Listing deactivated - amazon wrongly accusing me of 'violating Amazon Drop Shipping policy' when I 100% pack & ship all by myself
This is a strange one, amazon has suddenly deactivated all my MFN listings.
The message says :
Your seller-fulfilled offers have been deactivated and your listings have been removed in accordance with the Amazon Drop Shipping policy. A reserve equal to your gross sales amount for the preceding 14 days will apply while your account is under review. Although your offers have been deactivated, we still consider you an active seller in our stores. As such, continue to focus your attention on keeping promises to buyers so that your account is in good standing if you take the appropriate steps to reactivate your offers. This includes continuing to ship open orders, responding to buyer inquiries, and handling return and exchange requests. Why did this happen? We have taken this measure because we have found that you have repeatedly violated the Amazon Drop Shipping policy. Drop shipping or allowing a third party to fulfill orders to customers on your behalf, is not acceptable unless it is clear to the buyer that you are the seller of record. When a customer sees packaging and invoices or receipts identifying a seller that is not you nor Amazon, they may be confused about how their order is being fulfilled and who they should contact with any problems or questions. For more information, go to "Drop Shipping Policy": https://sellercentral-europe.amazon.com/gp/help/G201808410 Have your seller-fulfilled offers been deactivated in error? If you believe there has been an error, please submit an explanation by following the instructions in the banner on the top of your "Account Health" page: https://sellercentral-europe.amazon.com/performance/dashboard?ref=ah_em_op Your explanation should include the following information: -- Evidence or examples that demonstrate that your account complies with our Drop Shipping policy. What happens now? Your seller-fulfilled orders will remain deactivated. You may still accept Amazon-fulfilled orders. A reserve equal to your gross sales amount for the preceding 14 days will apply while your account is under review. Based on your order volume, the amount of the reserve may change daily. This reserve amount shows as your "Unavailable Balance" in your "Payments Report" in Seller Central. When your account balance exceeds this reserve amount, you will be able to transfer funds based on your settlement schedule.
This is all very strange as I only sell a few products at the moment but all packed and shipped by myself.
I have chatted with support to explain this all but they said there's nothing can be done but I need to admit that I violated the drop shipping policy in order to proceed with submitting a POA.
This is not right, how can I admit a wrongdoing that I haven't done ?
We try and re-use Amazon packaging to minimize waste but we make sure to remove all labeling from the packaging materials.
Come to think of it, there's a possibility that accidentally we may have attached a customer's shipping label over a label on a package that Amazon shipped to our shipping address (we sometimes buy directly from Amazon and sell back on marketplace). This is my only guess.
But would a customer take time and effort to analyze the label and make a complaint to Amazon saying their order may have been drop shipped ?
Appreciate all the experts thoughts on this issue please.
Thank you.
Listing deactivated - amazon wrongly accusing me of 'violating Amazon Drop Shipping policy' when I 100% pack & ship all by myself
This is a strange one, amazon has suddenly deactivated all my MFN listings.
The message says :
Your seller-fulfilled offers have been deactivated and your listings have been removed in accordance with the Amazon Drop Shipping policy. A reserve equal to your gross sales amount for the preceding 14 days will apply while your account is under review. Although your offers have been deactivated, we still consider you an active seller in our stores. As such, continue to focus your attention on keeping promises to buyers so that your account is in good standing if you take the appropriate steps to reactivate your offers. This includes continuing to ship open orders, responding to buyer inquiries, and handling return and exchange requests. Why did this happen? We have taken this measure because we have found that you have repeatedly violated the Amazon Drop Shipping policy. Drop shipping or allowing a third party to fulfill orders to customers on your behalf, is not acceptable unless it is clear to the buyer that you are the seller of record. When a customer sees packaging and invoices or receipts identifying a seller that is not you nor Amazon, they may be confused about how their order is being fulfilled and who they should contact with any problems or questions. For more information, go to "Drop Shipping Policy": https://sellercentral-europe.amazon.com/gp/help/G201808410 Have your seller-fulfilled offers been deactivated in error? If you believe there has been an error, please submit an explanation by following the instructions in the banner on the top of your "Account Health" page: https://sellercentral-europe.amazon.com/performance/dashboard?ref=ah_em_op Your explanation should include the following information: -- Evidence or examples that demonstrate that your account complies with our Drop Shipping policy. What happens now? Your seller-fulfilled orders will remain deactivated. You may still accept Amazon-fulfilled orders. A reserve equal to your gross sales amount for the preceding 14 days will apply while your account is under review. Based on your order volume, the amount of the reserve may change daily. This reserve amount shows as your "Unavailable Balance" in your "Payments Report" in Seller Central. When your account balance exceeds this reserve amount, you will be able to transfer funds based on your settlement schedule.
This is all very strange as I only sell a few products at the moment but all packed and shipped by myself.
I have chatted with support to explain this all but they said there's nothing can be done but I need to admit that I violated the drop shipping policy in order to proceed with submitting a POA.
This is not right, how can I admit a wrongdoing that I haven't done ?
We try and re-use Amazon packaging to minimize waste but we make sure to remove all labeling from the packaging materials.
Come to think of it, there's a possibility that accidentally we may have attached a customer's shipping label over a label on a package that Amazon shipped to our shipping address (we sometimes buy directly from Amazon and sell back on marketplace). This is my only guess.
But would a customer take time and effort to analyze the label and make a complaint to Amazon saying their order may have been drop shipped ?
Appreciate all the experts thoughts on this issue please.
Thank you.
10 replies
Seller_ZVAz3d5lZuGid
'we sometimes buy directly from Amazon and sell back on marketplace'
I am pretty sure that is not allowed, and maybe that is what they have picked up .
Seller_Wk5rPjMMiTu1W
Thank you for your input guys.
Unfortunately, I don't get an option to submit a POA but the below form only :
✔️ I acknowledge that I have read, and agree to comply with the Amazon
Drop Shipping policy.
✔️ I have taken steps to prevent violating this policy in the future, and
acknowledge that any further violations may result in account deactivation.
✔️ I commit to updating my inventory to what I can fulfil.
Identify the primary reason for the Amazon Drop Shipping violation:
Other
What was the issue faced?
Seller_g1iS3CyD4zQ2y
When you buy from Amazon & sell it on then the product is not 'new'. If you're selling it as new then that may be your problem.
Seller_RAXEWLxQ2dbmN
Dropshipping in this sense would mean taking orders and then buying in from Amazon itself and using them to post them on to the buyer (as if they were gift purchases)
If you are not doing that, it's hard to figure out why you've received the suspension.
Are you listing these items as 'new'? That is technically forbidden on Amazon though it doesn't really qualify as dropshipping.
The irony is that several sellers on Amazon dropship from other sellers as a matter of course. In fact their entire business model is based on it. They must dropship many thousands of orders between them yet many have been at it for years and seem immune from the rules... :-/