Domestic Sellers Feel Pressure on Amazon

by: FeelingFroggy

Welcome to Ebay's evil twin.

Those two are joined at the hip.

by: sellerchick

ABSOLUTELY!! It seems like Ecommercebytes is the only site with the guts to publish comments from us sellers who are dealing with this. It is out of control.

I have been dealing with this since Summer of '15. I would report these fraudulent duplicate accounts and they USED to get kicked off. But come holiday season 2015, they just STOPPED removing names even though I provided chapter and verse the SAME ASINs with the SAME verbiage the suspended accounts used as the new accounts. Terrible situation for buyers and sellers.

by: zenbreeze

Chinese sellers have been stealing images of my paintings and selling various items, such as glow in the dark pendants.  Amazon won't take them down.  And, equally disastrously, they're using FBA so buyers don't even know they're buying Chinese sweatshop counterfeit items.  I've also noticed how performance rules don't apply to them either.  US third party merchants can't get away with reviews and feedback that they do.  My sales are down 80% on Amazon this year.  I've been working hard on etsy, trying to help fill the gap.

by: thehosst

Amazon is now mostly China and India and most categories. Quality of products is worst than terrible, descriptions misleading and confusing shipping times. Why do people pay Prime Shipping to get something 4 weeks later from China or India??? Pathetic

by: Moonwishes
Web Site

Yep there are plenty of Chinese seller or at least US citizens disguised as Chinese sellers.

I am tracking some that are in my niche and will turn them in and will continue to turn them in. They can't ignore me forever.

I had Amazon merge one of my listings with one of the Chinese seller's listings and I wrote to the CSR and they had it fixed within hours. These people get away with it when the real sellers stay silent or fling up their hands and figure that nothing can be done. This is a problem we all have to work on.

by: go-figure

Chances are that you're looking at the same ''back room'' deals on Amazon that were also made on eBay. The Chinese government is paying (off) sites to open up their marketplaces to Chinese sellers/companies. What other explanation accounts for the mass influx and the unwillingness by marketplaces to enforce the rules they so feverishly apply to domestic sellers?

It's a similar deal to the ePacket postage deal that the Chinese government negotiated with the Obama administration (think back to when that issue started rearing its ugly head). Just where did you think all of the millions came from to fund the Obama campaign back in '08? How was it that Obama came out of nowhere to suddenly overtake Hillary, the darling of the US media?

Sadly, there's really no end in sight. All of the talk of doubling the minimum wage and the new extreme overtime rules just implemented by the Obama administration will serve to do one thing: push more and more of what little is left of US manufacturing activities overseas. Why pay someone $20, $30 or $40 an hour to manage and monitor a machine when you can pay someone $1 or $2 an hour to do much the same job or even produce it by hand?

It's a global economy folks--decisions can no longer be made in a vacuum.

by: Barbbie

I no longer buy anything on Amazon once I became a seller and realized how incredible it is if you get what you intended to purchase and when fulfilled by Amazon if you actually get it shipped to you safely packed to avoid damage.  Between the computer glitches, Chinese and just uncaring employees, it is a gamble.
The Chinese sellers get away with a lot of this by getting a trademarked name for their unbranded or knockoff items (or even real items that they want the listing to themselves) and then selling them under that name, most of the time by changing a listing that has historical sales to whatever brand name they chose to keep those sales going.  Then they threaten the other sellers or have amazon throw all others off the listing.  Amazon believes that if you have a brand name registered that it means the product is legit. The Chinese have done this so many times to me it is ridiculous.
Ever since the ebay UPC requirements, I have had 3 foreign drop shippers take my ebay listings and put them on Amazon. The listings are horrible. Some are out of stock, some are just not amazon allowed used/new with defects items, some are listings that are for one item that you would think are more than one if you read the terrible ad.
I have also found items that are branded that they sell knockoffs or they put their own name on. Amazon does not seem to care about that.  I have reported one for calling out buyers by first and last name on replies to negative feedback, and by putting big red no refunds signs on each seller policy page except the return policy which was the normal default amazon policy, they are still there.  It is very time consuming to try and clean up amazon, I only wish amazon was trying to as well. It seems also if FBA they can get away with anything.