MC011 Restriction and Realistic Expectations

[duneanemporium]

Hey folks! We recently got an MC011 restriction on my eBay account and are seeing the horror stories of folks doing some... interesting... things to get this restriction, and just wanted to get some feedback from the community on their experience with the MC011 restriction (What brought on the restriction? Did you get the restriction lifted, and if so, how long did it take? etc) as well as any eyes the eBay selling community might be able to put on my Sold Listings to get some opinions here on whether they think we have a shot at getting the restriction lifted or if it's just sayonara to selling on eBay. We are resellers of high demand items like video game consoles, sneakers, clothing and collectibles, with a massive emphasis on sneaker reselling. We don't attempt to hide our business model -- we are resellers through and through, and we know there are varying opinions on this business model on eBay, which we can totally understand (no hard feelings, promise!) -- but so far as we can tell through the policies, our selling performance and feedback as well as the handling of the few and far between disputes and claims/requests we receive from buyers, we have always tried to do our business on eBay with transparency, as much accuracy as possible, and we do our taxes honestly and completely just like any brick-and-mortar or ecommerce business would do on their own website or another platform.

So yeah, we'd love any and all feedback and insight/opinions on this! As openly honest resellers of mostly sneakers, is MC011 restrictions and ensuing account bans just part of the gig here on eBay, with nothing to be done about it though the policies don't seem to prohibit buying retail items and selling them for a profit? To be clear, we do not dropship -- everything comes to one of two locations for us on the east coast of the US and are all sold on eBay as either confirmed preorders or in hand listings. Selling on eBay is 100% of our business, we do not use other platforms or sell locally, only through our eBay store, so this is a restriction we are taking very seriously and want to do whatever is required and necessary (as we have already been working with eBay to do), but would love any community feedback or stories where you were able to get your restriction lifted, if you were able to do so, or any additional advice on how we can conduct our reselling business on eBay above board in ways that maybe we have missed or were not aware of over the last 4 years of selling (store selling anniversary coming up in May!)

Thanks everyone and happy selling!

[donsdetour]

119 high end items: brand names.

Good luck with your getting that restriction lifted...

Note: I have heard of such being done, but it seems it will take some time.

[downunder-61]

MC011 Restriction and Realistic Expectations

1. MC011 Restriction - follow the rules/provide required information to address the restriction you received.

2. Realistic Expectations - to lose your selling account if you do not follow the rules/provide required infomamtion to address the restriction you received.

[duneanemporium]

Thanks for the insight! Just curious -- are selling brand name items against eBay policy?

[bashort]

One common item I am seeing on the MC011 threads is high dollar electronics.

It appears that your buyers are happy.

I would assume that ebay is concerned where these items are coming from

[duneanemporium]

Thanks! This much we are able to assume in that we have been asked to perform certain actions with the understanding that if more information is needed it will be requested. Have you ever had an MC011 restriction or known a seller personally that has experienced this? And if so, what was their experience?

We inquired about the realistic expectations portion in our OP because it seems many folks "expect" to either have their accounts banned regardless of the work they have done, because it seems so few sellers are doing above-board business on eBay and haver zero receipts or invoices to prove they aren't selling stolen goods, or they submit the requested information and just get banned anyway without very clear reasoning from eBay apart from "we are protecting the eBay community". We 100% support protecting the eBay community, and with the Authenticity Guaranteed program, which is where all of our orders go through to verify the authenticity of the products we sell, we are always compliant with eBay policies and work hard to only purchase good from authorized retailers (never second-hand, never with cash from local business or third-party marketplaces), so we are just curious what the experience is for other folks like us!

[donsdetour]

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@duneanemporium wrote:

Thanks for the insight! Just curious -- are selling brand name items against eBay policy?

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Showing major changes in methods and goods sold, can and does send up flags.

Ebay has been used for a lot of nefarious things such as money launder, triangle fraud, one were the users falls for sell items for me and finds out they owe all the money including for the goods sold,  fraud or counterfeit items, and a lot more.

This is the reasons such get folks looked at and if the behavior falls into a pattern that shows a potential threat to eBay or its customers, such restrictions happen.

[duneanemporium]

This was our first thought as well, especially in regards to listing with stock images (as we of course need the product in hand before we can take pictures, and strive to always do so and update our listings as quickly as possible, though sometimes we aren't as quick to do so as we would like to be)

As a note, all of our products are purchased directly from authorized big box retailers (think Walmart, Target, BestBuy, Amazon, Footlocker, Champs Sports, adidas.com, Yeezy Supply, etc) or their respective online storefronts, so no second or third hand purchases or trades whatsoever (we don't deal in the potential for fakes or counterfeits -- our community of sellers have a horrible reputation and we aren't interested in contributing to the problem, but instead having an honest and transparent business).

We haven't gotten to the receipt(s)/invoice portion of the restriction lifting process, but see many folks find themselves unable to provide adequate information, and we have all of the receipts for all of the above for tax purposes, so hopefully things go well as we continue through the process!

[duneanemporium]

We have had a very busy March, so this does make sense to us, though this is in direct correlation to the number of sneaker releases there have been, particularly from adidas, in the last 30-60 days. We can always assume that as our business increases the chances that eBay needs to review our account, selling history, and business practices is all just normal procedure. This MC011 restriction however is different than the previous holds on payouts we have gotten in the past (only twice in 4 years) to verify our activity. We don't perform illegal activities on eBay, and we hope that our authentication history, or tracking history for delivered orders, and our swift action in the very few cases and disputes we've had opened against us are markers that will work in our favor during this restriction process to have the restriction lifted!

[wrong66]

In looking at your completed listings, every one I looked said "seller ended listing because item is no longer available". Is this normal?

[a_c_green]

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@wrong66 wrote:

In looking at your completed listings, every one I looked said "seller ended listing because item is no longer available". Is this normal?

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I think that's when their plug got pulled by eBay (regardless of that "ended by the seller" wording). The whole latest batch ended at exactly the same time, 16:03 PST yesterday.

[dryophelia]

@duneanemporium 

Selling expensive, brand name items is definitely allowed. 
The privilege of selling on eBay comes with responsibility. 
An MC011 flag is a designation for suspicious (to eBay) activity. 
A person with 30 pairs of Brand New Nike Air Jordan 12 Retro Royalty Taxi and 30 pairs of  Brand New adidas Yeezy Boost 350 V2 … IN HAND, and 10 pairs of something else, and 17 pairs of another brand name item… well, that’s going to raise red flags. 

You may have to prove these items were paid for before they were listed on eBay. 

[duneanemporium]

Makes sense! And we can definitely provide that documentation, no problem. We suppose that even though we have had high quantities available previously and have not received an MC011 restriction that the investigation was always going to be something we would need to go through, and we totally understand and appreciate the caution on eBay! All of the products we sell are paid for to the retailer directly through the same channel as any other consumers, and then made available for sale on our eBay store with a markup comparable to other platforms and sold listings for the same product on eBay to be competitive with the then-current market price across other reselling platforms! Our activity, so far as we can see it, is no different than other resellers on the eBay platforms, some of which are featured by eBay on our homepage or through eBay's Authenticity Guaranteed program for new sneaker releases. We can only assume those sellers were also subject to similar restrictions and precautions on eBay's end, and we know without a doubt there are other sellers on eBay with sales volumes and quantity listings that far outpace ours, so we've just been curious what community thoughts are as it's clear to us we are definitely not the first nor will we be the last sneaker resellers on eBay given their implementation of the Authenticity Guaranteed program through their authentication partner. eBay is arguably now perfectly designed, accommodating, and welcoming high-volume reselling activity of sneakers with this program in place, just like any other platform like StockX, GOAT, StadiumGoods, or SneakerCon (the actual third-party eBay is using for sneaker authentication). More arguably still, higher volume = more sales = more profits for eBay (from fees) and it's sellers (from profit margins), so the more the merrier right? Especially when the business is legitimate and 100% above board as we have always operated, and even more so with eBay's Authenticity Guaranteed program in place to protect buyers from fraud and counterfeit items. We love that, and choose eBay over all other options as the platform of choice for our business!

[kcvalue]

I had all my receipts with bank statements matching the purchase. After uploading them we received an email in about a minute that said after a thorough review we have decided to permanently suspend your selling privileges. Not enough time to even review the documents in my opinion 

[duneanemporium]

We have had this happen a small number of times due to a mistake in our inventory bookkeeping, either due to documenting a wrong size or wrong quantity. We work very hard to attain an accurate inventory down to the size and quantities available and have completely overhauled how we document our inventory, down to the order number from the retailer and the corresponding size and colorway of sneaker to ensure the most detailed and accurate inventory count possible. As with any business, mistakes in quantities and sizing happen, but we work very hard to do what we are able to keep this mistakes to a minimum or eliminate them completely!

In all of these instances where we have had to cancel an order due to being out of stock or damaged, we have always refunded the buyer as soon as the mistake is found, messaged them to apologize and explain the situation, and currently the number of defects on our account aren't high enough in quantity to even negatively exceed the threshold by eBay to lose our Top Rated Seller status (which is %.50, half of one percent), which we are very proud of and will continue to keep this defect rate as low as humanly possible. But again, we are human, and will never be so prideful as to say that mistakes will never happen again, but we have been working diligently to reduce the errors in our booking and inventory handling as previously stated.

We hate that these instances have occurred, and will own up to them 100% every time. If we had a 5, 10, 20, or 50% defect rate, sure, the restriction makes sense if this is the only reason, but it's less than half of one percent currently, specifically 3/832 orders in the "Transaction period: Apr 01, 2021 - Mar 31, 2022" -- 00.36% of sales in that period.