Amazon copying, then abandoning listing to overseas "markets"

In an open invitation to counterfeiters, Amazon copied the listing of one of my products to:

  • Japan
  • Italy
  • France
  • Spain
  • UAE
  • UK
  • Singapore
  • Egypt
  • Mexico
  • Australia
  • Poland
  • Saudi Arabia
  • Germany
  • Turkey

We have no accounts in these countries, so attempting to get these listings suppressed is difficult. From the number of reviews, we can date the copying, and there is no attempt to update these listings from the updates we apply to the USA listing. We get no help from the ā€œmarketā€, as they say that we must register (and set up a bank account in that country) as a seller in that market to get any support.

The problem is that opportunists see a ā€œout of stock productā€, and play all kinds of games, from brand hijacking to making an offer on the product when they clearly have no stock and hope to do some sort of ā€œarbitrageā€ to buy from USA only when orders are placed.

This also enrages our legit in-country dealers, who want nothing to do with amazon, and ask us we WE put up a listing for the product in their country, logically concluding that if it was not them, it could only be us. It is hard to explain how random amazon is in all regards. Competent business-people tend to not believe how wacky amazon is until they get their own seller account.

We canā€™t be the first person to have this happen, whatā€™s the solution?

4 Likes

May I ask if you have all four of the possibilities for Amazon to do this (link, SAS) tightly locked down to your Enterpriseā€™s preference, rather than Amazonā€™s*?

For the past few years, a good deal of evidence has surfaced that it is quite possible that if those particular hatches arenā€™t recognized by the Amabots as being tightly battened-down, problems ensue when one of Amazonā€™s far-flung Regional Marketplace teams decides that carte blanche has been granted - rightly or wrongly.

*

Which settings, sadly, are all-too often found with the Amazon-prescribed attribute that the default is ā€œEnabledā€ - without oneā€™s own input on the actual desirability of that, from a 3P Seller or 1P Vendorā€™s POV, dammitā€¦

4 Likes

I wouldnā€™t assume it was Amazon. Iā€™ve seen before where sellers create listings in other markets to sell at a higher price, especially if you have International Shipping.

Are there any actual listings???

2 Likes

No, the listings appeared with an ā€œunavailableā€ status. There have been brief appearances of one opportunist or another, but this seems the work of automated processes, as a look at the sellers shows a grab-bag of unrelated products. One suspects that they specialize in making offers on out-of-stock products, as speculative test marketing. All disappeared in puffs of smoke.

Yes, thatā€™s not an issue, and as you can see from the list, there are many counties outside the usual ā€œAmericanā€ expansion, when our only account is USA based.

1 Like