7 essential condition guidelines for Amazon sellers

What’s the buzz about condition guidelines?

Amazon forums are all abuzz with the chatter of sellers who’ve had their accounts suspended. It seems failure to comply with condition guidelines has reached epidemic proportions. As more and more sellers have a bee in their bonnet about it, we thought it’s high time we gave you a honey of a list to tick off as you describe your products. Continue reading to make sure your listings are the bee’s knees.

Honey-Coating It

While we can’t help but bang the drum for a quick sale, let’s bear in mind that it’s important to follow Amazon’s rules. On the other hand, understating your product is the best way to ensure gleaming reviews, but it won’t make your product any more competitive; nor your business more profitable. Therefore, the best way to go is to give your customer a true and fair account of what you’re selling; particularly as Amazon condition guidelines have not changed in over a decade. They don’t only serve as a safety net for customers, but for sellers as well.

The 7 Head-Scratchers

So, let’s take a gander at what it takes to list your stuff in the virtual land of milk and honey:

1. Items must be in working condition overall, be they new or used, and all their parts must work.
2. New means new, and nothing but brand spanking new will do. Mentioning a flaw in the condition notes does not absolve you from a claim. Take care when switching between categories, because some words don’t carry the same weight across categories. Category-specific guidelines can be found here.
3. Condition notes should never state that your item differs from the listing. The product must fully match the listing; save maybe for a missing instruction manual, etc. Non-media items that come in different colors, for instance, have different ASINs/EANs, and should be listed individually.
4. Remaindered books, ex-libris and book club editions are not collectibles. The title should clearly state that a book is a club edition. Remainder marks demote a new book to ‘Used-Like New’, at best. Ex libris books with stickers, bookplates and ‘From the library of’ inscriptions can be ‘Used-Good’, at most, as can those featuring notes, highlights and underlining. Books missing their dust-cover can be ‘Used-Acceptable’, at best. Those with missing pages are ‘Unacceptable’. Books that come in different formats are not one and the same product, even if their ISBN matches. Therefore, look for the specific catalog page or create one, but never list one for the other.
5. Identifying marks downgrade Music items to ‘Used-Good’, at most. Damaged jewel cases or cassette cases demote music items to ‘Used-Acceptable’, just as they do with Video products.
6. Cameras must be in the original retail packaging, unless the title specifically states that they come in plain boxes.
7. Default settings for computers and cell phones must be restored. Computers missing the original box and unimportant booklets can only be classified as ‘Used-Acceptable’.

Remember that guidelines were drafted specifically because people have different standards, as this visual guide put together for FBA sellers will show. They say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and it pays to be objective when selling on Amazon. What it all boils down to is customer satisfaction, and having guidelines in place is the best way to achieve it. Another potential solution is to monitor returns, and to check a risky item’s history before relisting it. Perhaps there are also changes to your supplier base or business flow that you could make to prevent recurrence. In the end, customer complaints can and do lead to suspended accounts every day. Suspension emails will be the same whatever it is you failed to comply with, but we all know you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, so let’s start putting that honey dipper to good use.  

Melanie takes an active interest in all things Amazon. She keeps an eye on the latest developments, and keeps Amazon sellers up to speed