You’ve put countless hours of hard work into selling online, when one day, out of the blue, you get an email from Amazon and all you can see is one word: ‘suspension’. But when it comes to product suspensions on Amazon, your worries can subside a bit. In this post, FeedbackExpress will cover what a product suspension is, how you can avoid, and what to do if you find yourself dealing with one.
Product Suspension: How It’s Different
There are a few different kinds of product suspensions, so let’s take a look at each kind.
Buy Box Suspension
Of all the different kinds of product suspensions, this one is probably the least worrisome. It means your product isn’t fully suspended and you can keep selling, but the product isn’t Buy Box-eligible at the moment.
How to Fix It: Research other sites that sell the same item and lower your price to meet the lowest price standard. You can also just wait until other Amazon sellers run out if you can’t/don’t want to budge on price.
Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) Suspension
All this means is the products you have in an FBA warehouse will be suspended and held until things are cleared up.
How to Fix It: Go with Fulfillment by Merchant (FBM) for now so you can keep selling.
ASIN Seller Suspension
If you find yourself with a seller suspension on an ASIN, it’s because you have either bad metrics or violations against you. And if this happens, you won’t be able to make an offer against an ASIN.
How to Fix It: You need to get your ratings up, if the numbers are low. And if you have violations against you, examine why and take steps to change the root of the problem.
Full ASIN Suspension
This is when the ASIN is turned off and your product removed from the site, disabling you from being able to sell it anymore. This typically happens if you’ve listed in the wrong category, tried to upload a restricted product, mismatched the product and ASIN, or sold something that’s out of stock.
How to Fix It: You’ll have to first figure out where you went wrong, then file an appeal with Amazon to get the ASIN reinstated.
Why You Could Find Yourself with a Product Suspension
Adding to the complexity is that within each type of product suspension are different reasons that could lead to the suspension.
- Safety: Amazon takes care of its buyers and if it deems one of your products unsafe, that’s a huge cause of concern to them. Take care that your items don’t have defects or risks that could lead to injury; if there is that potential, then be explicit and clear in outlining the risks.
- Used-Sold-as-New: There’s been a spike in the last year or so about buyers complaining they got used products that were advertised as new. This is just wrong all-around — sellers shouldn’t be profiting off used items, and buyers are entitled to receive either a new or used product, depending on what they chose. Although it’s more expensive, it’s much easier to deal with entirely new items because it’s black-and-white.
- Return Rate: If your return rate stays high over a period of time, then you could be at risk of that product being suspended. To avoid this, describe the product in as much clear and honest detail as possible and talk to buyers if they leave a negative review and see what went wrong.
- Intellectual Property: This is a tough one because unless you’re very big or have deep pockets, it can be difficult to win a case of intellectual property if you sold products you didn’t hold the rights to. If caught of this, suspension is immediate. It’s much easier to create your own brand and logo than to research intellectual property and know it inside and out.
Final Thoughts
It can be a little jarring to get a product suspension email from Amazon, but it’s definitely not the end of the world. We’ve outlined various types of suspensions, the reasons that can lead to them, and how you can solve each problem. But while you’re dealing with all this, it’s important not to let your feedback slide. You still need to make sure you’re getting as many good reviews as possible and FeedbackExpress can help with that.
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