Quick answer. To open a US Amazon seller account, choose a selling plan (Individual at $0.99 per item sold, or Professional at $39.99 a month), register with a valid credit card, bank account, phone number and tax information, and complete the tax interview. Amazon then verifies a government-issued photo ID, a proof of address issued within the past 180 days and, for businesses, government-issued business documents and beneficial owner details, sometimes by video call or optional facial recognition. Most new accounts fail on mismatches, where a name, address or number reads differently across documents. Check every document against your state business record and IRS EIN record before you submit, and open only one account unless Amazon accepts a legitimate business need for a second.

Opening a seller account looks like a form. It works like an identity examination. Amazon compares what you type against the documents you upload, the bank and card you attach and the public record of your business. A seller who types “Ste 210” and uploads a statement that says “Suite 210” has given Amazon two addresses. A business registered as “Greenline Supply LLC” with the state but “Green Line Supply” with the IRS has given Amazon two companies. Neither did anything dishonest, and both can be blocked before a single listing goes live.

The bigger danger comes after a block. Many sellers open another account to try again, and that one move turns a fixable document problem into a multiple-account problem. We work with new sellers in this order. Confirm you should be opening an account at all, choose the plan, assemble documents that genuinely agree, check them against official records, then submit once and cleanly.

Start Here With Whether You Should Open a New Account at All

Amazon’s seller code of conduct says sellers may “only maintain one Seller Central account for each region” unless there is a legitimate business need for a second account and all accounts are in good standing. If any of your accounts are not in good standing, Amazon may deactivate all of them until every one is. Amazon’s examples of a legitimate need include owning multiple brands with a separate business for each, manufacturing products for two distinct companies, and being recruited for an Amazon program that requires separate accounts.

A first-time seller is on the normal path. A seller with a healthy account who wants a second one needs a genuine business reason and Amazon’s acceptance. A seller whose account was suspended or deactivated is not on the new-account path at all. A fresh account opened to keep selling is treated as circumvention, is routinely connected to the old one, and usually ends with both deactivated. The honest route is to work the original account with a real root cause and genuine evidence. Our guide on whether you can have multiple Amazon seller accounts covers the rule in depth.

Five situations a seller can be in before registering, and which of them is the new account path. Tap a station to find yours.

If you were weighing a purchased account, read our breakdown of buying Amazon seller accounts first.

Choosing Between the Individual and Professional Plans

The plan decides your fees, your tools and, during verification, whose name must appear on your proof of address. Amazon’s selling plan comparison sets out the main differences.

Feature	Individual	Professional
Fee	$0.99 per item sold	$39.99 monthly subscription
Create new product pages	Yes	Yes
Feeds, reports and SP-API	No	Yes
Shipping rates	Amazon-set	Seller-set for non-media products
Promotions and Amazon Business pricing	No	Yes
US sales and use tax calculation	No	Yes
User permissions for other users	No	Yes

A hypothetical seller expecting 20 sales a month pays 20 x $0.99, or $19.80, on Individual, against $39.99 on Professional. Break-even sits near 40 items a month. A seller who needs promotions, reports, software connections or staff logins needs Professional regardless of volume. You can change plans later.

Our Amazon suspension team can take this Amazon case from first review to final submission.

What Amazon Asks For During US Registration

Amazon’s registration requirements page says US sellers need a valid credit card, a bank account, a phone number and tax information. An online tax interview determines whether you complete a W-9 (US taxpayer) or W-8BEN (non-US taxpayer). Amazon may also ask for scanned copies of a passport, national ID, bank statement or credit card statement. For North America, your account must have a business address, your bank account must be in a country supported by the Amazon Currency Converter, and your bank details must be up to date.

In Seller Central, registration runs through business information, seller information, billing, store, then verification, where you confirm Identity, Address verification, Beneficial owner and Business verification. Amazon customizes the verification page to your business type and location, so screens can differ slightly.

The registration sequence from business information to verification and login security. Step through each screen to see what goes in and where it fails.

The Documents Amazon Verifies, and the Standard Each Must Meet

Amazon says it must verify the identity of the legal representative or beneficial owner registering the account, and the legitimacy of the business and address. That means three document groups, each with its own rules, and each must agree with the other two.

Identity document

For a US business location, Amazon accepts government-issued photo ID such as a passport, passport card, national ID card, driver’s license, citizenship card, permanent residency card or military ID, and may ask for a specific type where US law requires. The ID must show a first and last name matching the primary contact in the account, a date of birth (holder 18 or older), the unique ID number and any expiration date. Amazon states the date of birth, ID number and expiration date you enter must match exactly. Include both sides if important information is on the back, merge them into one file if the page does not ask separately, and upload a color copy.

Proof of address

For Professional sellers, Amazon accepts bank, credit card or payment provider statements, utility bills (gas, water, electricity, TV, internet, mobile or landline), rent or lease documents, credit union or mortgage statements, tenancy bills, tax documents showing the address, and a business license or business extract. Individual sellers have a similar list. For a US business location, the document must be issued within the past 180 days, show the issue, due or transaction date, and show the account holder’s name and address. Financial documents must identify the institution. Amazon’s global page adds that a Professional seller’s proof of address must contain the business name, and handwritten documents are not accepted.

Business documents and beneficial owners

Business sellers provide government-issued documents matching the business information in the account. Options are a certificate of good standing or equivalent showing the business active as of the past 180 days, a business license issued or renewed within the past 180 days, or an official registry extract showing the business is active. Each must show the issuing authority, business name, registration number and date of issue. The primary contact also uploads a business association document such as a letter of authorization, articles of association or incorporation documents. A letter of authorization must be dated and signed by the legal representative, director, beneficial owner or trustee.

Amazon defines a beneficial owner as a natural person who directly or indirectly owns more than 25 percent of the shares or voting rights, or owns the business by other means. If none qualifies, a senior manager is listed. You can list up to four at registration. List the real owners, because a disclosure that does not reflect genuine ownership is a policy problem and potentially a legal one.

File rules that cause silent rejections

Correct content still fails if the file breaks Amazon’s rules. Files must be unexpired, readable and in focus, uncropped, a scan or photo of the original, under 50MB, in TIF, TIFF, PNG, JPG, PDF or JPEG, with no special characters such as $, & or # in the file name, not password protected, and authentic and unaltered.

The identity, address, business and file standards a new account has to meet. Open each tab to see what must show and where it usually fails.

Why Everything Has to Match, Field by Field

Every document is checked twice, on its own and against everything else. Most failed registrations we review involve no fraud at all, only honest differences between genuine documents that nobody reconciled before submitting.

Every field you enter is compared with the documents you upload and the official records behind them.

A worked example

A hypothetical Professional seller registers “Northpoint Home Goods LLC”. The state record reads “NORTHPOINT HOME GOODS, LLC”, the EIN letter “NORTHPOINT HOME GOODS LLC”, and the bank statement “Northpoint Home Goods” with no suffix. The phone bill she chose as proof of address is in her personal name at “1450 Harbor Blvd Ste 210”. On the form she typed “Northpoint Home LLC” and “1450 Harbor Boulevard, Suite 210”. Every document is genuine, yet the business name appears four ways, the address two ways, and the proof of address is in the wrong name for her plan.

Editing a document is never the fix. She copies the exact legal name from the state record into Seller Central, confirms the IRS holds the same name, asks the bank to correct the account title, uses a proof of address genuinely issued to the business (the corrected bank statement works), and writes the address exactly as that document shows it.

Field	Mismatch we see most often	Genuine fix
Legal business name	Different suffix, dropped words, trade name used instead of legal name	Copy the state record. Ask the IRS or bank to correct their record if wrong
Primary contact name	Nickname, missing middle name, name changed after marriage	Enter the name exactly as on the ID. Renew an outdated ID first
Address	Suite vs Ste, missing unit number, old address after a move	Use one written form everywhere. Update stale records at the source
ID details	Typo in ID number or expiration date, expired ID	Re-enter from the document. Renew before registering
Tax identity	EIN entered against a name the IRS does not hold	Confirm the IRS name before the tax interview

Common mismatches between what a seller types and what the documents show, next to the matched version. Compare the columns field by field.

How to Check Your Documents Against Official Records Before You Submit

Check your documents against the sources a reviewer trusts, on the day you plan to register, and write down the exact name and address strings you will use.

Check your entity with the state

The National Association of Secretaries of State lists every state’s corporate registration office on its corporate registration page. Choose your state to reach its registration pages and name database. Record the exact legal name with punctuation and suffix, the status (active or good standing, not delinquent, forfeited or dissolved) and the file number. If the status is anything but active, fix it with the state before registering. The certificate of good standing usually comes from the same office.

Check your EIN name with the IRS

The IRS says an EIN is free directly from the IRS and warns applicants not to pay for one. It tells applicants to enter the business name as it appears on formation documents and accepts only letters, numbers, hyphens and ampersands, so punctuation can legitimately differ from the state record. To confirm what the IRS holds, request an entity transcript, download a digital CP 575 notice if you are an eligible Business Tax Account user, or call and request Letter 147C, EIN Previously Assigned. If the name differs beyond permitted punctuation, resolve it with the IRS first.

Check your bank and proof of address

Put your latest bank statement beside your proof of address. For a Professional seller, the holder name should be the legal business name, the address complete with unit number, and the issue date inside 180 days. If the bank shows a trade name or your personal name, ask it to correct the account title. If a utility is in your personal name, use another accepted document genuinely in the business name. Never edit a PDF to change a name or date. That turns a mismatch into a forged or manipulated documentation case.

Question	Where to check	What to look for
Is my entity active, and what is its exact name?	State business entity search via nass.org	Exact name and suffix, active status, file number
What name does the IRS hold for my EIN?	CP 575, Letter 147C or IRS entity transcript	Matches the state record apart from IRS-permitted characters
Is my proof of address acceptable?	The document, against Amazon’s US requirements page	Business name (Professional), full address, issued within 180 days
Does my ID match what I will type?	The ID itself	Exact name, DOB, ID number, expiration. Not expired
Is anything outstanding after registration?	Seller Central Account Health page	Open verification or INFORM requests and deadlines

The checks that decide whether a new registration clears verification, grouped by readiness. Toggle what is true for you to see your level.

What to Expect From Video Calls and Facial Verification

Amazon says it verifies your identity at registration and at other times during the selling agreement, and in some cases offers facial recognition. With your consent, it captures images of your face and your ID through your device’s camera to confirm you are a live person whose face matches the ID photo. It does this directly using Amazon Rekognition or through an authorized provider, which includes Persona Identities, Inc. Amazon describes the step as optional. Exiting before image capture sends you to a video call instead, and no biometric data is created. Amazon says it keeps facial data for up to two years as mandated by applicable law, and its provider may keep the underlying images for up to 29 days for audit purposes.

How to prepare for the call

The person on camera must be the primary contact, holding the original ID that was uploaded. Nobody can appear on your behalf.
Keep the original business documents you uploaded within reach.
Use a quiet, well-lit room and a stable connection.
Know your business name, address, products and sources without notes, and say so plainly if you do not know something.

The requests a new account most often meets, paraphrased. Open each one to see what Amazon is looking for and how to answer it.

The INFORM Consumers Act and a New Account

The INFORM Consumers Act took effect on June 27, 2023. Amazon says it covers sellers who, in any continuous 12-month period during the previous 24 months, sold 200 or more new or unused consumer products with $5,000 or more in gross revenue. A new account is not high volume on day one, but a successful one can cross that line in its first year.

Amazon says it must collect and verify your name, a government-issued ID, business address, bank account, working email, working phone number and tax ID, in the business name or that of an individual legally authorized to act for it. High-volume sellers must keep this current, report changes, and certify at least annually. Once you open the Notice and Certification page, Amazon says certification must be completed within 10 days to avoid deactivation. If verification fails or timelines are missed, Amazon may withhold payments or deactivate the account. It says it aims to reinstate within 48 to 72 hours after verification and certification are both complete. The matched document set that gets you through registration is the set you will keep current for INFORM.

Two-Step Verification From Day One

Amazon requires Two-Step Verification to access Seller Central. You designate a primary and a backup method. An authenticator app cannot be both, and the same phone number cannot be both. The setting is tied to the login, so a login shared between your buyer and seller accounts protects both. Amazon recommends a separate login with its own email for everyone who accesses the account, created through User Permissions. It also notes that the “Don’t ask for codes on this device” setting can reset after clearing cookies, browser updates or using proxy and VPN servers, so keep your backup method working.

Blocked at verification, or about to submit?

Send us the notice or your document set and we will find the failing field.

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The Risks That Block or Deactivate New Accounts at Registration

A registration block usually cites verification without naming the defect. These are the usual causes.

Document and address mismatches

This is by far the most common cause. A name, address, date or number reads differently across the form and the documents, or the proof of address is older than 180 days, in the wrong name or missing a unit number. Amazon also notes that if your ID does not match your country of residence, your proof of address must.

Payment method problems

The card or bank account is in a different name, is outside supported countries, or is out of date. A payment method previously attached to another seller account is more serious, because shared payment details are one way Amazon connects accounts.

Related accounts

If anyone in the business, or any detail you use, connects to an account not in good standing, Amazon’s policy allows it to deactivate all connected accounts until every one is in good standing.

Prohibited or gated products

Some products are prohibited and some categories need approval before listing. These rarely stop registration itself, but they can trigger early removals on an account with no history. Check Amazon’s restricted products pages before buying inventory, and see our guide to restricted products.

A failed verification is answered inside the same account, with genuine corrected documents, in this order.

What to Do if Your New Account Is Blocked

Do not start again in a new account. For a genuine seller, a verification block is one of the more recoverable problems on Amazon, because you answer it with documents you are entitled to obtain.

Diagnose and find the root cause

Open the notice and the Account Health page and write down exactly what is requested, including whether a video call is needed. Answer that request and no other. Then name the specific field that failed and its correct value. “We made a mistake” is not a root cause. “We uploaded a phone bill in the owner’s personal name, but as a Professional seller we need a document in the business name” is.

Correct with genuine documents

Fix the record where it lives. Renew the ID, have the bank correct the account title, order a fresh good standing certificate, or update the address with the state. Upload the genuine corrected document and make your entries match it exactly. If a genuine document cannot be obtained, for example because the entity is not in good standing, fix the underlying status first.

Prevent a repeat

Keep one master record of the exact name, address and ID details, owned by one person with a set review date, so every future update uses the same strings. When writing to Amazon, structure the response as root cause, corrective actions already taken with documents attached, and the preventive control with its owner and date. Our guide to business verification suspensions goes further.

Some requests are not about paperwork. If Amazon questions whether the named person truly runs the business, or connects the account to another, the answer is proof of genuine ownership and control, with your accountant or attorney involved where the structure is complex. This article is educational information, not legal advice.

Common Mistakes That Sink a First Registration

Registering before the paperwork exists. Registering while you wait on the EIN letter or first bank statement invites a half-finished submission.
Using a trade name. Your store name can be your brand. The verified business name must be the legal entity.
Borrowing someone’s name. The primary contact and owners must be the real people behind the business.
Reusing details from an old account. Payment methods or addresses tied to an account in poor standing can connect the new one to it.
Retrying in a new account. This turns a document issue into a code of conduct problem.

A Routine That Keeps a New Account Verified

At launch. Save a dated folder of every uploaded document and the exact strings you entered.
Monthly. Check Account Health for verification or INFORM requests and respond within the stated timelines.
Before any change. Update the source record (state, bank, IRS) first, obtain the new genuine document, then update Amazon.
Quarterly. Confirm your ID is not near expiry and a proof of address under 180 days old is ready.
Yearly. Confirm active state status, renew licenses, and review beneficial owners and user permissions.

For a live account, our Amazon account health maintenance service is built around this routine.

Frequently Asked Questions

What do I need to open an Amazon seller account in the US?

A valid credit card, bank account, phone number and tax information, plus the tax interview. Verification then requires a government-issued photo ID, proof of address issued within 180 days and, for businesses, government-issued business documents and beneficial owner details.

How much does an Amazon seller account cost?

Individual charges $0.99 per item sold. Professional costs $39.99 a month. Other selling fees, such as referral fees, apply on both.

Is the facial recognition step mandatory?

No. Amazon describes it as optional, and exiting before image capture redirects you to verification by video call.

Can I have two Amazon seller accounts?

Only with a legitimate business need and with all accounts in good standing, such as owning multiple brands with a separate business for each.

My registration was rejected. Should I open a new account?

No. Resolve the request in the same account with genuine corrected documents, because a second account can be linked to the first.

Does the INFORM Consumers Act apply to new sellers?

Yes, once you sell 200 or more new or unused products with $5,000 or more in gross revenue in any continuous 12-month period within the previous 24 months.

How do I confirm the business name the IRS has on file?

Request an IRS entity transcript, download a digital CP 575 notice if eligible, or call and request Letter 147C.

What file types does Amazon accept for verification?

TIF, TIFF, PNG, JPG, PDF or JPEG under 50MB, not password protected, with no special characters in the file name.

Get Help With Your Amazon Seller Account Registration

If your new account was blocked at verification, or you want your documents checked before you submit, our team reviews how your records match, finds the failing field and prepares a clean, genuine response. If an account has already been deactivated, see our Amazon suspension and reinstatement service. You can submit your case or book a consultation.

This article is educational information about Amazon’s published seller policies and official government records. It is not legal, tax or accounting advice and does not guarantee any outcome or timeline. Amazon’s requirements change, so check the current Seller Central help pages before you act.

You can also see all our marketplace suspension services.

How to Open an Amazon Seller Account the Right Way and Avoid Early Blocks