New US INFORM Consumers Act imposes new requirements for sellers
The INFORM Consumers Act takes effect in the US on June 27, 2023. This law places obligations on high-volume third-party sellers to provide, and on Amazon to collect, verify, and disclose, information about their businesses.
To ensure a trusted store for both customers and sellers, Amazon already maintains and continues to innovate on robust processes for collecting and verifying sellers’ business information during and after registration. While many of these processes are more sophisticated and effective than the basic requirements of the INFORM Consumers Act, this new law requires us to take certain additional steps to verify information related to high-volume sellers.
You may be required to provide information about your business for verification, such as your name, a government-issued identification document, a business address, bank account information, a working email address, a working phone number, and a tax identification number. You may also be required to annually certify that your information is current.
In most cases, if you already completed verification for any of the required information, you won’t need to submit it again, as long as your information hasn’t changed.
If you need to take further action, we will contact you via email with specific instructions. We ask that you respond to these messages within the specified timelines, as the law may require us to deactivate your selling account until you successfully complete verification.
We recommend you go to your Account Information now to confirm that all of your business information is accurate and current.
To learn more about the INFORM Consumers Act, go to About the INFORM Consumers Act.
We have also updated the Amazon Services Business Solutions Agreement for consistency with the new law. To learn more, go to Changes to the Amazon Services Business Solutions Agreement.
Seller_uNTUEUuADKyws
Yippee, bigger government with more ID requirements! Make government bigger is what I always say....
Seller_UmrCDJCu7DwPR
Amazon, please check to make sure there is a way to verify our bank account if we have a Marcus credit line outstanding. We do not currently have access to the manage deposit page if we have any amount on that credit line drawn.
Seller_iJipOAhjm1IE4
how about oversea based sellers? they aint got EIN
Seller_ZVOOuHQkq7sar
A complete over reach that stands to only benefit big government. It is ridiculous that this is the definition of a high volume third party seller:
High-volume, third-party sellers include online marketplace participants that conduct 200 or more transactions resulting in total revenues of $5,000 or more during a continuous 12-month period. Online marketplaces must acquire these sellers' (1) bank account numbers, (2) government-issued identification, (3) tax identification numbers, and (4) contact information. Online marketplaces must verify this information and annually certify any changes to it.
I'm pretty sure 99% of Amazon sellers already do more than $5,000 in revenue and / or 200 sales a year on an annual basis. How are such low numbers considered high volume?
Seller_9WckySCMWG2d0
How come EBay does not require all this RED tape ?
Seller_wc3hEgm0kJ23u
Amazan has created a mess for me. Please look into my case.
My account is opened to a business entity based in EU. Amazon has remove all my deposit methods and asks to provide bank statement on my INDIVIDUAL name.
I have a bank account that belongs to my business ! If I link my personal payment method to my business account I will face serious legal issues in the EU country where my company is based.
Please allow me to send a bank statement on my business name not INDIVIDUAL!
This is not right at all as my Amazon account belongs to my business entity and you have ALL THE INFO ABOUT THAT!
Now all my withdrawals are blocked!
Seller_XJk5RkDQR39p0
Isnt' that exactly the info required right now for re-verification?
Seller_4K7eqIN4GuF2E
Amazon is working so well - NOT. Asked us to reverify our deposit method. So we uploaded our April statement showing Amazon DIRECT DEPOSITS. Because my name was not on the statement (we are a C-Corporation so no individual's name appears on any bank statement) it was rejected.So I asked for a call from seller support. The person reviewed our submission and since our corporate name is the same as on the bank statement (and matches the FEIN) she did not understand why it was rejected. So she resubmitted it but by doing so Amazon automatically placed a 3-day hold on disbursements.
What gives Amazon. [Moderator Edit: removed inappropriate commentary]
Seller_9Uf78DYSZ2lcW
Seller_4K7eqIN4GuF2E
No, it is just the programing is so incoherent as to not be functioning properly for a good portion of accounts. I mean I'm a single member LLC so they insist on showing my personal name as the Legal Entity but when I verified my deposit method I was given the option to say the account holder of the bank account was my business name or personal name. Since my bank account is in the business name I chose that and it worked just fine.
But I'm hearing from plenty of people that Amazon is NOT giving them that option.
And I'm also seeing that their servers are getting overloaded on the verifications and people are not able to get it done when they try sometimes.
They are just a mess.
Seller_0rXAME9V4LQSx
I feel like Amazon is dropping the ball on the other part of this bill. Probably the most important part.
(online marketplaces) must also provide consumers with methods to report suspicious activity on the marketplace.
To me this means Amazon needs to present a clear cut way to report (and remove) certain bad actors from overseas. That's the whole point of this collecting information, right? To know exactly who is behind accounts so they can be dealt with.
