Introduction
I was trying to buy some items yesterday in my Amazon app like normal, but realized I couldn’t log in. I then went to a PC and couldn’t log in either, ever after doing a password reset. I then called up customer service, who proceeded to ask for my name, email, last order date, what payment method was used, etc. The rep then said another team would email me in ~30 minutes to help me clear my account. Shortly after, I get this email:
Hello,
We have closed your account and canceled all outstanding orders.
We took these actions because either the Amazon Gift Card or the Amazon Gift Card balance you are using is in violation of our Terms and Conditions. We cannot reissue the gift card or reimburse you for these funds. For further details, we suggest that you contact the party who sold or gave you the gift card.
Please note that buying Amazon.com gift cards by unauthorized third parties, and sold or transfer-for-value of Amazon.com gift cards is a violation of our terms.
You can find more information on the Amazon.com. Help page:
If you believe we took this action in error, please send the gift card purchase receipt, or other documentation such as an email from the sender, to back up all the Amazon Gift Cards used to place the order xxxxxxxxx to our secure fax line.
Make sure that you write your name, phone number, and Amazon account email address on the document. If you did not buy the gift card, we request you to get in touch with the original purchaser to provide the gift card receipt or proof of purchase.
You can find our fax number on the Amazon.com Help page:
https://www.amazon.com/help/addressverification
Sincerely,
Account Specialist
Amazon.com
First off, I’ve had this account for over a decade already and it’s a PRIME account. I even have a seller account although I don’t sell much these days. I’ve always loaded my account using discounted gift cards that I get from Staples, Lowe’s, etc (courtesy of AO’s) and just sort of keep it in my ‘bank’ in case I needed to buy stuff. For the past year or so, this balance has always been about 1k-1.5k. It was up to 3K at one point just because I was lazy and thought nothing would happen to it. I was kind of freaked out about the high balance about a month ago and let it go down to $0. Then I stupidly loaded $1500 to the account, and then I loaded $28 from an ethbates cashout. I made a few purchases and whatnot and thought everything was fine. All of my Amazon gift card purchases were bought first hand; I don’t buy them off Raise or any other people.
So what now? Well this article seems to be the most comprehensive. I plan on faxing my receipts and gift cards to their fax line. However, I have no record of order xxxxxxxxxxxxxx, so not even sure what they were talking about there. I expect this to be a long drawn out appeal for my ~$2500 of cancelled pre-orders and existing balance.
Lessons Learned
I told some people about my issue, and I heard that this has happened to a few of them too. The common denominator was that all of us had high gift card balances (>$1000) in our account. One person had their account for over a decade like me while one person only had their account for a few months, so tenure doesn’t mean anything. I’m not saying EVERYONE with a high GC balance will get shut down, but why give them any reason at all to shut you down? For some reason, they are assuming that people with high GC balances must be buying gift cards fraudulently. If I get my account back, I’m not using a gift card again on my Amazon account. If I were you though, this is what I recommend:
- Don’t buy any gift cards on a 3rd party site, even Raise.
- Mark which gift card was used and when (and keep the receipt of purchase)
- Only use a gift card on checkout (don’t “bank” any gift card balances or if you do “bank,” do it with a low amount)
- For pre-orders, just use a credit card (since they charge your GC immediately and it may not ship out for a while.)
I know you can’t have 2 seller accounts in the same household, but I’m not sure about the buying side. I’m guessing it’s okay. Regardless, I wouldn’t put all of my eggs in the same Amazon account.
This also happened to me in March 2022 and I still cannot access my account with a balance of $1,631.81. My account had a balance of $831.81 . After I loaded my balance with $800 with a credit card to have a total balance of $1631.81, in the next day Amazon sent me an email saying that my account was closed. The funny thing is that my credit card was charged and I later I had to pay my credit card charges.
After seeing a lot of similar cases , I am concluding that this has become a pattern with Amazon characterizing an intentional wrongdoing. Apparently, they are doing these things to confiscate customer´s money and easily enriching Amazon owners. I think there should be a combined lawsuit to prevent Amazon causing these damages to more clients.
What exactly constitutes a “high balance”? My wife’s account was closed and her balance was only around $165.
That’s not high at all. Must be something else that triggered the closure.
Same thing just happened to me. $1300 in gift cards and my account closed after 22 years! My wife has an account but I am afraid to use it. 🙁
What Amazon is doing is clearly abusive and involves a financial product. Take a few minutes and file a complaint with the CFPB (Consumer Financial Protection Bureau). It is a government agency set a number of years ago by Elizabeth Warren (now Senator). They have been able to get legislation passed that has outlawed certain abusive credit card practices, passed mortgage reform, got a multi-billion dollar settlement from Wells Fargo, etc. BUT they can only correct abusive practices like what Amazon is doing IF THEY HEAR FROM YOU.
File a complaint here: https://www.consumerfinance.gov/complaint/
Submit a complaint
Having a problem with a financial product or service? We help consumers connect with financial companies to understand issues, fix errors, and get direct responses about problems.
Tell us about your issue—we’ll forward it to the company and work to get you a response, generally within 15 days.
Hi John,
I have same issue, Amazon stole my gift card around $5,000 on August 2020. Two days after called them and they restored $290. I don’t know how they came up from $5,000 to $290. I keep contact them, and verify all the information and the last email I received from Amazon. They said “We may not reply to further emails about this issue.” Can’t access my amazon account any more.
I filed a complaint form to my state, and submitted complaint to FTC. Also posted on Twitter. This has been over a year but no luck. 🙁
What do you suggest?
Thanks!
As I said in my comment above, file a complaint with the CFPB. You are a CONSUMER dealing with a FINANCIAL product and you need PROTECTION from Amazon’s abusive action.
Unfortunately the CFPB doesn’t handle complaints about retail companies like Amazon. That was the response I got.
Ed, You’re right. CFPB should have advised you to file a complaint with the FTC and with your state office that handles consumer complaints. Retail gift cards are subject to regs from both the Feds (via the FTC) and the state. Those wheels move very, very slowly. Why not take them to Small Claims Court? It exists to handle problems just like yours where a merchant is taking unlawful advantage of a consumer.
CFPB is for complaint against Bank account, credit card, loans etc…what category you choose when filing CFPB complaint? You had success in that?
Hello, over 2 months my account has been closed. $1593, on my Amazon gift card balance. Same thing several forms, still closed account. So, is there a way to get that back? 🤔
Mamiynina@yahoo.com
I’m sorry to hear most of you did not get your money back. I had the sane issue with an Amazon gift card that was a birthday gift for my grandson. You can contact Amazon via their website by using CHAT. Thats what I did and it got resolved quickly. Got all the money back by. I was relieved. All of you go online and use chat and don’t worry about how long its been…. its worth a try
Same thing happened to me, Amazon cancelled account. lost my gift card balance.
Several calls to Amazon, waste of time.
Hi Robert Please I beg for your help my email is ackemaf@yahoo.com
I’m a victim as well. Called and emailed many many many times, still unable to re-open my account. Anyone can help me? I had over 1500 in gift card balance. And there was an order never received (paid with credit card) and I can’t access my account to request refund.
Hi, I only had $210 in Gift Cards that I purchased from CVS to buy Christmas gifts. They deactivated my account and the cards. I sent them the receipt, the front and back of Amazon Cards, at that point they reactivated the account, but not the gift cards. I am still fighting to get my cards reactivated.
Use CHAT and chat with an associate on the Amazon website. Just now had the same problem and it was quickly resolved. So relieved!
Can you Please email me? I have some questions. I had this same thing happen and provided credit cards and gift card receipt purchases and they still closed my account :(. Mlwsf116@gmail.com
This just happened to us. What do we do to get it back.please help
Hello,
I can’t believe that this happen to me too – my account was blocked! I had $350 in gift card balance and the cards were send directly from Amazon as I was an affiliate member. They should have records in their system that THEY have sent me these cards. I’ve just called their call center (2nd time) and escalated the case. Maybe I should write to Jeff Bezos as well but it’s ridigulous! They cannot give me any explanation why my account was blocked. I am so upset and don’t know what to do more.
Were you using the American Amazon version or Amazon from another country? I ask because of your English… Would help if you clarified which version.
I am a victim as well. I even have a business account and require the large balance for our day to day purchases. Now the account is in limbo and the funds have disappeared…
Had to actually email Jeff Bezzos’ email to even get a response from their account team. I was told the same thing, to provide proof or have the person sending the gift card reach out to them.
I did both, provided all gift card purchases and the owner of the account reached out to them. Now I am still waiting after 48 hours…
This has to be the worst customer service I have ever seen. Way to make your big accounts feel special
Update – My account was restored by the account team. It required emailing Jeff Bezos and sending all proof of gift card ownership + anyone having sent gift cards to confirm they were to be used on this account. Took in all about 2 weeks, but got my account restored. It was a lot of work, but glad this is over! i can’t say I will keep a large balance ever again!
hello robert ı need your help ı lose 3.3 k usd same like you please contact me via email gokhan.demirci.hse@gmail.com
Hi Robert – can you send me a message? I had the same thing just happen even though I provided all receipts and credit card statements. Mlwsf116@gmail.com
I did exactly like you said here and it worked. amen
Hello Robert,
The same thing just happened to our account. We had over $4500 in gift cards on Amazon. They cancelled the account last night and told us our gift cards are gone. My husband earned those gift cards legitimately. He has proof of the gift cards. He wrote an email to the CEO. Amazon is stealing from us. How can they have the right to do this. Will we ever see this money again? What else can we do? Thank you
Janine
janineloewy@yahoo.com
Hey Robert, I can use your help too. My email is: themushfiq@gmail.com
What you posted made a lot of sense. However, think about this, what
if you typed a catchier title? I ain’t suggesting your content isn’t good.,
but suppose you added a title that makes people desire more?
I mean Amazon closed my account because of a high gift card balance – Miles per
Day is a little boring. You could glance at Yahoo’s home page and see how they write post headlines to get viewers to click.
You might add a related video or a related pic or two to grab people excited about what you’ve
got to say. Just my opinion, it might bring your blog a little bit more
interesting.
I just had my seller account/amazon.com account closed for the same thing. Had over $1700 in gift cards added to my amazon balance. I bought my discounted gift cards from gameflips app. I received an email first stating not to buy anymore third party gift cards which I didn’t but I used some of the gift cards that was already added to my balance to buy something so the closed account. What pisses me off is my seller account has orders still coming through of people that are buying from me and I can’t do anything about it.