Web Letters | The Nation

The truth of selling on Amazon

Everything that you read about Amazon’s unethical business practices is true. Coming from the inside, I see how the taxation of sellers pushes Amazon’s taxes of sales onto the sellers. They charge a seller commission then tax the seller on the commission, force a seller to a fixed shipping rate, then tax them on the shipping purchased from Amazon.

The commission itself is scam. Charging a commission on shipping that is too low for a seller to ship the item in the first place enables them to force sellers into using Fulfillment by Amazon, where fees pile up. As the moment that Amazon sees that an item is making money for its sellers, they will freeze out all sellers so that they can control the market, then tell us to inform the sellers that it was the publishing/manufacturing/production company that requested that we remove the listing. The seller will then be responsible to pay for a removal fee to get their items back or a disposal fee if they don’t want the items sent back. Guess what, that means Amazon gets you to pay them to make money off your products that you thought were being destroyed.

Seller Performance and A-Z claims: big joke. If you as a seller think you will win one and get your item back, wake up from that dream. That team has made the choice within the first ten minutes after the buyer filed the claim. They don’t release the information to seller support, so don’t bother calling them, as they are making stuff up based off of the e-mail sent to the seller. Best bet is to bombard seller-performance@amazon.com with e-mails. They are the only ones that can help you now, and the best part is that most of your e-mails are set to auto-resolve. Oops, guess they got you again.

Operating agreement: Don’t base your seller rules off that form, it changes every day and nobody, not even the employees of Amazon, knows what the rules will be.

Want to know more? E-mail Jeff, his address can be found with a simple Google search.

Ten Reasons to Avoid Doing Business With Amazon.com

Amazon isn’t as bad as you think

First off, Amazon is a great, fast-paced workplace. We are always reminded to drink water, which is almost around every corner, and most facilities have AC. If it gets too hot in a FC they will close it down until it cools off. They do have rates that aren’t too bad. Somebody that stays focused the whole time should be able to do it. Oh, this is all while you drink your cup of coffee and eat your donut while chatting the first thirty minutes of work. That doesn’t cut it for amazon. (Maybe in HR.) Companies use temporary employment—deal with it. And, might I add, they do offer help for certain beneficial needs. It’s called a job. How many people look for more money during the holidays? Amazon creates more jobs every year opening new facilities. The customer is the number-one focus for Amazon. Thus bringing success. My opinion is, your job is bogus. You get paid to type trash talk about successful companies. Must be nice.