[beerandt]

I know they claim that, and it may be their official policy, but it obviously is not working in practice. Either that, or it's become direct fraud in their part.

And it may work to benefit Amazon in finding problematic sellers, and it may scare most legit sellers to never supply fake products.

But it doesn't seem to do anything to actually benefit sellers or buyers, at this point.

For one, I suspect resold returned items to be a major weakness of this policy. Or orders of multiple quantity with different sources, which are picked, boxed, then returned to inventory for whatever reason.

[ikeboy]

You don't see the counterfactual where Amazon didn't enforce much and counterfeiting was much more prevalent. Without knowing how much counterfeiting would take place without enforcement, you can't say enforcement is useless.

I see the other side: I was suspended after false counterfeit complaints from tp-link, and was forced to sue them in federal court. In my case, Amazon suspended me despite having provided extensive proof of authenticity, simply because the brand didn't want me to legally resell their product and was willing to lie about it.

I agree that returns are a weakness, where counterfeits can enter the supply chain. But returns are a low percentage of sales, and counterfeit returns (fraud) are a low percentage of returns. Seems like a relatively small problem.

Multiple quantity from different sellers shouldn't be combined. If they're in the same warehouse they would just ship from the same seller. I don't know for sure how Amazon handles it but again, doesn't seem like a huge problem.

[beerandt]

I agree, we may not know the extent of the problem. But if they are tracking sources as well as they claim to be, the problem wouldn't keep growing like it is. There's a major disconnect somewhere...

And you kinda make my point. The practice is for the benefit of Amazon, not us.

(It still benefits Amazon to sell fakes already within their inventory.)

>Multiple quantity from different sellers shouldn't be combined

Yet it's happening. I don't claim to know all the whys, but I've ordered enough to know that it's happening. And a lot.

[ikeboy]

Why do you think the problem is growing, and that it has to do with commingling?

Re multiple quantity: have you gotten counterfeit and authentic product in the same box?

[beerandt]

It's growing because it's happening in a higher and higher percentage of my orders. Plus based on public knowledge of the issue. 4 or 5 years ago, it took serious searching to find other people talking about it. The last 2 years, it's become fairly well known. And is now common.

Some problematic products, I've ordered a couple dozen times and never gotten a genuine product.

>in the same box?

Yes, multiple times, although probably less than 10. And a couple were supposed single seller items. Didn't matter.

(One case initially got my account flagged and couldn't buy anything else until I sent pictures for proof. One of the only times I've ever had Amazon call me.)

However, the much more common occurrence is variance over separate orders.