Suspended for "Misuse of ASIN variations"
Since Amazon have stopped accepting FBA shipments, we reactivated SFP on Friday, got a full weekend’s worth of orders on the Friday afternoon… then got suspended for “misuse of ASIN Variations” (see below). All forms of seller support contact have been disabled excluding “submit an appeal” and “request more information” our request for more information has so far gone without an answer, with suspensions we usually have the option to request further information via phone or live chat which then helps us to create the appeal but this seems to be missing this time.
Our appeal (see below) was almost immediately rejected, with the default template “we have decided you may not sell on Amazon.co.uk” with no further information at all.
There were 2 options when submitted the appeal “submit a POA” or “I believe I have been suspended in error”
We’ve only ever received 2 warnings for misuse of variations, both of which were received last week and were genuine variations which had been incorrectly flagged as invalid, in addition they were listings which sold out 2+ years ago and that other sellers had since butchered beyond recognition (images changed to different products, etc.)
As such I submitted the appeal under the “I believe I have been suspended in error” since as far as we’re aware there are absolutely no other issues.
I can only find one other thread on here where someone has been suspended for this specific reason:
Anyone else out there had this happen and managed to actually get it resolved?
I’m considering sending an email to the MD, but with Amazon’s newly updated duplicate case policy (which we’ve already had a warning for, even though they were 2 completely separate issues I opened cases for) I’d wager they would see this as “obtaining a new resolution to an existing case” and block us from creating any new cases…effectively blocking our ability to appeal.
There’s no option to submit a further appeal, however there is an option to “provide the requested information” (they didn’t request any).
Original suspension message:
Hello,
Your Amazon selling account has been deactivated. Your listings have been removed. Funds will not be transferred to you and may be held for up to 90 days. Please ship any open orders to avoid further impact to your account.
Why is this happening?
You have misused ASIN variations repeatedly or impacted customer trust through the usage of incorrect variations. This is against our policies.
How do I reactivate my account?
To reactivate your selling account, please send a plan of action that explains:
– The root cause(s) of the variation policy violation.
– The actions you have taken to resolve the multiple misused variations on your account.
– The steps you have taken to prevent the misuse of variations going forward.
How do I send the required information?
If you wish to appeal this decision, click the Appeal button next to this message on the Performance Notifications page in Seller Central (https://sellercentral-europe.amazon.com/gp/customer-experience/perf-notification…).
What happens if I do not send the requested information?
If we do not receive the requested information within 17 days, your account will be permanently deactivated.
We’re here to help.
For help creating your plan, search for “Appeal the Removal of Selling Privileges” in Seller Central Help. When you are ready to send us your plan, click the Appeal button next to this message on the Performance Notifications page in Seller Central (https://sellercentral-europe.amazon.com/gp/customer-experience/perf-notification…).
Has your account been deactivated in error?
If you believe there has been an error, please submit an explanation. Your explanation should include the following information:
– Evidence or examples that demonstrate that your account complies with our ASIN Creation policy.
You can view your account performance in Seller Central (https://sellercentral-europe.amazon.com/performance/dashboard?reftag=email_suspe…) 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.
Thank you.
Sincerely,
Seller Performance Team
Original Appeal:
23 March 2020 10:31 GMT
Has your account been deactivated in error?
Hello,
Our account has been deactivated for “variation abuse”, however several variations have recently been removed which were genuine variations and did not go against Amazon’s policies.
For example:
Parent ASIN: B075SJ1CJ1
Child ASIN(s): B00LI5I8IM B075SJD4PD B00AFV1G5C B002N3M7W6 B00G5F44BA
This Variation consists of multiple sizes of the same item, they are all by the same manufacturer + brand (Youcopia) and do not consist of any different item styles, only different sizes and colours, as such this complies with Amazon’s policies (besides which the parent ASIN is not in our inventory so I’m not confident that we even created this variation)
Parent ASIN: B07B8NBLFN
Child ASIN(s): B00BFZD9ZC B01MRAEXPW B07B8NQ98Y
This variation consists of multiple sizes of the same whiskey glass, again these are all by the same brand and consist of the same style in different sizes.
The reason we did not push the appeals for any of these removals to be processed is because we no longer stock these items ourselves, however other sellers are still using the listings (and the variation may have broken apart if we removed it from our inventory, inconveniencing the other sellers)
We are already struggling to operate due to staff issues relating to the coronavirus/Covid-19, being unable to disburse funds from our Amazon account is severely impacting our ability to remain operational. As such could you please look to respond to this with some urgency?
Kind regards,
Adam.
15 replies
Seller_24Bec1n3QCVmi
I have looked at the asins you mentioned in your appeal and I have to agree with Amazon that you violated their policy I’m afraid. ASINS B00LI5I8IM and B075SJD4PD would have been ok as variations but in my view ASINS B00AFV1G5C, B002N3M7W6 and B00G5F44BA are completely different products so should never have been a variation of the first two.
I have generally found that the way to successfully appeal is to admit you made an error (whether you believe so or not), and tell Amazon what you will do to ensure you don’t make the same error again.
Appeals are generally denied automatically if Amazon’s bot detects that your appeal is not in the correct format. I also assume that during the current climate, Amazon will be relying even more on the bots and less so on human interaction.
Seller_N8REXkyGUOygR
This exact same thing has happened to me today.
I have no idea what the issue is as they have stopped the asins showing.
I have no idea how to appeal because how can I appeal something i have no idea what the issue is.
I am at a loss what to do but your story is Exactly the same as mine today!
Hate Amazon at times, alot of times aswell!
We have been selling on here for years and our account is in excellent standing
I sent a reply saying i think they have made a mistake but seconds later an auto generated email came back.
Its just pathetic isnt it!
Seller_ypSHjvblvjnom
Just to add a “me too” to the situation above - suspended 2 weeks ago for misuse of variations. 2 policy warnings on the same day, one day before we were suspened. One is our fault, completely didn’t understand the policy. The other is for a product which we have never sold, in a category we don’t sell in, and the ASINs concerned don’t even show up in our seller central.
Still waiting for seller performance to review currently.
Seller_fjUzZOHEpWtJT
Hi,
Our account suspend because the same reason: misusing variation.
We deleted all entire variations whatever against policy or not, and we send plan of action 11 times.
At the beginning Amazon respond ‘’ we got your information, we decided you may no longer sale on Amazon’’.
And now, even we can submit plan of action, Amazon respond nothing.
Don’t know why and how to reactive account.
Seller_N8REXkyGUOygR
I am still in the dark about this whole thing.
Looking at the policy violations i got on the 1st April, they seem to have changed what is a parent and child.
This is what i have sent to some Amazon person i have been sort of working with
I am so confused.
So on the 1st April i got 2 violation messages stating “The listing(s) at the bottom of this message has been edited due to a violation of Amazon’s ASIN Creation policy”
At the bottom it says
“Variations Corrected
Parent ASIN: [B075WYF1MP]
Abusive Children: B075CHVYNX,B075WY5HBP,B075WXWMLS,B07LB4WT75,B08258FQGB,”
The second violation products are:
Variations Corrected
Parent ASIN: [B086HJXR2K ]
Abusive Children: [B075CHVYNX,B075WY5HBP,B075WXWMLS,B07LB4WT75,B08258FQGB,]”
The silly thing is, the first Abusive Children number B075CHVYNX is the parent as you can see here https://www.amazon.co.uk/Canon-PIXMA-TR7550-4-Printer/dp/B075CHVYNX/ref=sr_1_5?dchild=1&keywords=tr7550&qid=1590573032&sr=8-5
So it looks like the changes made by Amazon have caused the issue and i have no idea what to do to correct it.
I literally am at a loss on what to do.
Any ideas please?
Paul
Seller_1ezr1wvgVs00v
Hello!
We have been recently suspended for the same issue, we got no complaints before, no warning. Could you guys give us some feedback to our submitted plan of action? Because we got none from Amazon. Here is it:
The root cause of the issue
The root cause of the misusing ASIN variations, and impacting customer trust by this, was EAN related issue which caused the fact that one of our product variations, BUSHCRAFT SATCHEL BAG (Parent SKU TB-BST-CD ASIN B0895KLCY6, child TB-BST-CD-23 B07FDJWDBS) was showing on Amazon.co.uk as completely different thing, in this case as URBAN TACTICAL PANTS.
The EAN code problem is a well known issue for us, it began when other dealers of our Helikon-Tex brand began crating new listings for product without our assistance. They listed some products which were discontinued from production, with incorrected EAN codes.
This led to this situation where correct submission was changed on Amazon, due to the fact that backend systems of your site remembered this EAN code as something else.
The actions that you have taken to resolve the issue
We have take specific measures to resolve policy violations, such as:
a) Carefully studied Amazon’s variation policy and ASIN creation policy, to be able to follow all Amazon’s relevant policies the future
b) Contacting Amazon Seller Support to clear up all the ambiguities regarding the issue
as well as other sellers who listed our troublesome product to ensure that their customers haven’t filed any complaints
c) Product page issue was reported to the Brand Registry Support
d) Deletion of this product from our inventory, our submission no longer have an impact on the product page
e) Review of all our listings in search for more cases of violating variations policy
f) We would like to point out the fact, that although we didn’t have this product in stock on Amazon, but we are aware of the fact that we as the Brand Registry owner of Helikon-Tex, we are responsible for all listing under our brand, especially those which are violating Amazon’s policies.
The steps that you have taken to prevent the issue going forward
The following specific steps are taken to prevent future violations:
a) Redirection of our focus to resolving any issues which will present themselves in the future, as soon as they appear.
b) Creating new instructions, guidelines and standards for better cooperation between our e-commerce team and Amazon Helikon-Tex product sellers. We have started this project before suspension, but now we have focused on it even more to be able resolve issues like this as soon as we can.
c) Setting up regular listing inspections, we plan going trough all product pages at least four times a month
We don’t even started selling… Especially this product! Response to our appeal was automatic, we got only the message “You may not sell on Amazon.co.uk” How do you get to appeal once more?
