands or even hundreds of thousands of dollars, so in these cases, it is worth the expense.  Call Amazon sellers attorney to speak with me for a free evaluation of whether your case is arbitrable.  www.amazonsellers.attorney

How to Avoid Amazon Suspension

Many clients come back to me after a successful Amazon appeal and Amazon reinstatement of their Amazon seller account and ask, “What can I do to avoid suspensions in the future?”  They think that, because I’m an Amazon sellers lawyer, I hold the secret; the “magic beans” that will give them the extra edge they need to become a successful seller on Amazon without fear of losing their account overnight.   You can see more information about suspensions and appeals by clicking here.

The truth is that the answer is right before their eyes: in the Amazon plan of action.  It is what they were missing all along – sound business practices to follow for maximum customer satisfaction.  To Amazon, the customer is the king, and for the millions of third-party sellers out there, it is your responsibility to make sure the customer’s shopping experience on Amazon is seamless and enjoyable.

The most common Amazon suspension is for inauthentic items. In Amazon lingo, this can one of two things: 1) You are selling a knock-off or counterfeit item; 2) You are selling an item that you cannot sell without the permission of the brand owner.  For those conventional sellers, the main way to avoid an inauthentic item suspension is to buy from an authorized wholesale distributor of the brand owner.  Many brands are “brand-gated” by Amazon.  These restricted brands on Amazon require advance permission to sell.  However, once a seller obtains permission, they still must purchase from a supplier who is an authorized distributor of the brand.  For retail arbitrage, I usually recommend using a program like “Check Permission” to ascertain if the brand is restricted or not.  That will tell you whether you are safe buying at retail or not (most of the time.)  Inauthentic item complaints from customers

Closely related to inauthentic item suspensions are seller suspensions for intellectual property complaints.  These come into play when a brand owner complains to Amazon that a third-party seller is violating their intellectual property.  When a seller uses an image or sells a product that is copyrighted, or sells a product that infringes on a patent or trademark of another seller or brand owner, this can result in the loss of your listing or Amazon selling privileges and is also against the law.  The way to prevent both suspensions is to have an adequate business practice to quality control your inventory intake – to check if the product is restricted, and to ascertain if your supplier is authorized to convey resale rights to you.

The next most common reason for Amazon seller account suspensions is poor selling performance.  This results from poor business practices in order fulfillment and shipping that lead to an increase in a seller’s order defect rate, pre-fulfillment cancellation, late shipping rate, or the closely related valid tracking rate.  These problems can be prevented by an adequate order fulfillment plan and shipping quality control plan.  I often recommend shipping control software such as ShipStation, which keeps track of your orders and enters tracking numbers into Seller Central in real team.  For order fulfillment, a strong quality control program by management to ensure products match the order exactly, are in their proper packaging that matches the detail page, and are packaged securely to avoid damage is imperative.

There are many other reasons for suspensions, including violations of policy such as opening more than one seller account, or having an account that is related to another seller account, falsification of documents, such as invoices, and many more.  The exercise of common sense can help you avoid these and the other common suspensions we have covered in this article.

And, as always, if you do find yourself in trouble with Amazon, don’t write your own appeal letter or use a template, and don’t contact them with an emotional Amazon appeal letter.  They don’t care how bad you feel about losing your account or listing; only that their customers are taken care of.  Take a deep breath and call Amazon Sellers Attorney.  www.amazonsellers.attorney

 

Is Retail Arbitrage Dead on Amazon?

A common subject in the forums is retail arbitrage, the practice of buying items at retail sales or close-out events, in such retail stores as Walmart or Best Buy, and then listing those products for sale on Amazon.  Recently, probably because of Amazon’s increase in requiring brand-gating or approval to list in certain categories, its Seller Performance Team has been refusing to accept retail receipts as proof of authenticity.  This can result in a suspension of a listing or bring an entire seller account to a halt, a devastating occurrence that requires a second look into this common practice.

There is no official Amazon policy on the subject, which may be why the “get rich quick” seminars still tout it.  This is the reason why many clients, when I advise them retail arbitrage is a thing of the past, they often argue with me.  The writing on the wall shows that I am correct. 

Amazon is gating more and more brands every day, and now has subjected sellers who are already selling in certain categories, to apply for approval to list products in those categories, and one of the things they ask for are “invoices or receipts.”  Make no mistake, however, the word “receipts” does not mean that they will accept a cashier-printed receipt from WalMart or Target.

Chances are that any recognized brand, such as Samsung, Apple, Nike or Adidas, is off-limits and selling it is an unreasonable risk unless you are buying from an authorized wholesale distributor with full resale rights.  More and more brands are being added every day.  A non-comprehensive list can be found here.

My advice to Amazon sellers about retail arbitrage?  Don’t do it.  Convert your supply chain to a wholesale supplier.  Otherwise, the next time your account is placed in review, you may have to call someone like me.

Kenneth Eade www.amazonsellers.attorney is an Internet lawyer, specializing in Amazon Appeal of Amazon Suspension.

Welcome Amazon Seller, Now Watch Your Step!

Third-party sellers at the retail giant are subject to suspensions at alarmingly high rates

By Attorney Kenneth Eade

Amazon, the e-tailer behemoth, began by crushing the publishing industry and has become a dominant force in the retail arena which will soon be counting large department stores and grocery chains as its next victim.  But recently the company has become more aggressive with its third-party sellers, due largely to a failure to vet them.  Anyone can become a seller on Amazon, and, as a result, the site has become infamous as an outlet for counterfeit goods, intellectual property violation and unfair business competition.  Suspensions of third-party sellers have become so common now, a cottage industry has arisen to help sellers with appeals of seller account suspensions, made up of ex-Amazon employees and a small number of law firms.  It has become so complicated that it is almost impossible for the average seller to compose one of these plans themselves.  Amazon is aware that the plans of action, which are ghostwritten for sellers, are professionally done and has, accordingly, raised the bar as to what it considers a viable plan, entitling the seller to a second chance.

Amazon considers selling on their site a “privilege.”  This selling privilege can be taken away by them at will.  However, if they give you the opportunity to appeal, you may file a plan of action which identifies the policy violations, the root causes of the policy violations, your resolution of the violations, and a plan to prevent future violations.  If accepted, Amazon’s Seller Performance Team will reinstate a seller account.  Typically, the cases we see fit in several defined categories:

1.  Inauthentic or counterfeit products: This can be selling knock offs, or the genuine product without sufficient authorization to resell.  Often sellers will buy products from eBay or close-out sales and then wonder why Amazon does not accept their invoices as provenance.  They must buy from a wholesaler authorized by the brand owner, with rights of resale.  And there is another scenario where competitors, trying to knock the competition out will make false counterfeit or inauthentic claims to eliminate their competition. There are two resolutions to these types of complaints:
2.  Provide the invoices from an authorized wholesale distributor and a plan of action; or
3.  Permanently delete the offending product, offer a refund to customers, and file a plan of action.

Amazon has formed a dragnet to try to eliminate counterfeiters which has trapped many third-party sellers who actually do have resale rights to genuine products.  These sellers are put through the listing or account suspension process along with the counterfeiters, and the result can put legitimate business out of business.  One client of mine, who holds the sole, exclusive rights to market a national sports brand in the United States, was recently suspended from selling authorized, genuine products on the erroneous grounds that it was selling counterfeits, and the matter had to be escalated to Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon, because the Seller Performance division did not accept a legitimate license agreement as proof.

2.  Intellectual property infringement: These are typically copyright or trademark violations.  These complaints can often be settled by sending an attorney letter to the rights owner, offering to give written assurances not to sell their product and a deletion of the product from the seller’s inventory.
3.  Poor seller performance: This consists of late shipping, order defects (damaged products either by poor inventory quality control or damaged during shipping), cancelling orders before they are fulfilled.  These matters are solved with quality control programs written in the plan of action that sellers can also follow as a business practice.  A lot of sellers are uneducated or don’t have a command of the English language and have difficulty communicating with customers.  This accounts for many poor selling practices.
4.  Related accounts: It is against Amazon’s policies to have more than one account and sellers often get suspended because they open another account under a different name or company, with a different computer, or with a relative, etc.  The Amazon database is very good.  It coordinates many pieces of data to match one account to another, such as: ISP address, the same computer, same office or home address, same surname, same geographical location, same banking relationship and related products.

The solution in these cases is either to prove the accounts are not related, which is very difficult, or to admit the violation, promise not to do it again, and propose a plan of action to restore the former suspended account by addressing all the issues in that account.

5. Listing errors: This occurs when a product does not match the detail page, variations of products are not classified correctly as parent and child products, or images or listings have information that encourages the customer to go off-site.  These can be solved with a listing review and plan of action.
6.  Review manipulation: Since October 2016, it has been against Amazon’s policies to offer any type of incentive or discount in exchange for, or in the hopes of, a positive review.  Sometimes, sellers use an automatic feedback service which can be the culprit.
7.  Listing hijacking: This occurs when a seller’s listing is taken over by someone who sells a knockoff product or product that doesn’t match the listing page.  If the client has a registered trademark, an attorney can send a cease and desist letter and file a takedown notice to Amazon and kick the offending competitor off the product listing.  If no trademark protection exists, but the competing product does not match the listed product in every way, including packaging, the offending competitor may often be eliminated from the product listing.

Attorney Kenneth Eade runs a legal practice concentrating on e-commerce and intellectual property issues.  He can be reached at: www.amazonsellers.attorney.

Fake or real IP complaints; Amazon will suspend your account regardless

With all the talk of “fake news,” it is important to note that the law has not caught up with the wild, wild west that is the Internet.  Nowhere is that more evident that the world of E commerce, where Amazon is vying for the title of “World’s Largest Retailer” at a record-breaking pace, after first blockbusting the publishing and bookselling business, and by now, apparently, going after the made-to-wear and grocery business.  If you are selling goods online, Amazon is, most likely, the most important online site for you to list your products on; even more important than EBay or other online retail sites, such as Walmart.com.

When you open your seller account with Amazon, you sign away your rights to sue Amazon in court because the business agreement Amazon requires all sellers to adhere to contains an arbitration clause.  That means that, if you have a flack with Amazon, your ultimate remedy is not the courts, but private arbitration before the American Arbitration Association, which is generally cheaper than going to court in the long run but their fees can be cost prohibitive for small sellers and even pricier for private arbitrators if you end up going to a hearing.  Once you shell out these costs, and tack on your own attorney’s fees, depending on the amount in controversy, you can be looking at tens of thousands of dollars just to get Amazon to the mat.

Amazon looks at your relationship with it as a privilege, not a partnership.  You see, you need Amazon more than the giant e-tailer needs you.  That is why, with Amazon, which has established a “buck stops here” appeal system with Seller Performance, if you have been accused of violating their policies, you are guilty until proven innocent, and they don’t want to hear you protest your innocence.  They would rather have you confess your sins and give them a plan of action showing that the likelihood of you sinning again is non-existent.

Before arbitration, Amazon has a considerable amount of power over the legalities of your selling account and its own way of handling disputes between you and customers and even other sellers.  For example, if they receive a takedown notice under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1988 (DMCA) or a trademark infringement notice, Amazon can suspend your seller account immediately, and will not usually reinstate the account unless and until you are able to convince the alleged intellectual property rights owner/accuser to withdraw the complaint.  Amazon states that it won’t get involved in intellectual property disputes, but this practice and policy makes Amazon a seller’s judge and jury, leaving no avenue of dispute other than arbitration, which could take an average of seven months, during which time you are out of business, and at a cost that would come close to breaking the average seller.

This de facto “judicial system” that exists within Amazon makes its Seller Performance Team the ultimate arbitrator of your intellectual property rights and, as a result, ruthless sellers have been known to eliminate their competition on private label goods by reporting violations against their competitors, just because they can.  The danger of this system is that it puts the decision making in the hands of laypersons who know nothing of the law of intellectual property and, who are, in fact, precluded by Amazon policy from making a decision if a seller stands his or her ground and refuses to give up on an intellectual property fight.  When accused of intellectual property infringement, whether a complaint is fake or real never comes into the equation.  Amazon takes the accuser’s side and, if the complaint is not withdrawn, the accused is guilty – period.

When I was a young lawyer, the local county court enlisted my aid to sit in place of judges as a Judge Pro Tem when they were short-handed.  I remember one of the “real” seasoned judges holding a little “class” for temporary judges.  He told us that if we had a hard time deciding any particular case, just remember that the plaintiff (accuser) usually “has something”, otherwise he or she wouldn’t have filed the case.  That struck me as unfair and I decided right then and there I wouldn’t be the temporary judge who made a decision in that fashion, and that every case, big or small, would be decided on the facts and the law that should be applied to them.  Amazon shouldn’t have to decide disputes between sellers, and it says it doesn’t, but the fact of the matter is by deciding to favor the accuser over the accused, it is doing the same thing that old judge told us to do, without regard to who is right and who is wrong, and this is not justice.

So what is a seller with a private label product to do?  In this case, the old adage of “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure” comes into play.  Sellers should display copyright notices on the images they use in their listings and protect their private label brands with trademark registration, which can be done inexpensively online.  If a product has a unique design that differentiates it from all other similar products, you may also wish to obtain a design patent.  Armed with a registered trademark and/or patent, you can easily ward off intellectual property attacks from unscrupulous competitors.

Once you have protected your intellectual property, you can go one step further and enroll your brand in Amazon’s brand registry, which is a kind of “get out of jail free card” in case of intellectual property disputes.  Amazon even has a handbook on how to create your own brand in seller help.  Being listed on its brand registry also gives you the chance to add enhanced content to your branded listings.  One may think that this is a great way to protect your intellectual property, and it probably is, but it also puts Amazon into the position of being an intellectual property register, something that, in the United States at least, is within the exclusive purview of the U.S. federal government.

One thing is for certain: whether or not Amazon’s “judicial system” or intellectual property registry potentially violates your rights as a seller or not, it is something you have to deal with if you plan to have any type of a relationship with the online retailer at all.

Kenneth Eade is an international attorney, practicing ECommerce law, helping Amazon sellers with legal issues.  www.amazonsellers.attorney

Amazon Sellers Attorney

Amazon suspended accounts

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