I agree that this would not be a frivolous lawsuit due to the mere fact that this is a private company. For one thing, Amazon does not appear to have a policy like EBay where they actually INVESTIGATE the negative feedbacks. They don't seem to care about if the negative feedback is TRUE...all they care about is that someone left negative feedback. You know, when we shipped thousands of orders, but had three negative feedbacks out of 22 FIVE STAR feedbacks (two of the negative feedbacks were from the SAME customer, and we can prove they were untrue), which left us with just over 1% negative feedback rating and took us to a 4 of 5 star rating...and they suspended our account! Granted, it's not like we didn't try to appease the two negative customers. One even filed an A to Z claim, which Amazon denied since the customer clearly wanted both a refund AND to keep the product! LOL! Worst yet, Amazon asked me to submit a plan to improve our order defect rate (ODR), which we did submit in several appeals (and in fairness to Amazon, I think was a good idea)...yet to date we have received no response to our appeal and our account is still blocked. Just FYI...we have maintained an A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau (BBB) for over a decade, so it's not like we're even remotely an unethical business.
The irony of all this is...just check the Better Business Bureau's list of complaints against Amazon from other sellers like us. Amazon has a HUGE list of negative feedback from seller slike us. So it's more a case of Amazon running its business with the philosophy, "Do as we say and not as we do." LOL!
Even though Amazon is a private business, when you get as large as they have, and are affiliating numerous small businesses (which are the very foothold of the American economy), then the government or Attorney General or some type of oversight organization or legal entity has to consider that Amazon is no longer JUST a private business. It has pretty much risen to the scope of the "too big to fail" since its actions (or inactions) can probably negatively impact the US economy. It could almost be deemed monopolistic or at the very least on the verge of unfair trade. I'm guessing with all the complaints I've seen, the legal aspect may not be working, but it's still probably worth looking into, because I bet an attorney may be more likely to take on a case if they see there are powerful numbers and relevant claims.
Even if it turns out that we can't address this legally, I think we could probably band together to address this publicly (i.e via the web and news medias like CNN, Fox News, Steven Colbert, etc.). Maybe we could even contact Anderson Cooper for the “Keeping Them Honest” segment. I think negative publicity about Amazon's unfair practices could at the very least affect their business (by aiming at decreasing customer sales and decreasing sellers currently operating on Amazon and even warn prospective sellers). We could even try for boycotts on the part of buyers and sellers. I bet you we are a very small representation of Amazon's disgruntled sellers.
Another option is to try to create a new Amazon type website to compete with Amazon, because I believe we could form some alliances to take on their size and scope, and compete against them purely on the merits of running our business in a more user friendly and customer-service oriented manner. If we marketed it correctly, I think we could prevail.
So if we get organized and think strategically, I think we could either impact Amazon’s negative and unfair practices or we could try to form a competing business. We just have to be sure to maintain our reputation by keep our arguments fair-minded, rational, and logical. So who’s in this with me? If you agree, then let’s quit griping and start planning. I own a business and I work a LOT of hours. So while I’d be happy to help organize and strategize, we need to get a competent team together of people who have either the time, experience; and/or expertise in things like web design, business law, marketing/PR, business management, etc.; and/or connections with any media outlets. Then once we see what type of response we get from people who are truly ready to take ACTION on this (and not just sit around blowing a lot of hot air), then we’ll all put our heads together and set a plan of action based on the skill sets of the team. Sound like a plan? So for now, in order to get all responses in one location, just post at this link at (((Redacted))) if you’re willing to join the team, and what your skill set is (i.e. web design, business law, marketing/PR, business management, organizer, worker bee, or other relevant skill set), and how you’d like to help, and then we’ll see what kind of response we get posted on this blog. If we get a lot of response, then maybe we can set up a website and email and get this all organized to take action.
Remember...there's power in NUMBERS, so show me we're getting enough response, and then we'll show you that power of numbers in the form of ACTION! I’m crossing my fingers that we get enough response to make this worthwhile!
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