Amazon won't replace products sold through sellers such as Cloudtail, Appario

Amazon

After the revised FDI guidelines that kicked in on February 1, Amazon's customers will not be able to replace products purchased from Cloudtail and Appario, let alone purchase them.

"Starting February 1, 2019, FBA sellers such as Cloudtail India, Export LLC, Appario and Amazon Retail India (ARIPL) will temporarily be unavailable on the Amazon marketplace," reads a communication sent to a customer by Amazon. "Customers will no longer be eligible for replacements post January 31, 2019 11:59 pm; if they have ordered from any of these sellers," it adds.

The customers can, however, get the money refunded for the products purchased depending on the their case.

Amazon did not respond to the media query.

FBA sellers are the merchants who used to take the fulfillment services of Amazon. With Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA), they got to store their products in Amazon's fulfillment centers. Amazon used to pick, pack, ship and provide customer service for these products.

The revised FDI guidelines bar marketplaces such as Amazon and Flipkart from holding equity in the sellers that sell on their platforms.

This in principle bars entities like Couldtail and Appario from selling their products on Amazon.in. Cloudtail is the joint venture of Amazon and Narayana Murthy's Catamaran Ventures and also one of its important vendors.

Amazon and Flipkart had sough extension of the February 1 deadline, however, the government didn't budge. While Amazon had asked for four months, Flipkart had requested for an extension of the deadline by six months.

Given the sensitivity of the issue which directly impacts impacts the offline retailers considered a huge vote bank for the Bharatiya Janta Party, the government refused to budge this time. The crucial Lok Sabha elections are expected to happen in the next few months.