Forum

Account under review on non-ghost account. Should I still ship items?
 

Brand new to selling on Amazon. Started my first account, a non-ghost account which uses my real information, everything is on the "up and up", and I'm proud to be doing well. Account was put "under review" 2 days ago. Over the past 3 weeks my inventory has gone from 200 items to 500 items, so I think I may have hit a velocity limit. I'm currently selling roughly ~25 items, ~$500 a day thanks to the holiday season - a fraction of what some people here do.

I've disbursed several times over the last few days, ranging from ~$400-$700 every 1-3 days. Perhaps this is what made my account go "under review".

I have ~$600 in my account now. What sucks is I need to keep disbursing which allows me to buy more items to grow my stock, to keep the money moving. I don't have a crapton of money in my personal savings so if I can't disburse for 30 days I'll have to stop my growth temporarily.

A month ago, my account was suspended for poor performance. I submitted a "Plan of Action" and my account has been spotless ever since, but the rating still isn't perfect due to my poor performance form before. Perhaps this has something to do with my account going "under review".

Trying to figure out what "under review" means and how I should react. A few questions:

1) Do all accounts go "under review" when they hit a certain volume to ensure they are safe for the Amazon marketplace?
2) I've read horror stories of Amazon banning accounts and keeping the money, is there any risk of this happening in my situation?
3) Should I continue to sell and ship items as usual?
4) There's an option to "appeal" the review, which asks you questions about the source of your stock, your online selling history, and other similar questions. If Amazon needs to review my account to keep their marketplace safe, fine, is it a good idea to appeal the review and provide additional information to speed this process along?
5) What typically triggers an account to go "under review"?

Thanks as always. This place rocks. Trying to learn the ropes of Amazon selling. I like it a lot more than eBay thus far. A LOT.

This is the "Performance Notification" that they sent me:

It mentions "Velocity Limits" in that email, so I'm assuming the account is under review due to recent fast level of growth? Is there anything I should be concerned or worried about in this situation?

If your items are legit, ship them. If your items are not legit and that is all you sell, ship if you want, but you may run into issues. If they are not legit I would like to add that you will constantly be running into issues with amazon, and you need to create a new business plan.

Fortunately for me my items are legit.

If you do not ship then you will not get your money until after 90 days and you will RUIN completely legit info with amazon forever. Why risk it? Keep selling and shipping and do NOT forget to ask for feedback.

I haven't been sending specific messages to request feedback, but I will do that now. Thank you for the tip.

I have been including a feedback request slip inside every package, which says:

Feel free to use this if you think it can be useful.

Despite this, I've found that it still hasn't increased the amount of people who leave feedback.

I imagine contacting buyers directly is much more effective. No idea why I didn't think to do this myself.

Does anybody know an automated way to send feedback requests, perhaps even with the buyer's name and item that they bought in the message body, say 30 days after the transaction is over?

Would you guys say it was most likely a velocity limit that caused this? I went from 200 to 500 items in the last month.

***I received this on my amazon ghost acct that I opened last month, I've had ~$400 in sales already.
all legit items. This letter f/ amazon also mentions “Velocity Limits and Account Reviews” --- HOW MANY TIMES DOES AMAZON DO A ACCOUNT REVIEW, IN THE USUAL CASE?

Hello from Amazon.

We are writing to let you know that we are conducting a review of your selling account. During this review, your funds will be temporarily reserved in your seller account.

We conduct account reviews in support of our commitment to improving the customer experience. These reviews are intended to ensure the timely shipment of orders and compliance with our selling policies.

Please continue to fulfill orders and list only items that you are able to ship by or before the promise date.

For information on how you may be able to expedite this review, search on “Velocity Limits and Account Reviews” in our seller Help.

We will notify you via e-mail when our account review is complete.

We appreciate your patience and cooperation.

Best regards,

Merchant Review Team
Amazon.com
http://www.amazon.com

Read the advice of AmazonStealth - if your items are legit, go ahead - if possibility exists for illegit accusation and account deletion, dont. Make business decisions based on your judgment and wisdom :)

^absolutely agreed. You can ship the non legit stuff, but it is really a coin toss in the end.