Quick answer. Most Amazon enforcement traces back to five groups of policies. Account conduct (the seller agreement and the Seller Code of Conduct), catalog and listings (ASIN creation, product detail page rules, brand name rules), products (intellectual property, anti-counterfeiting, restricted products, product safety), pricing (the Marketplace Fair Pricing policy) and reviews (the customer product reviews policies). Amazon measures many of them through the Account Health Rating, a score from 0 to 1,000 that drops when a violation is detected and recovers when you address it. Amazon says 200 or more is Healthy, 100 to 199 is At Risk, and 99 or lower means the account is eligible for deactivation or already deactivated. Check Account Health weekly, read each violation in Amazon’s own words, and fix the cause, not only the listing.

Sellers rarely get into trouble because they never read a policy. They get into trouble because Amazon publishes well over a hundred policy pages scattered across Seller Central, and nobody explains which rules are measured, how a violation turns into points, or which ones can end an account without warning. So they delete the listing, apologize and move on. That works until the same policy is violated again and the score falls faster.

Below, the policies are grouped by how sellers get caught. Account conduct, the catalog, the products, pricing and reviews. For each, we cover what the policy requires, the typical violation, how it shows up in Account Health, and how to check your own account. If you already face an account-level action, our Amazon suspension service page explains how we work those cases.

How Amazon’s policy rules fit together

Amazon’s Program Policies page states that the products you offer must comply with your seller agreement, including all applicable Amazon policies, and all applicable laws and regulations. That is three layers. The top is your contract, the Amazon Services Business Solutions Agreement, which gives Amazon the authority to restrict, deactivate or withhold. The middle is the program policies, grouped into General Policies, Intellectual Property, Product and Listing Requirements, Shipping, Tax, Optional Programs and FBA. The bottom is law, and the Restricted Products page says that even a product shown as a permitted example must still comply with applicable laws.

Measured policies and unmeasured ones

Amazon’s page on policies included in the Account Health Rating says not all of its policies are currently included in AHR. Some violations appear on your Account Health page with a visible point impact. Others can lead to action without the score ever turning yellow. The AHR policy page also states that regardless of score, Amazon may deactivate an account immediately if it suspects fraudulent, deceptive, illegal or otherwise harmful activity.

The agreement gives Amazon authority, the policies and the law set the standard, and the Account Health Rating measures only part of the picture.

How the Account Health Rating measures you

Amazon describes the AHR as a color-coded score from 0 to 1,000, shown on your Account Health page separately for each store. You lose points when a new violation is detected and gain points when you successfully address violations. Points are also granted when a minimum number of orders are filled, so health is judged against the size of your business. New sellers start at 200, and the score reflects policy adherence and selling activity over the last 180 days. Fulfilled by Merchant sellers can also earn points from Buyer Contact Rate, Average Contact Response Time and Buyer Dissatisfaction Rate, and Amazon says it will not restrict selling privileges for below-average performance on those three.

The policy groups that feed Amazon’s Account Health Rating, plus what sits outside it. Tap each zone to see how sellers get caught and how to check your own account.

Severity and repeat violations

Amazon assigns points by four severity levels, critical, high, medium and low, and critical violations can lead to immediate enforcement. Severity reflects how much a violation harms customers and whether it breaks applicable laws. Repeats cost more each time the same policy is violated. Amazon says the account may be at immediate risk of deactivation if it reaches the maximum number of repeat violations for one policy within 180 days, a maximum that can be as low as two for higher-severity violations. Fix causes, not listings.

A worked example

Amazon does not publish per-violation point values, so these numbers are hypothetical. A seller at 260 has a listing removed under the Intellectual Property policy because an image used a brand’s logo. The seller deletes the image but never checks the 40 other listings built from the same supplier image pack. Five weeks later a second listing from that pack is removed under the same policy. The repeat costs more, and the account drops into yellow. An audit of every listing from the same source would have prevented it.

The policies the score includes

Amazon’s current list, which it says will be updated as policies are added, is grouped below by how sellers get caught.

Enforcement group	Policies included in AHR
Account conduct	Selling policies and seller code of conduct. Communication guidelines. INFORM Consumers Act
Catalog and listings	ASIN Creation policy. Product detail page rules. Amazon Brand Name policy
Products	Intellectual Property. Anti-Counterfeiting. Restricted Products. Product safety and compliance. Product condition guidelines. Guidelines for adult products and for selling software
Pricing	Amazon Marketplace Fair Pricing policy
Reviews	Customer Product Reviews Policies

Amazon says it uses machine learning, automation and expert human review to find non-compliance, and that its tools learn daily. Assume detection is continuous, not only complaint-driven.

Account conduct. The agreement and the Seller Code of Conduct

Conduct violations are about how you operate, not what you sell, and they produce the vaguest notices. A Code of Conduct citation tells you which rulebook was used, not which rule, so narrow it to the specific conduct before writing anything.

What the Code of Conduct requires

Amazon’s code says sellers must provide accurate information, act fairly, not damage other sellers, not influence ratings or reviews, not send unsolicited communications, contact customers only through Buyer-Seller Messaging, not circumvent the sales process, not run more than one account without a legitimate business need, and not violate price fixing laws. Its examples of unfair activity include creating multiple detail pages for the same product, manipulating sales rank with paid or externally refunded orders, raising a price after an order is confirmed, inflating traffic with bots or paid clicks, keyword manipulation, and allowing others to act on your behalf in a way that violates policy.

The typical violations

Three patterns cover most cases. Information accuracy. A business name that does not identify the business, a product in the wrong category, or outdated details. Third-party conduct. An agency or “ranking service” did something prohibited, and the code is explicit that letting others act for you in a violating way is your violation. Multiple accounts. Amazon allows one account per region unless there is a legitimate business need and all accounts are in good standing, with examples such as separate businesses for separate brands. If any account is not in good standing, Amazon says it may deactivate all of them. Amazon also says sellers who file infringement notices as a brand’s agent to benefit their own selling account may be terminated. Our guide to Code of Conduct suspensions covers the appeal side.

How to check your account

Compare legal name, address, contacts and bank details in your account settings with current registration documents.
List every user login and connected tool, each with a named owner and a current reason for access. Remove the rest.
Read a sample of your Buyer-Seller Messages and inserts for anything promotional or anything pointing buyers off Amazon.

A hypothetical listing, insert and multi-pack offer in a violating and a compliant version. Compare each row to see where catalog, review and pricing cases start.

Catalog and listings. How detail pages get you caught

Catalog violations rarely start with a dramatic notice. They start with a listing created in a hurry, copied from a supplier or merged into the wrong variation family, and they surface weeks later.

Duplicate pages, accuracy and the brand field

The ASIN Creation policy and Product detail page rules are both scored, and the Code of Conduct names creating multiple detail pages for the same product as misleading. Sellers do it to escape an old listing or old reviews, or because a tool created a new ASIN instead of matching. Each produces the same violation.

The Restricted Products page requires accurate categorisation and description and warns that listings purposefully inaccurate, miscategorised or deceptively described to get around category, product and listing restrictions may lead to immediate termination. Moving a restricted item into another category to avoid a gate is circumvention, not a listing error. The Brand Name policy is scored too. Under the IP policy, Amazon treats a brand as a name shared by products through a common name, logo or mark on the product or packaging, so a brand field that does not match the item is an accuracy problem with brand consequences.

Variations and reviews

Amazon’s reviews policies list creating a variation relationship to manipulate reviews and boost star rating through review aggregation as a violation. Merging a new product into an established parent to borrow its reviews is a reviews case as well as a catalog one.

How to check your catalog

Export active listings and look for near-identical titles under different ASINs you created.
Confirm every variation child is the same product differing only by an attribute such as size or colour.
When one listing from a supplier content pack is flagged, check every listing from that pack.

Products. Intellectual property, counterfeits and restricted items

Product violations carry the heaviest consequences and the clearest evidence standards, which helps if your sourcing is genuine.

Intellectual property

Amazon’s IP policy covers copyrights, trademarks and patents, and says violations may result in loss of selling privileges or other legal consequences. Amazon acts even when a seller infringes without knowledge, and terminates repeat infringers in appropriate circumstances. For multiple warnings, Amazon asks for the list of ASINs and at least one of the following. Invoices proving authenticity (pricing may be removed), Amazon order IDs, an authorization letter from the rights owner that is not a forwarded email, or a court order. This is educational information, not legal advice, and Amazon’s own policy recommends a lawyer for specific IP questions. For more, see what an intellectual property complaint actually is.

Five intellectual property cases that reach an Amazon seller. Open each notice to see what Amazon asks for and which response fits it.

Anti-counterfeiting

The Anti-Counterfeiting policy is scored separately. A counterfeit allegation questions whether your goods are genuine at all, so the evidence is supply-chain proof, meaning invoices from a source traceable to the brand or its authorized distribution, covering what you sold. Read the current invoice requirements page in Program Policies before submitting. See our article on the anti-counterfeiting policy.

Restricted products

The Restricted Products page prohibits illegal, unsafe or other restricted products, including prescription-only items. Listed consequences include immediate suspension or termination, destroying fulfillment center inventory without reimbursement, and permanently withholding payments, with possible civil and criminal penalties. Restricted areas include dietary supplements, cosmetics, food and beverage, medical devices, pesticides, prohibited product claims, recalled products and products needing an EPA Certificate of Conformity, among many others. Some categories need pre-approval. FBA sellers must also check FBA Product Restrictions, and “FDA Cleared” or “FDA approved” claims carry additional requirements. Our guide to restricted products you cannot sell walks through the categories.

Restricted product problems often come from claims rather than the item. A legal product becomes a restricted listing when the listing adds an unsupported health, safety or regulatory claim, or when a supplier changes a formula or packaging and the detail page is never updated. Check the page content, the physical product and your compliance documents together.

How to check your products

For each brand you resell, confirm you hold traceable invoices covering units sold.
Look up each brand in the USPTO Trademark Search system to see who owns the mark.
Search the CPSC recalls database by category and date, and read your category’s restricted products and prohibited claims pages against each listing.

Pricing. The Fair Pricing policy

Amazon agrees sellers set their own prices, but its Fair Pricing policy says it regularly monitors prices, including shipping, against other prices available to customers. Practices that harm customer trust include a misleading reference price, a price significantly higher than recent prices on or off Amazon, multi-packs priced higher per unit than a single, and excessive shipping fees, judged against current public carrier rates, reasonable handling and buyer perception. Actions range from removing the Featured Offer or the offer, or suspending the ship option, up to suspension or termination in serious or repeated cases.

Most cases we see come from automation, not deliberate gouging. A repricer with a high maximum follows a competitor out of stock, a multi-pack price is never revisited, or an old shipping template no longer matches carrier rates. See the pros and cons of automated pricing. Confirm every repricer rule has a sensible maximum, divide each multi-pack price by its unit count, and compare shipping charges with published USPS, UPS or FedEx rates.

Reviews. The policy Amazon calls zero tolerance

Amazon’s reviews policies state zero tolerance. Possible actions include permanent withdrawal of selling privileges and withholding of funds, removal of all the product’s reviews, permanent delisting, legal action and referral to authorities, and publicly disclosing the seller’s name.

What the policy prohibits

Examples include reviewing your own or a competitor’s product, compensation or free products for reviews (including through review services or social media groups), refunds tied to changing or removing a review, review clubs, reviews by family or employees, diverting negative reviews elsewhere while sending positive ones to Amazon, variation manipulation, review requests or incentives in packaging, and using a customer account to write reviews. “Seller” includes employees and third-party partners, and Amazon says their infractions bring enforcement even without your knowledge or consent. The Code of Conduct permits neutral review requests to your own customers, but not incentives, positive-only requests, or asking only happy customers.

Federal law points the same way. The FTC’s Rule on the Use of Consumer Reviews and Testimonials, 16 CFR Part 465, covers fake reviews, buying positive or negative reviews, undisclosed insider reviews, company-controlled review sites and review suppression. See our article on faking reviews.

How to check your review practices

Read every insert and template for any review mention beyond a neutral request.
Ask every marketing or launch vendor, in writing, how buyers are recruited and whether anything is free, discounted or refunded around a review.
Confirm no employee, relative or contractor has reviewed your products or a competitor’s.

Unsure which policy is at issue?

Send us the notice and we will read the case before anything is submitted.

Submit Case →Book a call

How Amazon announces policy changes

The AHR policy page says that as new policies launch, Amazon updates its Help pages and tries to share policy or account health changes via Account Health News whenever possible. Individual notice is not promised, so staying current is your job. Amazon also says it may call to offer support if account health degrades toward deactivation, and asks sellers to keep the emergency contact number current under Notification Preferences. Keep a dated list of the policy pages for your categories, re-read them monthly, and log any change and the listings it affects.

Where to verify each policy in your account

Question	Where to check	What to look for
What is my risk level?	Account Health page, each store	Score, band and every open violation by policy
Am I near a repeat limit?	Account Health policy list	Two or more violations of one policy within 180 days
Which policies are scored?	Policies included in AHR help page	The current list
Is my information accurate?	Account settings	Details matching current documents
Who can act on my account?	User permissions and connected apps	A named owner and reason for each
Can I prove authenticity?	Supplier invoices, Amazon order records	Traceable source, matching descriptions and quantities
Who owns this brand?	USPTO Trademark Search	Registered owner and goods covered
Is my product recalled?	CPSC recalls search	Matches by category, hazard and date
Are my prices fair?	Repricer rules, pricing, shipping templates	Spikes, multi-pack math, shipping against carrier rates
Did a policy change?	Account Health News, policy pages	Edits affecting your categories since your last check

When a violation lands. Diagnose before you respond

Amazon protects the buyer’s trust and does not weigh whether a seller is a good person. Appeals arguing fairness or years of good history do not move it. Evidence that the risk has been found, contained and controlled does.

The stages an Amazon policy appeal passes through, drawn from a reviews case and an IP image case. Step through each stage to see where appeals like them break down.

A worked diagnosis

A hypothetical seller receives a Code of Conduct notice about review manipulation on two ASINs and insists they never bought reviews. Investigation shows that a launch agency, hired three months earlier, refunded buyers through an outside payment app after they posted reviews. The trigger is the flagged reviews. The root cause is hiring a vendor without asking how buyers were recruited, with no written rule on review solicitation. Corrective actions. The agency terminated in writing on a stated date, all launch services stopped, every insert and template checked. Preventive controls. A written ban on review incentives, a named person approving any marketing vendor after a written description of its method, and a quarterly template review. The appeal addresses that conduct, not the whole code, and denies nothing the account data shows.

Evidence standards and honest viability

Every document must be genuine, complete, internally consistent and matched to the violation. Invoices should identify supplier and buyer, describe the product as the ASIN does, and cover quantities sold. Never create, edit or “clean up” a document. If a genuine document cannot be obtained, remove the affected offers and judge honestly whether an appeal for that ASIN is viable. A third-party cause with clean remediation is often a strong case. A counterfeit product or deliberate circumvention is much harder.

Mistakes that turn one violation into an account problem

The most common mistake is answering the policy instead of the conduct, which shows the specific issue was never found. The second is fixing the listing but not the source, leaving the same image pack, repricer rule or vendor active for a costlier repeat. The third is assuming a third party absorbs the blame, which the reviews policy and the code both rule out. The fourth is ignoring warnings because nothing was removed, though warnings become part of the record a later action can cite. The fifth is letting account details and the emergency contact number go out of date.

Related guide. Amazon Prohibited Seller Activities.

A monthly routine to stay on the right side of these policies

Run the checks in the same order each month and log the date, the person and what changed. That log is your proof of preventive controls if a notice arrives.

The monthly checks that keep an Amazon account on the right side of its policies. Toggle what is already true to see how exposed the account is.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which Amazon policies count toward the Account Health Rating?

Amazon’s help page lists them, including the Seller Code of Conduct, Intellectual Property, Anti-Counterfeiting, ASIN Creation, Product detail page rules, Fair Pricing, Customer Product Reviews and Restricted Products. Not all policies are included, and Amazon updates the list as policies are added.

What Account Health Rating score is safe?

Amazon says 200 to 1,000 is Healthy, 100 to 199 is At Risk, and 99 or lower is eligible for deactivation or deactivated. Amazon may still deactivate regardless of score for suspected fraudulent, deceptive, illegal or harmful activity.

How long does a violation affect my score?

Amazon says the score reflects activity over the last 180 days, and you regain points when you successfully address violations.

Can two violations get my account deactivated?

Amazon says reaching the maximum repeat violations for one policy in 180 days can put the account at immediate risk, and that maximum can be as low as two for higher-severity violations.

Am I responsible if an agency violated the reviews policy?

Yes. Amazon says infractions by partners, employees or agencies result in enforcement even without your knowledge or consent.

Can I run more than one Seller Central account?

Amazon allows one account per region unless you have a legitimate business need and all accounts are in good standing.

Can I ask customers for reviews?

Yes, in a neutral manner and only from your own customers. Amazon prohibits incentives, asking only for positive reviews, asking customers to change or remove a review, and soliciting only customers who had a good experience.

What documents does Amazon accept for multiple IP warnings?

Amazon asks for the list of affected ASINs and at least one of the following. Invoices proving authenticity, Amazon order IDs, an authorization letter from the rights owner that is not a forwarded email, or a court order.

How will I know when Amazon changes a policy?

Amazon updates its Help pages and tries to share changes via Account Health News whenever possible. It does not promise individual notice, so re-read your policies regularly.

Get Help With Amazon Policy Violations

If a notice has landed and you are unsure which policy is at issue, our team will review the account before anything is submitted. Submit your case or book a consultation.

This article is educational information only and is not legal advice. Amazon’s policies and processes change, so confirm current wording in Seller Central before acting. No outcome or timeline can be guaranteed.

You can also see all our marketplace suspension services.

Amazon Policies Sellers Should Know and How Each One Is Enforced