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Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

gizmodo.com

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Re: Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

#71

Post by Wowfunhappy »

DoubleGlazing wrote: post #56

I've stopped buying 3rd party seller items because of this. Now, I'll only buy items sold directly by amazon. For example, I bought a little portable projector last Christmas. In the box was a big bar of Swiss chocolate and leaflet offering me a tripod in return for a five star review. The projector wasn't as good as the description made out. It wasn't terrible, just not as good as they claimed. So I left a three sta…

> But..... the seller reappearance with a different name. They had the same product range and descriptions.

But don’t they loose all their reviews, which they clearly care so much about?

Re: Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

#72

Post by [deleted] »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #71
DoubleGlazing wrote: post #56

I've stopped buying 3rd party seller items because of this. Now, I'll only buy items sold directly by amazon. For example, I bought a little portable projector last Christmas. In the box was a big bar of Swiss chocolate and leaflet offering me a tripod in return for a five star review. The projector wasn't as good as the description made out. It wasn't terrible, just not as good as they claimed. So I left a three sta…

> But..... the seller reappearance with a different name. They had the same product range and descriptions. But don’t they loose all their reviews, which they clearly care so much about?

[deleted]

Re: Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

#73

Post by rlaabs »

decremental wrote: post #8
blibble wrote: post #5

I had this... a third-party seller started harassing me via email to submit feedback so I did... I gave them a two star review with something along the lines of "kept pestering me to leave feedback" then they started emailing me demanding that I remove it, which I ignored then they started phoning the number for the delivery, which happened to be an elderly relative (as they were the order recipient) contacted Amazon…

The third party sellers shouldn't get access to your contact information. On DoorDash, calls go through DoorDash's system. Same with text messages. No one gets the other person's real number. I've had one restaurant that always calls me right after I place the order to ask me for my phone number to put into their system for future orders. I always tell them no, I prefer to go through DoorDash instead. A similar syste…

The New York City council recently passed a bill that requires apps, like Doordash, to share the customers real name, number, email address.

Their reasoning is that this somehow "helps" small-business.

https://legistar.council.nyc.gov/LegislationDetail.aspx?ID=4...

Re: Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

#74

Post by rualca »

blibble wrote: post #5

I had this... a third-party seller started harassing me via email to submit feedback so I did... I gave them a two star review with something along the lines of "kept pestering me to leave feedback" then they started emailing me demanding that I remove it, which I ignored then they started phoning the number for the delivery, which happened to be an elderly relative (as they were the order recipient) contacted Amazon…

> I had this... a third-party seller started harassing me via email to submit feedback

I has a very similar experience. I bought a cheap USB cable pack comprised of 5 USB cables of varying length, and after a span of a couple of weeks all 5 cables stopped working. Once I posted a review I started getting pestered by the seller asking to change the review and offering replacements, which was not unusual, but afterwards started offering 20$ in exchange for a retraction of the bad reviewto instead post a positive one. I recall receiving about half a dozen emails from the seller, even after I stopped replying.

Re: Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

#75

Post by bryanrasmussen »

greenyoda wrote: post #12
antipodes123 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Long time Amazon Seller here It's against Amazon TOS to contact Amazon's customers outside the Amazon messaging system, and they are really heavy handed against sellers breaching this. If you complain to Amazon that the seller is contacting you outside the Amazon messaging platform and harrassing you, then Amazon will close their seller account. Alternatively you can threaten to report them to Amazon for this and the…

> "contacted Amazon, who responded with "we'll deal with the issue and get back to you within 48 hours", which never happened" Apparently, complaining to Amazon didn't solve the problem.

maybe the contact to Amazon said something like "The seller is harassing me" not "The Seller is contacting me outside of official Amazon channels and harassing me", and probably, if you just dropped the harassing me it would be even more important to Amazon to shut that down.

Re: Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

#76

Post by moltar »

mcny wrote: post #33
neolog wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's against Amazon TOS to contact Amazon's customers outside the Amazon messaging system Is there some reason the seller needs to have the buyer's contact info?

> Is there some reason the seller needs to have the buyer's contact info? I have the same question, except I'll narrow the scope a little bit. In case the order is fulfilled by Amazon.com (FBA), is there any reason for the seller to have the buyer's contact or shipping information? I know the seller has my information because I have a similar experience to TylerRobinson, except my gift card was only USD 5: > The situ…

For FBA buyer info isn’t released. Emails are obfuscated and proxies via @amazon.comm domain.

They did release this info up to about 2y ago.

Re: Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

#77

Post by sneak »

rlaabs wrote: post #73
decremental wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The third party sellers shouldn't get access to your contact information. On DoorDash, calls go through DoorDash's system. Same with text messages. No one gets the other person's real number. I've had one restaurant that always calls me right after I place the order to ask me for my phone number to put into their system for future orders. I always tell them no, I prefer to go through DoorDash instead. A similar syste…

The New York City council recently passed a bill that requires apps, like Doordash, to share the customers real name, number, email address. Their reasoning is that this somehow "helps" small-business. https://legistar.council.nyc.gov/LegislationDetail.aspx?ID=4...

This just allows them to sell your name+email+phone+address to Google et al.

State mandated doxxing.

This is why I have a burner phone number, throwaway domain/email, and special alias for food delivery that needs my home address.

Re: Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

#78

Post by kadoban »

OJFord wrote: post #69
kadoban wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't need your email or phone number though, even if so, and both of those are a lot easier/cheaper to spam.

I'm sure the line is that they need it in case of problems during delivery. Couriers always want it for that, or trying to ensure there aren't problems (for them) like missed deliveries by texting you to say they're delivering today or whatever. I don't really have a problem with that in general, but yeah I don't want to deal with random third party sellers. Also in my experience when there's a problem with the item…

Couriers do say that, it seems, but have you ever experienced them using it? I never get anything at all, unless I look up the tracking online. Doesn't matter if the package is on time or if it disappeared somewhere in Alaska or if it got delivered 2 streets over, total radio silence.

Re: Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

#79

Post by Chris2048 »

DoubleGlazing wrote: post #56

I've stopped buying 3rd party seller items because of this. Now, I'll only buy items sold directly by amazon. For example, I bought a little portable projector last Christmas. In the box was a big bar of Swiss chocolate and leaflet offering me a tripod in return for a five star review. The projector wasn't as good as the description made out. It wasn't terrible, just not as good as they claimed. So I left a three sta…

> but..... the seller reappearance with a different name. They had the same product range and descriptions.

I wonder how they are able to do this so fast?

Re: Amazon third-party sellers reportedly hound customers who leave bad reviews

#80

Post by squiggleblaz »

rlpb wrote: post #58
bigger_inside wrote: post #53

I'm of two minds on this. We all hate getting calls and mail from people and being hounded time and time again - in fact, I have a certain history of blocking people just for that. So all the anger is understandable. I share that annoyance. However, I find it curious that the article never once turns its eyes on the monopolization of online commerce and the monopolization of communication in Amazon's walled garden as…

> since we're now also dependent on it for enforcement This, I think, is the root of the problem. In the case that Amazon takes control of the situation (you don't really have a relationship with the third party seller; you have a relationship with Amazon), then despite what they claim, they should be held legally responsible. In the UK we have a legal concept of "vicarious liability". An employer is liable for an em…

> then despite what they claim, they should be held legally responsible.

I fully agree with this. There is a great deal of distrust in contemporary society, because those who hold the power do everything they can to avoid being held responsible. And because they hold the power, they are able to do it. If these parasites want a civilisation to be parasitical off, they will need to shape up.

However, it needs to be careful legal responsibility. Otherwise you just end up with the Google problem. Google will arbitrarily shut down an account for no apparent reason and no clear possibility of appeal or even explanation. So aside from being responsible for the bad actors they choose not to exclude, they should also be responsible for the actors they unfairly or disproportionately exclude. Probably it means their current business models become unviable, but that's fine.

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