Are "Request Approval" Product Listings Working Or Not Working, When Listings Already Existed Before "Request Approval" Was Introduced?
Hi everybody.
Recently, as many of you Sellers are probably aware, Amazon added a “request approval” system to list some “branded” products. 
I sell mostly used physical home media (VHS + DVD’s) and with the “request approval” system in place I can no longer list some product titles - mostly ones that are “Universal Branded”. The thing is though, I listed various physical home media titles BEFORE Amazon added the “request approval” system (and they are still listed now). I’ve done some checking and things don’t make sense as I will explain below: 
NOTE: I have various physical home media titles that might be affected by the Amazon “request approval”, but to make things simpler I will mention one single product title here as an example:
“Doctor Who - Robot [VHS]” - ASIN: B00008T3QH
Technically the “request approval” to list this product is “BBC VIDEO Branded” not “Universal Branded” (compared to other possibly affected product titles I have) but with all this “request approval” nonsense it all comes to the same result regardless.
(1) This product I listed BEFORE Amazon added the “request approval” system.
(2) This product DOES show up as ACTIVE in my inventory.
(3) If I go to the Buyers product page and click on the “see all buying options” button to see all Sellers selling the same product, I CAN see my own product listing there (and you other Sellers should also be able to see my listing there if you go there and look yourselves using the title/code I provided above).
(4) I CAN change the Sale-Price of this product in my inventory (directly without clicking on the “edit” button).
(5) I CAN NOT change any other attributes of this product listing - specifically if I try to “edit” the product listings in my inventory (such as “Offer Condition Note” or my own scanned images of the product) I always get stopped by the “request approval” page. Also being a “request approval” product, Amazon require legal documents and stuff which I cannot provide. And frankly don’t see why I or any of us Sellers should need to provide given the nature of the products being “used” + “physical home media” - but that’s a whole different and practically endless argument. 
(6) One thing that makes me worried that this product may not be working is that some months ago I had 2 attempts by Buyers (possibly 2 different Buyers - I’m not sure) to try and order this precise product title, but both times were cancelled before the orders officially went through. OK, it might have been the Buyer (or Buyers) who decided to cancel the orders for whatever reason - which of course Buyers are free to do and I have no problems with that. BUT what if the reason the orders were cancelled is because the Amazon system wouldn’t let their orders go through in the first place - in other words I wonder if Amazon have screwed up this product listing for me making my product listing appear listed when it shouldn’t be?
In fact, I just looked at my “cancelled orders” list, and I see around a similar time a few of months ago something similar:
“Quantum Leap - Series 1 [DVD]” - ASIN: B00061S0BY
This product listing is another product that appears ACTIVE in my inventory + shows up on the Buyers product page, but if I try to “edit” do anything with it comes up with the “request approval” page.
So these kinds of “request approval” product listings of products that I had listed before this insanely stupid and broken “request approval” system was introduced… ARE THEY WORKING OR NOT? 
Can anyone help please!
Are "Request Approval" Product Listings Working Or Not Working, When Listings Already Existed Before "Request Approval" Was Introduced?
Hi everybody.
Recently, as many of you Sellers are probably aware, Amazon added a “request approval” system to list some “branded” products. I sell mostly used physical home media (VHS + DVD’s) and with the “request approval” system in place I can no longer list some product titles - mostly ones that are “Universal Branded”. The thing is though, I listed various physical home media titles BEFORE Amazon added the “request approval” system (and they are still listed now). I’ve done some checking and things don’t make sense as I will explain below:
NOTE: I have various physical home media titles that might be affected by the Amazon “request approval”, but to make things simpler I will mention one single product title here as an example:
“Doctor Who - Robot [VHS]” - ASIN: B00008T3QH
Technically the “request approval” to list this product is “BBC VIDEO Branded” not “Universal Branded” (compared to other possibly affected product titles I have) but with all this “request approval” nonsense it all comes to the same result regardless.
(1) This product I listed BEFORE Amazon added the “request approval” system.
(2) This product DOES show up as ACTIVE in my inventory.
(3) If I go to the Buyers product page and click on the “see all buying options” button to see all Sellers selling the same product, I CAN see my own product listing there (and you other Sellers should also be able to see my listing there if you go there and look yourselves using the title/code I provided above).
(4) I CAN change the Sale-Price of this product in my inventory (directly without clicking on the “edit” button).
(5) I CAN NOT change any other attributes of this product listing - specifically if I try to “edit” the product listings in my inventory (such as “Offer Condition Note” or my own scanned images of the product) I always get stopped by the “request approval” page. Also being a “request approval” product, Amazon require legal documents and stuff which I cannot provide. And frankly don’t see why I or any of us Sellers should need to provide given the nature of the products being “used” + “physical home media” - but that’s a whole different and practically endless argument.
(6) One thing that makes me worried that this product may not be working is that some months ago I had 2 attempts by Buyers (possibly 2 different Buyers - I’m not sure) to try and order this precise product title, but both times were cancelled before the orders officially went through. OK, it might have been the Buyer (or Buyers) who decided to cancel the orders for whatever reason - which of course Buyers are free to do and I have no problems with that. BUT what if the reason the orders were cancelled is because the Amazon system wouldn’t let their orders go through in the first place - in other words I wonder if Amazon have screwed up this product listing for me making my product listing appear listed when it shouldn’t be?
In fact, I just looked at my “cancelled orders” list, and I see around a similar time a few of months ago something similar:
“Quantum Leap - Series 1 [DVD]” - ASIN: B00061S0BY
This product listing is another product that appears ACTIVE in my inventory + shows up on the Buyers product page, but if I try to “edit” do anything with it comes up with the “request approval” page.
So these kinds of “request approval” product listings of products that I had listed before this insanely stupid and broken “request approval” system was introduced… ARE THEY WORKING OR NOT?
Can anyone help please!
5 replies
Seller_p27bs0l5E6QqD
Cannot help other than to say I have similar -ie many of my items were delisted on just one day.Some I am able to relist easily,some still appear on the listings, some have been given approval but I still cannot relist and so on.Sometimes the item has been sold anyway years ago.It’s a crazy system due to crazy algorithms but the effort of checking all these items is enormous.Some are delisted for not putting the country of origin which I have always done.
Seller_RAXEWLxQ2dbmN
I'm getting lots of "Request Approval" emails for various BBC DVDs that have been listed for sale for a long time.
They specify that I need approval for "Spirit Entertainment" products which had me puzzled as these are BBC branded DVDs
A quick google suggests the reason:
"BBC Studios and Spirit Entertainment announce UK sales and distribution deal
Following a competitive tender process, BBC Studios has sealed a UK sales and distribution agreement with Spirit Entertainment Limited to represent its physical Home Entertainment portfolio.
This stupid forum won't allow me to post a link to the original article (external URLs not allowed...)
Seller_2hS4s2SbSs4On
Indeed, I've seen many "Request Approval" for products that are for strange brand name companies, although I don't think I have seen that "Spirit Entertainment" brand for "BBC" products yet.
Many of my products are "BBC" or "BBC Video" (or some other variation), and I had to go through the "Request Approval" system to get them all unlocked. Fortunately I only needed to "Request Approval" for 1 single BBC product (or maybe 2 depending on however many variations of "BBC" brand approvals there were - I forget) and it unlocked for all my hundreds of "BBC" products (at least it should have - I went through checking all my listings several weeks ago). I've also managed the same with various other "Brand" products.
Except sadly, I have still not been able to get approval for "Universal" brand products.
There are two kinds of "Request Approval" pages that I have encountered (after you click on the "Request Approval" button for a product). One version has a page that shows roughly the following stuff:
A short "video" to watch.
CHOICE BOXES / TICK-BOXES that asks something like: "Are you reseller/distributor or manufacturer or both of your products" (select what is relevant to your business)
Various other CHOICE BOXES and/or TICK-BOXES that ask other things like: "Are you responsible for your actions + products + etc when selling on Amazon" (again select what is relevant to your business - although EVERYONE should be responsible for their own business, naughty Sellers heheheheh)
I just fill in all the relevant details on this page and I've been approved each time for various brands! Although when I am approved it also says something like "based on my sale history" - so this is probably also a factor in why I've been so fortunate with these kinds of "Request Approval" products.
However, the 2nd kind of "Request Approval" page I get (the one that usually appears for "Universal" brand products) I can not get approval for. It requires a whole lot of legal documentation which I can not provide. I am hoping Amazon might change "Universal" product approvals to the simpler "Request Approval" page some time in the future. I do wonder if maybe the reason "Universal" (etc affected) products (for Sellers in the UK at least maybe) require the legal documents stuff instead of just being able to fill out the simpler approval page mentioned above, is because I think I read that some sort of change of the "Universal" brand in the UK has or is occurring atm. It could be that Amazon just haven't quite caught up or got permission from them yet for Sellers or something. However I don't know any of this for certain (also am not a legal expert) - so don't quote me on any of this!
Anyway, if you have a "Request Approval" product, it is always worth to click on the button and go through the check-lists and tick-boxes and whatever else to see if you can get approval. Except if the product requires the legal document stuff - if you can provide that stuff then fine, but if you can't well you're stuck and can't list that product, at least for now - maybe try a request another time in the future. If you get approval, be sure to wait a while for it to properly be saved into Amazons system (I suggest wait a day to be safe).
But anyway, kind of going off topic...
You said you had BBC DVD's listed for sale for a long time, and you are just now getting "Request Approval" for them. Well, back to my original point of this thread:
So us Sellers have pre-listings which were listed before "Request Approval" was added to the Amazon system.
Some of those pre-listings might now need approval, but us Sellers might not be aware that they do or we just can't get approval for them. Yet the listings remain ACTIVE on display for Buyers.
So if Buyers order these kinds of products, will the order actually go through, or could Amazon's system automatically cancel the order before it goes through the system, because these kinds of products haven't been approved yet?
Typically of course, nothing properly displays to us Sellers to show us that pre-listed products might now require "Request Approval" (apart from us Sellers manually going through every single one of our listings to check them all). And if Amazon have made some of our pre-listings now "Request Approval" required, then why are the listings still allowed to be ACTIVE on display to Buyers? This is the problem of Amazon introducing new programming into its system and not properly testing or thinking it through.
Seller_RAXEWLxQ2dbmN
Possibly best not to rock the boat on that one... :-o
