Hi there,

A seller has filed a trademark infringement complaint and I really need some help appealing the claim. I am a relatively new seller and this is the first policy violation I have received. It has put my account health ‘at risk’ and I really need to make a successful appeal to get my account health back to ‘good’.

To give you some context, I mistakenly made an offer on a branded listing thinking it was a non-branded listing. The rights owner filed the complaint almost immediately.

I have made one appeal but it was rejected. I suspect it was too long and not to the point. I have now drafted a second appeal. I would really appreciate any feedback or comments from some more experienced sellers before I submit it.

I will post the initial complaint below, along with my first appeal and Amazon’s response.

Thank you.

---

POLICY WARNING EMAIL

Hello,

We removed some of your listings because we received a report from a rights owner that they may infringe the rights owner’s trademark. The rights owner communication about the alleged infringement and the listings we removed are at the bottom of this message.

Why did this happen?
We received a report from a rights owner that one or more of your listings are inauthentic. Listing content infringing on the intellectual property of others is against our policies.

We’re here to help.
If you need help understanding why your listings may infringe the intellectual property rights of others, please search for “Intellectual Property Policy” in Seller Central Help (https://sellercentral.amazon.in/gp/help/external/201361070).

How do I reactivate my listing?
Please provide the following to reactivate your listings:
– An invoice, letter of authorization, or a licensing agreement from the manufacturer or rights owner demonstrating that your products are lawful. External links are not accepted. For security reasons, we only accept attachments in the following file formats: .jpeg, .jpg, .pjpeg, .gif, .png, .tiff.

How do I submit this information?
Go to Received Intellectual Property Complaints under the Product Policy Compliance section in account health (https://sellercentral.amazon.in/performance/dashboard?ref=ah_em_mpa) and locate the deactivation record for this product listing. Click on the Appeal button next to the listing deactivation record to submit information necessary to reactivate your listing.

Have your listings been removed in error?
If you have never sold or listed the product, please reach out to us and tell us.
If you think that the rights owner has made an error in sending the notice, please reach out to the rights owner and ask them to submit a retraction of this notice. We may only accept retractions that the rights owner submits to us directly. We do not accept forwarded or attached retractions.

These are the rights owner’s contact details:
[OMITTED]

For any other reason, please explain to us why you were warned in error so that we can investigate the case.

What happens if I do not provide the requested information?
Your listings will remain inactive. Violating this policy may also result in the loss of selling privileges or other legal consequences.

Rights owner communication: seller is selling my brand and does not have tights owner permission.

This is inauthentic item and breaching trademark infringement

seller must be removed immediately
ASIN: [OMITTED]
Infringement type: Counterfeit
Trademark asserted: [OMITTED]
Complaint ID: [OMITTED]

---

FIRST APPEAL - REJECTED

Dear Seller Performance Team,

Thank you for the opportunity to appeal the policy warning we received.

I have attached images of the product and packaging which includes the EAN, and an invoice from my supplier, so that you may verify the source of the product.

I hope the following information expresses our intent to play by the rules as we put in place robust selling practices for the long term.

I am sure that you are aware that we are a relatively new seller on Amazon, and I hope that you will bear this in mind when reviewing our appeal.

Root cause

I have identified the root cause of the complaint as follows:

• The brand name ‘General X’ is a registered trademark owned by [OMITTED], trademark number: [OMITTED]. I do not have authorisation from the rights owner to sell their branded products in the UK including on Amazon. By offering a similar product under the ‘General X’ brand name I have infringed on their trademark. Moreover, by offering an inauthentic product I regret that I have violated Amazon’s Intellectual Property Policy: https://sellercentral.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/G201361070
• I believed I was selling a non-branded product, and I failed to understand that the listing is offering a branded product under the brand name: ‘General X’. Factors that contributed to this were:
  • no brand name is contained within the product title
  • the brand attribute: ‘General X’ was understood to represent a non-branded product, in the same way as the brand attribute: ‘Generic’
  • before I made an offer on Amazon I purchased the product from Amazon and physically inspected the product for branding of which none was identified
• I failed to take a number of steps which could have prevented the situation from occurring:
  • I failed to understand the rules that govern non-branded product listings as outlined in Amazon’s Brand Name Policy: https://sellercentral.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/G2N3GKE5SGSHWYRZ
  • I could have verified the EAN of the listing matches with the supplied product
  • I could have sought permission from the right’s owner before selling on Amazon
  • I could have verified a registered trademark with the IPO office

Corrective measures

Upon receiving the complaint, I have taken the below corrective measures:

• I have verified the asserted trademark (trademark number [OMITTED]) at https://www.gov.uk/search-for-trademark
• I have deleted the flagged ASIN, and four further ASINs with the same brand attribute which were not flagged: [OMITTED], [OMITTED], [OMITTED], [OMITTED].
• I will ensure that I will not sell products listed under this brand name in the future for as long as I do not have permission from the rights owner
• I have contacted the rights owner four times by email and three times by telephone. Please see attached emails and telephone records. I have not yet received any correspondence back from the rights owner; however, I am continuing to reach out to them for further understanding of this issue and to find a resolution
• I have reviewed all of our existing offers for similar violations that may have gone unnoticed. Subsequently I have deleted ASINs which I understand may be at risk of policy violation, and incurred the losses associated. List of ASINs deleted:
  • ASIN deleted: [OMITTED], reason: product listing image not representative
  • ASIN deleted: [OMITTED], reason: product listing image not representative
  • ASIN deleted: [OMITTED], reason: brand name attribute does not match product brand name
  • ASIN deleted: [OMITTED], reason: listing EAN does not match barcode on product packaging
  • ASIN deleted: [OMITTED], reason: listing EAN does not match barcode on product packaging
  • ASIN deleted: [OMITTED], reason: listing EAN does not match barcode on product packaging

Preventive steps

I will integrate the following steps into my future workflow to prevent repeat failures:

• I will sell non-branded products only on listings with the brand attribute: ‘Generic’. I will not sell non-branded products on a listing if the brand attribute is anything other than ‘Generic’, as to comply with Amazon’s Brand Name Policy and Intellectual Property Policy, and to prevent potential violations of trademark law.
• I will ensure that all information on an existing product listing page exactly matches the product I wish to sell, in order to prevent customer confusion, and to protect the intellectual property rights of other sellers
• I will use the EAN field to help verify the identity of products within Amazon’s catalogue:
  • I will not sell a product on an existing listing if the EAN does not match exactly the product that I wish to sell, even if some of the other listing information matches.
  • If the EAN matches the product that I wish to sell I will verify all other pertinent information on the product listing page (brand, manufacturer, product title, product bullet points, product description) to ensure an exact match before selling on the listing
  • If there are no existing listings matching the EAN of the product that I wish to sell then I will create a new listing page
• Any products to be sold as non-branded on Amazon must be suitably of no brand when sourced. I will confirm with my supplier for non-branded products, and I will inspect the product and packaging for branding. Only if I am happy that the product I have sourced is non-branded will I consider selling the product as non-branded on Amazon
• If I am in doubt whether a product that I wish to sell may be deemed inauthentic by selling it on a particular listing page then I will not sell said product. When in doubt I will use the IPO office online tools to search for a trademark: https://www.gov.uk/search-for-trademark
• I will continue to keep all invoices and source only from reputable suppliers in order to prove authenticity of products should a problem arise
• To keep on top of policy changes I will review Amazon’s Intellectual Property Policy, Amazon’s Brand Name Policy, and all other programme policies every two months, and subsequently ensure all of my selling and listing activities are in line with the current policy. If any potential issues arise I will immediately close affected listings and cease selling so that a more detailed review can be done. I will contact seller support for further guidance on the matter if required. If I detect any policy violations then I will immediately delete affected listings in order to protect myself, the customer, and the selling community

I hope the above outlines what went wrong, the corrective measures we have taken, and the preventive steps we will be putting in place moving forward.

Thank you for considering our appeal.

---

AMAZON RESPONSE

Hello,

Thank you for submitting information to reactivate your listing. We reviewed your appeal and determined that you have not submitted required documents or the documents submitted are invalid. Please include the missing information listed below and resubmit in your plan of action.

Please provide any one of the below documents for proving authenticity of your listings:

– A letter of authorization (LOA) or licensing agreement (LA) from the rights owner indicating that the your products are authentic. You can find the contact information of the rights owner in the listing deactivation communication you have received.

– An invoice to indicate that your products are authentic.

– Retraction from the rights owner to be sent to Amazon directly. You can find the contact information of the rights owner in the listing deactivation communication you have received.

Has your listing been deactivated in error?

If you believe there has been an error, please tell us why. Your explanation should include how your listing(s) have not violated the brand’s intellectual property along with documents mentioned above to support authenticity.

Where do I send this information?

If you are appealing an action we have taken on your listings for an intellectual property complaint, go to Received Intellectual Property Complaints in the Product Policy Compliance section on Account Health (https://sellercentral-europe.amazon.com/performance/dashboard?ref=ah_em_mpa). Locate the deactivation record for the product listings you want to appeal and click on the Appeal button next to the record to submit your appeal to reactivate your listings. If you want to submit additional information, click on the “View appeal” button next to the deactivation record. Click the “Submit additional information” button to submit information necessary to reactivate your listings.

What happens if I do not send the requested information?

If we do not receive the requested information, the listing will remain removed and your account may be deactivated.

ASIN: [OMITTED]

Complaint ID: [OMITTED]

You can see your balance and settlement information in the Payments section of Seller Central. If you have questions about those, please send an email to payments-investigate@amazon.co.uk.

You can view your account performance (https://sellercentral-europe.amazon.com/performance/dashboard?ref=ah_em_mpa) or select Account Health on the home screen of the Amazon Seller app on your iOS or Android device. The Account Health dashboard shows how well your account is performing against the performance metrics and policies required to sell on Amazon.

---

DRAFT OF SECOND APPEAL - PLEASE COULD I HAVE FEEDBACK

Dear Seller Performance Team,

Thank you for reviewing my appeal. I have considered your response and outlined below what I have done to rectify the situation.

What went wrong

In response to a rights owner trademark infringement complaint, you have asked me to provide a valid invoice from an authorised distributor or a letter of authorisation or licensing agreement from the rights owner. I do not have a valid invoice because I regret that I mistakenly offered a non-branded product on a branded listing. I also do not have a letter of authorisation or a licensing agreement from the rights owner because I did not seek approval from the rights owner beforehand, as I failed to understand I was selling on a branded product listing.

I wrongly thought that:

• The brand attribute: ‘General X’ could be used to sell non-branded products in the same way that the brand attribute: ‘Generic’ can be used
• No brand name in the listing title was an indication that the product was non-branded
• I purchased the product from Amazon beforehand and inspected the product for branding of which none was identified

I failed to understand that:

• The brand attribute: ‘General X’ could not be used for selling non-branded products
• Only the brand attribute: ‘Generic’ can be used for selling non-branded products

I accept full responsibility for the mistake and I sincerely apologise for violating Amazon’s Intellectual Property Policy in these circumstances.

What I have done in response to receiving the complaint

I immediately deleted the flagged ASIN: [OMITTED], and four other ASINs under the same brand which were not flagged by the rights owner: [OMITTED], [OMITTED], [OMITTED], and [OMITTED].

I contacted the rights owner using the email address that you provided. I have emailed them four times explaining our mistake and offering an apology. I have also contacted them by phone three times. The rights owner has not responded to my emails or calls. I have attached evidence of emails and phone records. This explains why you have not yet received a retraction from the rights owner despite my efforts. I will continue to contact the rights owner to seek resolution.

I have reviewed all ASINs in my inventory for the same issue that may have gone unnoticed. I can confirm that I am not selling any non-branded products.

I have created a checklist for non-branded products:

• Is the brand attribute: ‘Generic’?
• Is there reference to a potential trademark either in the product description or in the images?
• Verify any potential trademarks at the UK IPO website: https://www.gov.uk/search-for-trademark
• Does the specification of the sourced product match the listing description including images?

I have read and bookmarked Amazon’s Intellectual Property Policy and Amazon’s Brand Name Policy, and will refer to these when considering selling a new product on Amazon.

What I will do to prevent a repeat failure

I will use my checklist before selling non-branded products.

Moving forward I will ensure I will sell non-branded products on listings with the brand attribute: ‘Generic’. For example, I will sell ASIN: B08L51VB5Z. I have sourced a product with matching specifications from a reputable supplier and have attached an invoice. I hope this demonstrates to you our new, compliant process.

Thank you for considering my appeal. I hope the above addresses your concerns and outlines our commitment to improve our selling practices. If there is any more information I can provide I would be happy to assist.

---

MY QUESTIONS TO THE FORUM

I have largely ignored writing about getting valid invoices from authorised distributors and letters of authorisation from rights owners as I don’t see this as directly relevant to my case (these documents would be relevant if intending to sell branded products). The issue as I understand it, and hopefully so do the seller performance team see it this way, are the rules and policies governing non-branded products.

The rights owner is ignoring my emails and calls (detailed in my appeals above). Will Amazon consider an appeal without a retraction from the rights owner, under any circumstance? If any sellers have experience of this issue it would be great to hear from you