Responding to Amazon sales-rank manipulation allegations: checking orders and promotions

This article is for sellers who have received a warning or suspension notice citing sales-rank manipulation, and for sellers who are unsure whether their own promotions might cross a policy line. It lays out the conduct the policies prohibit and where the line falls with ordinary promotions, what to do right after a notification arrives, how to back up your orders and promotions with records, and how to think through an appeal and preventing a repeat.

What "sales-rank manipulation" means: the conduct the policies prohibit

According to Amazon's buyer-facing Help, the Amazon Ranking (Best Sellers Rank, 売れ筋ランキング) is based on sales and is updated hourly to reflect each product's most recent and cumulative sales figures (the exact calculation method is not disclosed). The policies prohibit intentionally moving that ranking, on the premise that buyers use it to judge a product's popularity.

This article is based on Help content and other materials we were able to confirm in Japan's Seller Central (セラーセントラル) as of September 2026. Policies and on-screen labels can change, so please also check the latest Help content and the notification you received.

Conduct listed under "Sales rank manipulation"

The Help page "Seller Prohibited Activities and Actions" (出品者の禁止活動および行為、ならびに遵守事項) has a standalone section called "Sales rank manipulation" (売上ランキングの不正使用). In summary, it covers the following:

• Intentionally manipulating the sales rank
• Soliciting false or fraudulent orders, or knowingly accepting such orders
• Ordering your own listed products
• Giving buyers compensation or promotion codes for purchasing a product, for the purpose of raising the sales rank
• Stating anything about sales rank on the product detail page, including in the product title or description

The Code of Conduct and "search and browse abuse"

The Help page "Amazon Services Business Solutions Agreement and Seller Code of Conduct" (出品者利用規約および出品者行動規範) also lists, as examples of unfair conduct, manipulating the sales rank by accepting false orders, orders the seller paid for, or orders discounted from outside Amazon, and disguising paid-for searches as organic buyer behavior. Warnings under the Code of Conduct in general are covered in responding to warnings under the Seller Terms and Code of Conduct.

The same prohibited-activities page also has a "Search and browse abuse" (検索およびブラウズの不正使用) section, which prohibits artificially inflating views through bot traffic or by paying for clicks on organic search results, among other things.

Why this gets treated seriously: the impact on Account Health and your payments

Here is what Amazon's official Help indicates about the impact.

Item	Official explanation (summary)
Account Health Rating (AHR)	"Manipulating search results or sales rankings" is explicitly listed as an example of Critical (重大) severity. A single Critical violation can lead to suspension, and once detected, your rating turns red with a score of 0
Grace period before suspension	There is a three-day grace period before suspension; addressing the issue within that time may allow you to avoid suspension. An Account Health specialist may also call you
Exception to the grace period	Where fraudulent, deceptive, illegal, or otherwise harmful activity is suspected (including attempts to circumvent Amazon's systems), your account can be suspended immediately regardless of your score
Payments (売上金)	Under the reserve policy for seller payments (売上金留保のポリシー), if Amazon determines your account is being used for purposes such as "attempting to manipulate rankings," your funds are held in reserve until it is confirmed that no problematic conduct occurred

Amazon states that it monitors for violations using machine learning, automation, and review by specialists, but the criteria it uses are not made public. This article does not cover ways to avoid detection, such as adjusting the number or timing of orders.

Reviewing your own promotions: where the line falls, by type of conduct

The standard to apply is the premise behind the policy: that buyers judge a product's popularity from its sales rank. Review each of your promotions for any mechanism that generates orders for a reason other than genuine demand.

Conduct	Treatment under the policies (summary)	Official alternative to consider
Purchasing your own product using your company's account or an employee's or family member's account	Ordering your own listed products is not allowed. Help does not spell out how purchases by employees or family members are treated, but if the company directs or pays for it, it risks being treated as "soliciting a false or fraudulent order," so it should be avoided. Reviews by family members or employees are prohibited	There is no alternative (don't buy your own products on Amazon, including for quality checks)
Refunding part of the purchase price outside Amazon after purchase (cashback)	Giving compensation for a purchase in order to raise the sales rank is prohibited. The Code of Conduct also gives "accepting orders discounted from outside Amazon" as an example	Promotions or coupons set up through Amazon's own screens
Distributing promotion codes in order to raise the sales rank	Giving codes for the same purpose is likewise explicitly prohibited	Don't distribute codes for the purpose of asking specific people to buy. Set conditions for discounts through Amazon's own Promotions feature, and keep records of who codes were distributed to and why
Paying people to search for and buy your product, or using bots to inflate views	The former is given as an example of unfair conduct under the Code of Conduct; the latter is prohibited under "Search and browse abuse"	Official ways to attract traffic, such as advertising
Putting phrases like "No. 1 bestseller" in the product title or description	Stating anything about sales rank on the product detail page is prohibited	Factual product descriptions
Promising a benefit or refund in exchange for posting a review	Compensating reviews (including providing the product free or at a discount) is prohibited	Amazon Vine, the "Request a Review" (レビューのリクエスト) feature

The Promotions feature itself is an official tool, but using it to hand codes to specific people you've asked to buy, or as a reward for a purchase or review, risks being treated as prohibited compensation. If you're unsure about a promotion, check Help before you run it.

Officially permitted tools and their main conditions

Tool	Main conditions and rules (summary)
Amazon Vine	Requires a role such as Brand Registry brand representative, and applies to FBA-fulfilled listings and similar requirements. Covers products with, for example, fewer than 30 reviews. The seller cannot influence what a review says
Request a Review	Sent using Amazon's standard wording from a page such as "Request a Review" (レビューのリクエスト), within 30 days of order completion. Prohibited: wording that encourages a positive review (including anything suggesting compensation or a benefit), asking only satisfied buyers to review, asking a buyer to delete or update an existing review, and sending repeated requests for the same order
Promotions	Percentage-off discounts and "Buy One Get One" require a Professional selling plan and a seller rating of 2.5 stars or higher (no rating yet is also acceptable). Discount rates range from 5% to 50%. Listed under Advertising (広告) > Promotions (プロモーション) > Manage Promotions (プロモーションを管理)
Coupons	Requires a Professional selling plan and a seller rating that meets Amazon's threshold. Applies to products sold on Amazon for 14 days or longer; coupons worth more than 50% of the product price are prohibited

Vine, Promotions, and Coupons all require a Professional selling plan. Individual plan sellers can't use them, and Amazon's in-store ads such as Sponsored Products are also for Professional sellers. Individual plan sellers should therefore focus on the options available to them, such as reviewing their pricing and product pages. How to review promotions that involve reviews is covered in responding to a product review warning.

What to do right after you receive a notification

STEP1. Identify what's affected from the notification and Account Health

Notice of a violation arrives by email, as a warning or as notification that your selling privileges have been suspended or revoked. As a precaution against phishing, don't open the links in the email; instead log in to Seller Central directly, for example from a bookmark, and open Account Health (アカウント健全性) and Performance Notifications (パフォーマンス通知). Cross-check them against the email and write down the following:

For how to read the screens, see how to check your Account Health score. Specific orders aren't always identified, so use your own records to narrow down what's affected.

STEP2. Check your emergency contact and support channels

In case you get a call during the grace period, check your emergency contact phone number under Notification Preferences (通知設定) and decide who will answer. Professional plan sellers can also reach out from the [Contact Us] / [Request a call now] (お問い合わせ／今すぐ電話がほしい) button on the Account Health page. See preparing to consult Account Health Support for how to prepare.

STEP3. Stop any ongoing promotion, and record when you stopped it

If a promotion that may cross a policy line is still running, stop it without waiting for the investigation's outcome. Instruct any contractor in writing or by chat to stop the work, and end any cashback offers or distribution of promotion codes. Remove any sales-rank claims or promotional wording such as "sale" or "limited time" from the product title or description (this is prohibited under the product-detail-page rules). Before you take down a social media post or announcement page, save a screenshot and note the date and time it was posted. The date and details of when you stopped each promotion become material for showing corrective action in your appeal.

STEP4. Pull the orders and promotions from your reports

Fields such as "item-promotion-id" (商品プロモーションID) in your order report, or "promotion-id" (プロモーションID) in your payment report, let you check which promotion was applied to which order. That said, Help only describes these fields for percentage-off and free-shipping promotions, so coupon and Lightning Deal usage isn't always identifiable from these fields alone — cross-check them against the results and run dates shown in each management screen. Line up orders day by day for the affected ASIN's covered period and the time around it, and note down the settings that were in effect at the time.

STEP5. Interview your staff and any contractor

Check with the employees involved in the promotion, whoever handled social media or advertising, and any contractor, about what they did during the covered period. The Customer Reviews policy (カスタマーレビューポリシー) explicitly states that a violation by a contractor or employee can lead to action even if the seller was unaware of it or did not consent to it. Keep a record of when you spoke with each person and what they said.

STEP6. Sort the facts into "what happened," "what didn't happen," and "what's unclear"

If you fill in what's unclear with guesswork, a mismatch with the facts later can undermine your whole explanation's credibility. Label anything unclear as "still being confirmed," noting what you'll confirm and by when. Use this list as the framework for your appeal.

Backing up your orders and promotions with records: materials to prepare

When you submit an appeal, Amazon asks you to provide evidence for every product and ASIN under review. Examples of records you can use are as follows.

Fact to confirm	Example records you can use	What to check
Which orders came through which promotion	Order reports, payment reports	The number and share of orders that came through a promotion during the covered period
What each promotion involved and when it ran	The list under "Manage Promotions," and copies of your coupon or advertising settings	Whether the period orders increased matches the period the promotion ran
Announcements made outside Amazon	Social media posts, email newsletters, copies of package inserts	Whether any of it offers a benefit in exchange for a purchase or review
Work done by a contractor	Contracts, purchase orders, results reports, chat records	Whether the actual work matches the scope you assigned

If you used a contractor or agency

If your only communication was verbal, ask the contractor for a written report so you have it on record.

Structuring your appeal: what to write depends on whether you recognize the conduct

If you've been suspended, submit your appeal by following the on-screen instructions from [Reactivate your selling account] (出品用アカウントの再開) at the top of the Account Health page. Amazon states it can take up to about two days to receive a response to your appeal. If you're asked for additional information, submit the documents or information from [View Account Health Requests] (アカウント健全性の要請を見る). The full process is laid out in the path from suspension to filing for reinstatement.

Amazon asks that an appeal stick to the facts, avoid emotional language, and stay concise, and that it present the root cause and the actions you've taken, together with the dates of any changes and any related documents.

If you recognize the conduct: show your corrective action and prevention in concrete terms

If you find that conduct violating the policies did occur, acknowledge it, and write out the root cause, the corrective action you took, and your prevention measures, down to who changed what and when. See how to structure a plan of action for the approach. Below is a sample explanation for a situation where a contractor was offering cashback. This is a hypothetical example, not a real case, so rewrite it to match the facts of your own business.

We had outsourced promotion of the affected ASIN to an outside contractor. Our investigation found that, without our approval, the contractor had been offering buyers a benefit — a partial refund of the purchase price through a method outside Amazon — when distributing promotion codes on social media. This amounts to giving buyers compensation and violates the policies. Even though this was the contractor's conduct, we recognize it happened because our own oversight was insufficient.
The root cause was that we had no procedure for reviewing a contractor's promotions in advance, and we had not made the policies known to them.
As corrective action, we ended the promotion in question on [Month] [Day] and stopped working with the contractor. We identified the orders that used the code from the promotion ID in our order report and have attached the list.
To prevent recurrence, starting [Month] [Day], we changed our procedure so that any promotion run outside Amazon is reviewed in advance by both the staff member in charge and their manager, with the approval kept on record.

This sample is only a framework. Describing investigations or measures you haven't carried out as if they were already done would be a false explanation, so write only what you actually did, the dates you did it, and the supporting documents.

If you don't recognize the conduct: show how the orders arose, with records

Even if the conduct didn't happen, simply writing "we didn't do this" gives Amazon nothing to evaluate. Show, with records, how the orders actually arose.

Don't write speculation, such as sabotage by a competitor, unless you have evidence for it. It doesn't fit Amazon's guidance to base your explanation on facts, and it risks undermining your credibility. How to keep records when you suspect suspicious conduct by a third party is covered in responding when you suspect harassment.

Responses to avoid

• Continuing to sell under a new account: A second account is permitted only where there is a legitimate business reason and every account is being operated without problems. Continuing to sell under a different account while one account is suspended or being addressed for a violation does not qualify. If any one account has a problem, all of your accounts can end up suspended.
• Continuing a promotion by adjusting the number or timing of orders: Attempting to circumvent Amazon's systems is included among the harmful conduct that can result in immediate suspension.
• Altering documents or records: Submitting materials that don't reflect the facts can be treated as "deceptive conduct" under the Account Health policies, which can lead to immediate suspension regardless of your score.
• Ending your explanation by placing the blame on your contractor: As noted in STEP5, the Customer Reviews policy explicitly states that a contractor's violation can lead to action even if the seller was unaware of it, and a contractor's conduct can also become the seller's responsibility. Present, as your root cause, the point where your own oversight and management fell short.

Preventing a repeat: reviewing both the policies and Japanese law

Promotions related to sales rank or reviews can also be subject to Japanese law. Check whether a specific law applies to your situation with a professional such as a lawyer.

Promotion to review	Points to note under the policies and the law (summary)
Reviews or social-media posts you ask a third party to write	Since October 1, 2023, stealth marketing — advertising that hides the fact that it is advertising — has been a violation of the Act against Unjustifiable Premiums and Misleading Representations (景品表示法). The regulation applies to the business supplying the product (the advertiser); the third party who posted at the business's request is not covered
Providing a free gift or premium	Amazon's Help explains the cap on general premium offers (総付景品) as no more than two-tenths of the transaction value where it is ¥1,000 or more, and no more than ¥200 where it is under ¥1,000
Coupons and promotions	Raising the regular price right before applying a coupon can violate applicable law. Promotions must also comply with the Act against Unjustifiable Premiums and Misleading Representations

Put the following into a document and share it with your staff and any contractor.

Repeating a violation of the same policy has a bigger impact on your rating, and reaching the limit within 180 days can lead to immediate suspension.

Frequently asked questions

Q. Is buying even a single unit of my own product for a quality check a violation?

A. The policies prohibit ordering your own listed products, and no exception is stated for purposes such as quality checks. Check quality through means that don't involve ordering on Amazon, such as inspecting items when you receive stock or before you ship it in.

Q. Orders jumped suddenly after a Lightning Deal or coupon. Could that be a problem?

A. Lightning Deals and coupons are official promotion features set up through Amazon's own screens. What the policies prohibit is things like false orders, buying your own product, or giving buyers compensation or codes for the purpose of raising the sales rank. Because the criteria Amazon uses aren't published, keep records such as the promotion IDs described in STEP4, so you can show how the orders arose if asked.

Q. If my appeal is approved, does the violation get removed from the record?

A. It may be removed, but the treatment depends on the circumstances. Amazon explains that a violation is removed when, for example, a dispute confirms it was a mistake, or you have taken the necessary corrective action. That said, even a violation removed because your appeal (acknowledging the conduct and correcting it) was approved can still count toward the 180-day repeat-violation limit if you did not also file a dispute (showing the violation was a mistake). For an account suspended based on its score, the violation stays on the page even after 180 days.

Q. My payments have stopped.

A. Under the reserve policy for seller payments (売上金留保のポリシー), a reserve applied because Amazon determined there was a risk normally lasts 90 days, though it may be extended. On the other hand, if Amazon determines your account is being used for purposes such as manipulating rankings, funds are held in reserve until it is confirmed that no problematic conduct occurred. You can dispute this through the procedure in the notification or in Seller Central, and if it isn't lifted, you're told you can escalate to a separate channel once 60 days have passed from the reserve date. See how to check on your payments after a suspension for more detail.

Q. I couldn't respond within three days and my account was suspended.

A. You can still appeal after suspension, from [Reactivate your selling account] (出品用アカウントの再開) at the top of the Account Health page or from the banner guidance shown there. Rather than rushing to submit one thin appeal after another, gather your facts and documents first, then submit.

Summary

Sales-rank manipulation is called out as its own prohibited item in the policies, and it's a violation listed as an example of Critical severity under Account Health.

• Buying your own products, giving compensation or codes for the purpose of raising your rank, and stating sales rank on the product page are all prohibited
• When you receive a notification, check what's affected and how severe it is, stop any promotion that's still running, and then work out how the orders arose
• A contractor's conduct can also become the seller's responsibility, so confirm with records what you asked for against what was actually done
• Build your appeal around the root cause, corrective action, and prevention measures if you recognize the conduct, or around records of how the orders arose if you don't
• For prevention, use Amazon's official tools, and build the relevant legal points into your internal rules too

If you're unsure where the line falls or how to explain your situation, consider organizing the facts and consulting a professional early.

*This article provides a general explanation. The appropriate response in individual cases depends on the circumstances.

Further reading

A surge in pending Amazon orders: documenting suspicious orders and seeking support Read article → Checking funds after an Amazon suspension: holds, disbursement requests and video interviews Read article → When Amazon flags product-review practices: reviewing requests and buyer communications Read article →