Monitor your account health with new Account Health page features

#81

Does anybody with knowledge of the US rollout know how many points are deducted for each type of violation?

I assume each severity level, critical, high, medium and low each carry a different value?

#82

From the help page

Point values for each violation are based on severity level and typically range from 2 to 8, though critical violations automatically bring your AHR score to zero

#83

The reason I ask is we’ve had hundreds of violations over the years (even in the high bracket). None of them though any fault of our own, however our heath rating has always been in the green even with multiple violations showing at any one time. I have always suspected that this is because of historical sales as smaller sellers report on the forums falling into at risk for even one violation.

My point is the system isn’t actually changing and all that is happening is Amazon are giving transparency to what has always gone on in the background.

#84

If you’ve had hundreds over the years, and always remained in the green, that would suggest that by new standards, your current score is somewhere over 500 to 600

If what is being said is true, we’re all going to be starting at 200 - which is 1 above the yellow at risk stage - which is my gripe

#85

Yes I really can’t see why they can’t calculate your opening score based on the last 180 days of sales.

This would work well for a lot of existing sellers who have sufficient order volume over the last 180 days and would give us representative scores based on our last 180 days performance.

#86

So from the email announcement this morning this is live in 3 weeks on 15th Feb, odd that there’s nothing on the seller central dashboard?

#87

Definitely needs clarification.
If the FBA orders weren’t taken in to account, and the seller was 100% FBA, then the seller would presumably always stay on a score of 200 (just 1 point away from account risk).

To achieve a 1000 score, you’d need to average about 223 orders per day, every day (assuming no defects at all)
Not sure how many FBM-Only sellers would be consistently achieving that amount?
Maybe the FBA orders would count for less points per order, but if they don’t count for anything, then it makes FBA selling very much more risky.

Agreed… We’d actually surpass that ‘Perfect’ score consistently.
So if we received a (for example) -8 for something, would that just be cancelled out by the next 400 sales in the same period meaning it could usually be ignored?
I have visions of the ‘new’ sellers that appear, flood the market with container-fulls of imported tat and potentially make hundreds of sales per day until they eventually get shut down, now becoming almost immune to the risks of deactivation.

#88

oh dear god. not more crap.

Amazon, when you give out suspected interlectoral property/trademark issue things, for items that one sold 8 yrs ago and has no active inventory, please cancel them off when asked and provided evidence to the effect. also, if you say that i’ve used a HP trademark on a non geneuine HP product that is a proper HP product and the ASIN is a proper HP product and i have given you the papers that say i can sell them, please also remove. or at least have competent seller support people that understand these simple things.

#89

Here is an excerpt from US forum where this new policy went live in Sept last year.

The score calculation is well explained.

  • The baseline is 200 for everyone
  • The baseline does not start at 1000
  • Unless you have more than 200 sales in the last 180 days you will not be over 200
    • FBA does count
    • MCF does not count
    • Removal Orders do not count
  • Unless you have mega sales you will be in the 200-250 range

Those with more sales are less likely to get in trouble over minor violations. It’s always been that way.

In order to gain points above that, you must have a minimum number of sales within a (rolling I assume) 180-day period, at a rate of 4 points for every 200 completed orders.

In order to maintain points above 200, you must maintain that same minimum number of sales within a 180-day period. Otherwise, your score will begin to migrate back toward 200.

If you were to stop selling today and never make another sale again, your score will return to 200, but never drop below that .

The only things that can bring your score down below 200 are policy violations.

#90

Or should that be ‘alleged policy violations’ ?

Amazon’s usually methodology is ‘guilty until proven innocent’.

As a book and media seller who almost only ever lists against ASINs already in the catalogue, infractions like ‘ip violations’ shouldn’t be an issue and yet I (along with numerous other sellers) had dozens of them in the great DVD and CD purges of a few years back.
These were finally acknowledged (after a long delay) to be due to glitches with the bots but it doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. There is no way most BMVD sellers could get a letter of authorisation from the likes of, say, Sony, Marvel or Penguin…

#91

How does a seller surpass the 200 points mark?

#92

Only way is to fulfil orders. You get 4 points for every 200 orders fulfilled on a rolling 180 day window.

If you are a high volume seller it is fairly easy to get yourself to a higher bench level and be safer from violations. Although for a serious violation you can apparently be taken down to zero points regardless.

For a low volume seller it will be really difficult to get to a safer position. For those who may only do two orders a day it will take 100 days to get an extra 4 points.

#93

Isn’t this going to get sellers to start switching from FBA to FBM?

With the changes coming on the second buy box there could be a mass exodus.

I wonder if this will concern Amazon and what they will do about it.

#94

You get points for fba orders too

#95

Ah I totally misread that. Thanks

#96

Is there a separate calculation for each European marketplace or are they all added together?

#97

And frequently ‘still guilty, even if you’ve proven you’re innocent but did so in a way our bots or poorly trained staff couldn’t process’.

#98

Wasn’t this supposed to be live today? No change on my account

#99

I was thinking the same. No change here either.

#100

The notification here just says ‘in the coming months’
I believe it was a separate (but still account health) policy that was changing today