What Amazon sellers need to have on their invoices, both before they submit and after.
CJ Rosenbaum, one of the founding partners of Rosenbaum Famularo, the law firm behind AmazonSellersLawyer.com talks about inauthentic suspensions.
An inauthentic suspension is the #1 reason for an account getting suspended and the #1 reason for a seller to lose a listing (ASIN) or a group of ASINs.
Amazon is not necessarily accusing you of selling an inauthentic product. It’s a sourcing issue. Amazon wants to see and learn where you purchased your products from. The best case scenario is tracing back to your distributor who can go all the way back to the manufacturer. But if it is a basic inauthentic suspension, all you need to do is gather your invoices & receipts and show where you purchased it from, to show that they are most likely genuine products.
Amazon will tell you and you can read online that you are allowed to redact information. I highly suggest that you don’t redact anything.
What Amazon sellers need to have on their invoices, both before they submit and after:
The top portion of the invoice:
1. The name on your invoice. It should be the same name as your Amazon account if possible.
2. Your address on your invoice should also match the address on your Amazon account. This shows that it is 1 business and it was really going to you. Amazon has learned over the last 20 years that people resource and ship to different addresses, and if you get hit with an inauthentic suspension, you want to be able to show that the invoice was made to you.
3. The same thing goes with your phone number and the website. Everything should match.
4. Amazon also wants to see the same email address. The email address that you have on your invoice should be the same email address that you have on your Amazon sellers account.
The next section of the invoice:
Usually a chart or graph that indicates the quantity, price, and description of the product.
The quantity of the invoice should match somewhere close to what you are selling on Amazon. Again, you are trying to show Amazon that these were purchased from a reputable supplier, a reputable distributor, to be sold on Amazon. It doesn’t have to be identical, but these quantities should match up.
When it comes to the description of the product, you want that description to be as detailed as possible. You want to have the SKU on there, the UPC code, description, name of product, size, if they are a different version (male vs. female for clothing), different colored products.
The line usually to the right of the invoice is how you are paying per unit. Amazon says you can redact. I highly recommend that don’t. Throughout the arbitrations, we have seen that Amazon looks for any reason to discredit your invoices once you are in this loop. The price of a unit should be in the realm of reality. It shouldn’t be too cheap or too expensive. If there are mathematical mistakes, it’s an indication to Amazon that your invoice might be fake.
The fonts on the invoices should all match. If the fonts don’t match, this is an indicator to Amazon that the invoice might not be real. You also want to make sure that the dates of your invoices are accurate.
If you are submitting invoices to Amazon, look for holes and fix them before you submit!
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