And Amazon regularly requests that we update our list price since it hasn’t changed “recently”.
We tried to get the strike through over the years to run a sale and never had success even though we followed the guidelines (policy?). We always thought there was more to it than we were aware of or could at least see (read).
Guess our decision to have our list price be our price and forget about it wasn’t such a bad decision after all.
Ya they want you to click this box to make them look better when they force you to lower your price.
I fully agree that the list prices being shown are being used to mislead people. A lot of “list prices” have units being sold at those prices either rarely or never. Unless more than 50% of a product’s volume is being sold at the list price I think it’s false advertising.
They practically demand we inflate our list prices to make it look like customers are getting deals.
If we sell at list price it isn’t eligible to be a “featured offer”
List prices are usually fiction for all but a small percentage of products.
Slimy lawyers in Washington state might be able to find an ignorant enough jury to get a judgement.
I don’t think a jury would have to be ignorant to get a judgement. The “discount from list price/MSRP” is a strategy as old as time, but I personally hate it and believe it’s false advertising. Just because something has been done for ages doesn’t mean it’s right.
I would award a judgement both against the retailer and the brand who provided the list price/MSRP if I were ever on a jury in a case like this.
But the legal question is – it it Amazon’s fault, or that of the seller who inflated the MSRP?
In this lawsuit, Amazon is the defendant related specifically to their own Fire TV “sale” pricing where the “list” price wasn’t backed up by 90-day sales data.
Otherwise, I believe that Sellers could certainly provide enough proof that though they might have given in to Amazon’s demands for inaccurate list prices by providing whatever number seemed to satisfy Amazon and free an ASIN from its various possible fates, they were forced to provide numbers that met Amazon’s unknown criteria–not numbers that were necessarily accurate.
Is that always (or even usually) the case? No.
But it’s enough of an issue that trying to go after thousands of small 3Ps wouldn’t be worth the time.
If Amazon wanted accurate list prices, well, they have all the 90-day data PLUS comparisons across the web. They don’t have to ask.
All any Seller would have to do to defend themselves (rightly or wrongly) is pull posts from OSFE and NSFE (including mod posts) and any communications from Amazon, to note the vagaries and inconsistencies.
I think they’re definitely going after Amazon on this one and not small 3Ps, though it would be worthwhile going after a big brand or two that do this practice either on or off Amazon (this isn’t a problem unique to Amazon) as that would set an example and scare people from using this type of tactic anywhere.
IMO they are going after Amazon because Amazon is too BIG and if they don’t do it now, they might not get to go after Amazon at all.
When hit with too many legal actions, public and private, some companies decide to settle and the plaintiff lawyers get a big payday,
Much as I loath Amazon, I loath plaintiff’s lawyers more.
Wha? I always sell at list price and I’m always the featured offer.