CJ Rosenbaum talks about Kerry McDonald, our Senior Paralegal in the office. She’s one of our longest employees here. She’s just fantastic. She manages a team of up to 9 paralegals here in our Long Beach, NY office.
Here are Kerry McDonald’s top 5 issues for Amazon sellers dealing with “USED SOLD AS NEW” allegations, suspensions, and listing loses.
5. Manufacturer packaging: on your products being sold to Amazon, all the information has to be exactly the same as what’s being sold in stores or directly from the manufacturer. For example, plastic wrap… if the entire box is wrapped in plastic wrap, yours has to be in plastic wrap. It has to be exactly the same as the way the manufacturer would deliver that product that they would buy at brick and mortar stores in order for it to be deemed “new” in Amazon.
4. Do not allow returns back inventory. This is vital. If you allow returns to go back into inventory, you are allowing Amazon’s warehouse staff, who are not paid or treated particularly well according to the news, and do not have the time to make good evaluations, to make the decision whether your product should be delivered now to a new consumer. If you are worried about the long term health of your account… if you want to avoid suspensions… or you have been suspended and something you need to change in your business, do not allow returns to go back into your inventory. OPT OUT OF IT. If you need help doing this, CALL US.
3. Storage Issues for Merchant Fulfilled Sellers: Depending on where you’re storing your products, especially if you’re merchant fulfilled, you have to make sure that they are not getting dusty, dirty, or being exposed to direct sunlight which could bleach the color of the packaging. If you have been suspended and you’ve been accused of selling used products or used sold as new, that’s one of the things you want to talk about in your POA (how you are going to change the way or the place that you store your products being they are shipped to consumers).
2. Invoices / Receipts to Demonstrate Products as Genuine: As a seller when you are sourcing, keep in mind, that you have to be able to show Amazon that when you source the products, they were new where you got them from. You can’t buy goods on Amazon and resell them on Amazon. Amazon doesn’t consider its own sales to be significant enough evidence that they are new. You have to be able to show that when you purchased your products, they were brand new and then you resold them in a new condition and specifically, you can not use receipts, invoices or documents that you purchased on Amazon to resell on Amazon.
1. Do Not Participate in Commingled Inventory: If you are allowing your products to be commingled with other sellers’ products, you are basically responsible for everything that they are selling, and they may not have good packaging, or be the same packaging as when the manufacturer sent it out. They also may be allowing returns to be evaluated by Amazon’s warehouse staff.