Updating a client's bank information in Seller Central is typically a simple task at Redesigned Retail.
As long as the account owner's user credentials are used at log in, updating a deposit or charge method is quick and painless. That is until yesterday when we received an alarming phone call from a client that recently changed deposit methods.
Their account had been shut down.
Immediately after the change, Amazon's Seller Performance team sent a notification stating they believed the account had been compromised. As a result, access was temporarily restricted and listings were deactivated.
To regain access, Amazon required their account password be changed and suggested the email address be updated as well.
To regain access to your account, you will need to reset your account password with a new, unique password that you do not use for any other account or website. We also suggest that you change the email address associated with your selling account to prevent unauthorized access from other parties.
Their password was quickly changed and account access was regained. However, the recently updated bank information was no where to be found in Seller Central.
We were hesitant to follow Amazon's second suggestion of changing the email address associated with the seller account. In past experiences changing the account owner or their login credentials has been troublesome and time consuming. Instead, we simply readded the new bank info and the problem was solved.
With our client's account reactivated and bank information updated things were looking good. However, the situation was unordinary so I went to the web to find out if other sellers have had similar experiences.
Sure enough, there were quite a few stories of account suspensions following a bank information change. However, this was the first time it happened to one of our client's.
Could it be related to this client's sales volume? Their biweekly deposits consistently exceed $250,000. The week before we updated bank information for another client that receives $30,000 deposits and had no problems. Could this be related to Amazon's "One Vendor Shift"?
In the end, we believe this is a security measure in place to prevent fraud. If you find yourself in this situation, remain calm and contact seller support. Based on our experience, a simple password change will get things back on track.
