Rejected Amazon Review

Factual Questions
1

I recently purchased and reviewed a back scratcher from Amazon.
I gave the item 5 stars. The review was simple:

“Pricey But a Great Back Scratcher”
“VERY scratchy and a bit pricey, but this works great.”

A day or two later I get this from Amazon:
“Thank you for submitting a customer review on Amazon. After carefully reviewing your submission, your review could not be posted to the website. It appears your content did not comply with our guidelines.”

Why did they reject the review? What am I missing?

2

Beats me. Looks like these are the Guidelines, but I didn’t see anything that that would have run afoul of.

3

It’s probably too short and simple, so they think it might be a fake review from the seller or its agent. Positive review, with few details. Fake reviews are a common scam on Amazon. Websites/plugins like ReviewMeta and Fakespot can reveal when an item has a high number of suspicious reviews.

4

Understood but, good Lord, it’s a back scratcher. How detailed a review are they expecting?

5

Nah. I’ve done shorter reviews than this one.

Hmmph - this is a back scratcher head scratcher.

6

Dang - I got two more reviews rejected by Amazon. Both really positive.

I must be on Amazon’s shit list.

7

Were they also very short reviews?

FWIW, I think you got your point across but can also see why a QA drone might flag it as being too vague or not doing a good enough job reviewing the actual product.

8

No - they are both longer. Here’s one for a Kohler “Hyten” toilet seat (also 5 stars):

Works Well
Very easy install. Doesn’t move when installed. Brings toilet to chair height at a fraction of the cost of a new toilet.

9

Do all the reject reviews use “price” or “cost”? The guidelines do have some clarifications on when you can mention price or not. I could see their automod automatically rejecting anything using those words.

10

Until you get it figured out, you are no longer my first choice for writing my online dating profile.

It’s a damned good thing I’m happily married

ETA: If memory serves, this didn’t comport with FQ guidelines, so:
a) Apologies, and
b) Did you enter the review from the product listing on your orders page – in other words, IIRC, that’s the way to be a ‘verified purchaser.’ If you didn’t do that, maybe that’s the issue. If you did do that, then I’m pretty lost for an answer here. The reviews seem okay, at least.

11

One such rejected review might reflect a product whose seller is spamming lots of fake positive reviews and thus a 5-star review automatically comes under suspicion. Several such rejections are strange, unless the OP is deemed a Notorious Five-Star Reviewer.

It’d be mildly interesting to see if similar Four-Star revews from the OP were also rejected.

12

Yes, I did.

I just left a chat session with Amazon. Their agent is also stumped and will submit this to the Amazon gods.

13

So far, it’s only been reviews submitted in the last 3 days or so, and none have been less than 5 stars. I’m not shy about giving less than 5 star reviews though.

14

From Amazon’s guidelines:

It looks to me like @MindsEye_Watering’s comments were all on the OK side of this. As you say, they could have been automatically flagged. But “After carefully reviewing your submission” sounds like something more than just an automatic rejection.

15

Very weird. I just received this email from Amazon:

Thank you for your inquiry. We have noticed some unusual reviewing, rating, or voting activity associated with this account. As a result, we removed all of this account’s reviews, and the account is no longer able to contribute reviews, ratings, votes, customer questions and answers, and other related Community content.

Why is this happening?

Customer reviews, ratings, and votes are meant to help customers make informed purchase decisions through unbiased product feedback. Reviews, ratings, and votes that violate our Community Guidelines and our Review policies are not allowed.

This account can no longer contribute content for one or more of the following reasons:

– Reviews, ratings, or votes were posted in exchange for compensation, such as gift cards, product refunds, review swaps, or free or discounted products.

– The account requested free or discounted products in exchange for reviews, ratings, or votes.

Has your account been deactivated in error?

If you believe there has been an error, please submit an explanation. Your explanation should include the following information:

– Evidence or examples that demonstrate that your account complies with our policies.

To contact us about this decision, please reply to this email.

The Amazon Review Moderation team

16

So that you all know, I have never done this. They are mistaken.

I’m not sure if I should care about any of it. So what if I can’t post a review?

17

Not a big deal, but understandably annoying.

Awhile back I bought a portable room humidifier on Amazon. It was an OK product, only the manufacturer included a note with the shipment offering me a rebate if I gave the item a five-star review on Amazon.

My review (which was less than 5 stars) noted this offer and included a comment about how the manufacturer was trying to make Amazon complicit in its scheme to boost ratings. The upshot of this was that 1) the review was removed, and 2) Amazon blocked other reviews of mine from going online.

I sent an e-mail inquiring what the hell was going on, and got a reply saying Amazon was reviewing the situation and would get back to me (which they never did). After a few months I was able to post reviews again, having apparently learned my lesson. :crazy_face:

18

After protesting strenuously, I got this:

The email you received on June 21, 2022 was sent incorrectly. We apologize for any inconvenience caused.

Hello (my name), Thank you for contacting us about your reviews. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. After reviewing the account once again, we have restored this account’s previously contributed reviews ${INCLUDE IF NEEDED} and the ability to contribute reviews, comments, customer questions and answers, and other content. It may take up to 24 hours for reviews to reappear.

Thanks to all for your input!

19

Whether Amazon, social media, Flickr, discussion forums (heh), or personals apps, they never tell you why you were blocked or banned beyond the useless “violated community guidelines” so they have no culpability and you have no recourse, thus minimizing customer service interaction.

20

At least you didn’t try to post a negative review of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Kidnapped, and through a mad comedy of errors, ended up being executed for murder.