When Amazon bots restrict listings as pesticides it causes a whole world of hurt for the seller. But, it only happens when you use the wrong words in your listings. Something stinks at Amazon and it’s not the anti-microbial insoles in your product listing.
I am convinced that Amazon created Bots to drive sellers nuts. In the past week or so if you sell anything that says something like “anti-microbial” in the description these little brainless algorithms decide that you are selling a pesticide.
Anti-Microbial is Now Hazmat?
The result is that your product will become stranded as a pesticide or pesticide device! Not only does it push your product to a pesticide classification, it will ALSO require you as a seller to be a USA resident, AND it will lock your listing description so you can’t edit the wording to remove the offending words.
They are not changing the category on the product, but the reclassification results in you paying for storage on something you can’t sell.
Take The Pesticide Course To Quickly Unlock Your Listings
If you put “anti-microbial”, or similar words, in your description and your listing gets locked you can fix it. Unfortunately to get it selling again you will have to watch the pesticide course video and take a test. We believe you’ll be able to edit the words in your listing once you complete the test, but we aren’t sure. I wish that taking the course and the test was something we could help you with, but we can’t.
You might also be able to appeal the reclassification but that takes time. You can always do this after you get the listing selling again by taking the course.
If your product is stranded because of this reclassification here’s my advice. Get one of your employees or your virtual assistant to complete the eLearning course and test for you. Once they pass you can unlock your listing.
Avoid or Change These Words in Your Product Descriptions:
Anti-microbial
Anti-bacterial
Anti-fungal
Antimicrobial
Antifungal
Antibacterial
Insecticide
Pesticide
Insect
Pest
“Safe”
Non-poisonous
Non-injurious
“Harmless”
Non-toxic
“All natural”
Repellent
Repelling
Repel
Antiseptic
Germ
This is Why Amazon is Doing This
While this decision seems random, Amazon didn’t make this rule for no reason. However, we think they need to train their bots better. This is because the EPA made Amazon voluntarily regulate products that could potentially be pesticides. It’s all part of a massive settlement regarding illegal importing, selling, and marketing of products (some were lethally toxic). This fell under the US Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA). Since non-US violators are untouchable, Amazon and 3rd-party sellers in the Marketplace bear the consequences for those that broke these rules.
Here’s the New Normal
From now on, to sell Pesticides and Pesticide Devices on Amazon.com, you must be a resident of the USA and complete an eLearning and related test (with a passing grade of 80% or better).
If you are not selling pesticides and pesticide devices make sure your product descriptions avoid words that might appear to look like you are.
If we create your listings, we are aware of this new issue and are strategically trying to avoid using any of these words. Should you need help, we have listing packages available for all sorts of needs. When Amazon Bots restrict listings as pesticides it does no one any good. Here’s hoping that Amazon retrains their Bots.