I let my Amazon shop go
I feel like this is not going to be news to anyone, but I'm going to say it so that the feedback is public:
1. My account gets "deactivated for inactivity" about once a month despite me going through several tabs on my dashboard checking on my things at least once a day. In fact, you can still go through several pages that look fine before you suddenly hit a page that says that your account is deactivated. It is easy to not notice for days. It is just one example of how Seller Central does not work well, and why sellers say that they feel like Amazon wants them to quit. Despite sellers' activity, the platform deactivates them randomly and without notice, and makes it a chore to go through the reactivation steps and wait several days, losing business, for the shop to be visible again. It made it so easy for me to just let go.
2. When I joined, it was so difficult to set up the store. Listing forms full of irrelevant and confusing mandatory fields. Forms that don't show any warnings but don't work, and the answer from support is typically "give it a couple of days and it will start working." How can you seriously operate in 2025 with a platform where everything seems to be held together by chance and strong word one step away from crashing?
3. Support associates who respond in chats don't have answers and rush to close the conversation.
4. When I paid for premium support, my representative never replied to my email. He called me once to assure me that my open support tickets will get a response. I got no help to review the shop and help me market my products better. My rating for the premium seller support is 0/10.
5. Seller forums are full of sellers who feel defeated.
I don't know how much money Amazon received from me in premium fees. Notably, I can't find this information on Seller Central. I would say, a couple hundred dollars. That's the cost of the lesson I learned. As a businessman, I can't imagine why Amazon prefers to take this small cut and lose a seller to building an efficient platform where sellers thrive, to earn commissions in perpetuity. The overwhelming feeling is that Amazon is infiltrated by employees and contractors who learned how to manipulate the system to earn their salary while doing as little as possible, and these people have no motivation or incentive to help sellers. If there is anyone who is not indifferent about seller success, it is apparent that they are not listening on this forum, they don't use Seller Central, and they don't look at support tickets. In fact, when I reached out to a couple of Amazon executives with titles in Seller Experience on LinkedIn, you can guess that none of them gave a flying duck. The rot is widespread. Throughout my experience, I met two Amazon associates who genuinely helped. It was difficult to find such people, and a matter of luck that a business cannot reliably build on.
Amazon made it very easy for me to quit selling on Amazon. In fact, it is the only thing in my entire experience as an Amazon seller that seems to be intentionally made easy for me. Process that. This marketplace has become an Aliexpress extension.
I let my Amazon shop go
I feel like this is not going to be news to anyone, but I'm going to say it so that the feedback is public:
1. My account gets "deactivated for inactivity" about once a month despite me going through several tabs on my dashboard checking on my things at least once a day. In fact, you can still go through several pages that look fine before you suddenly hit a page that says that your account is deactivated. It is easy to not notice for days. It is just one example of how Seller Central does not work well, and why sellers say that they feel like Amazon wants them to quit. Despite sellers' activity, the platform deactivates them randomly and without notice, and makes it a chore to go through the reactivation steps and wait several days, losing business, for the shop to be visible again. It made it so easy for me to just let go.
2. When I joined, it was so difficult to set up the store. Listing forms full of irrelevant and confusing mandatory fields. Forms that don't show any warnings but don't work, and the answer from support is typically "give it a couple of days and it will start working." How can you seriously operate in 2025 with a platform where everything seems to be held together by chance and strong word one step away from crashing?
3. Support associates who respond in chats don't have answers and rush to close the conversation.
4. When I paid for premium support, my representative never replied to my email. He called me once to assure me that my open support tickets will get a response. I got no help to review the shop and help me market my products better. My rating for the premium seller support is 0/10.
5. Seller forums are full of sellers who feel defeated.
I don't know how much money Amazon received from me in premium fees. Notably, I can't find this information on Seller Central. I would say, a couple hundred dollars. That's the cost of the lesson I learned. As a businessman, I can't imagine why Amazon prefers to take this small cut and lose a seller to building an efficient platform where sellers thrive, to earn commissions in perpetuity. The overwhelming feeling is that Amazon is infiltrated by employees and contractors who learned how to manipulate the system to earn their salary while doing as little as possible, and these people have no motivation or incentive to help sellers. If there is anyone who is not indifferent about seller success, it is apparent that they are not listening on this forum, they don't use Seller Central, and they don't look at support tickets. In fact, when I reached out to a couple of Amazon executives with titles in Seller Experience on LinkedIn, you can guess that none of them gave a flying duck. The rot is widespread. Throughout my experience, I met two Amazon associates who genuinely helped. It was difficult to find such people, and a matter of luck that a business cannot reliably build on.
Amazon made it very easy for me to quit selling on Amazon. In fact, it is the only thing in my entire experience as an Amazon seller that seems to be intentionally made easy for me. Process that. This marketplace has become an Aliexpress extension.
0 replies
Seller_JxGBh45c1NGew
Well said, Amazon is indeed plagued with problems since 2023 and does not seem to be getting any better. We have been selling here for over 6 years now and it was challenging but great up until about last year when everything went haywire. They stopped real seller support for all the medium to small sellers years ago and never fixed it on purpose. I mean alot of these so-called support agents do not even speak English, it is like a third language for them which is crazy. It blows my mind as well how such a large business such as Amazon can continue to function when their most important asset, the 3P American seller, is not given any support and relies solely on a computer algo/Ai/bot.
Very large sellers who do millions in sales, there is some threshold, do have a real account manager who can fix everything with a phone call, and this is truly unfair for any small seller or anyone trying to get into this business. The worst part is that due to Amazon basically controlling all search engines (monopoly), there is no chance to compete and succeed in online resale through your own website or other channels. It requires millions in advertising to get your name out there which is why everyone succumbs to the big great beast that is Amazon.
Until congress can change that, we are all stuck here. Amazon created this dilemma and uses it to its's advantage, many have tried but Amazon has a building full of lawyers that no law firm is willing to go up against. It is the biggest and greatest scam/fraud of all time in my opinion.
Seller_ONDn9UyWE3G3e
All it takes is ONE Attorney General of the United States and a building full of corrupt lawyers won't stand a chance. ; )
Seller_1oT4ZOwrSByEE
You are required to sell something once a month here or it is automatic
Seller_UHVnOVHF8YpEx
It's unfortunate that we have to pay extra for "premium" support. It's like Amazon is saying, "we don't want to deal with you, but if you pay us even more money, then maybe we'll glance your way."
Can't blame you for going. Their customer service for sellers and A-Z claims dept seems to be run by autonomous chimpanzees on drugs.
Seller_oOG0u7WrgAtTa
Amazon Sucks. What can I tell you. I sell on amazon but I never ever buy on amazon.
Seller_zSWez2Mzpdboa
It's really not worth it any more. Amazon is enriching themselves by taking advantage of small businesses knowing very well that they don't have the wherewithal to fight with this giant of a company.
So, they just step on everyone they can. No one is going to stop them.
Seller_NWmjsYhnCMUDw
When I first started selling it. selling on Amazon. about three years ago it was FBA I felt the fees. were unjust. I felt that the payment schedule was hard to keep up with.. So now that I've went FBM. it's better.. I've also went from my pro account. to. the lesser account. Period. Now I kind of know. when I'm going to get paid. What's happening? I've never really counted on them One time I was making decent money.
Seller_2srXkS44rN39i
I've been selling on here since 2010. My prime years were from around 2016 to 2019. Now I'm selling in 3.5 months what I used to sell in a month back then. Long tail items used to be my bread and butter. Now they like never sell. More and more brands need approval or those 2D codes that are on the packaging, but aren't on the actual product (pretty much eliminating any way to sell a used item). I used to have over 2,000 orders a year on here and last year it was around 430.
I'm still making some $$ on here, so its not yet time to fully jump ship, but no use to really put much more than minimum effort on here.
Seller_304rkbkKjimED
I couldn't agree anymore. We are also leaving the platform. The bottom line is this - SELLER SUPPORT is a JOKE.
Simple as.
We are trying to operate a business without a crucial 'member of staff'. It literally sinks everything else. It's not a long term growth strategy.
SHOPIFY is the WAY forward. Build your OWN business and be in CONTROL. Yes you have to advertise and it's a whole different beast, but at least you are BUILDING something. On Amazon you will always be capped. It's the difference between a free market and dictatorship.
Seller_qMgi7qxvEo7f1
I have to agree. Selling on Amazon is mentally draining for sure. Most of the sellers feel helpless. :-(