How to Transfer an Amazon Seller Account (Full Guide)

in this video we're going to take a run through how to transfer an Amazon Seller Central account from a seller over to a new buyer or legal entity I've transferred hundreds of seller accounts over the years and I've tried to distill down the simplest and most efficient process of how to get that done never had an account run into issues never had an account suspended it's a bit of a common myth in the space that Amazon does not allow Seller Central accounts to be transfer erred if you follow these steps down to the letter I'm confident that you can do it um efficiently and without running into any major headaches so what are some of the common reasons that someone would transfer a seller account from a seller over to a buyer and firstly the most common one is if the business has been sold so if the business has been sold and needs to be transferred over to a new buyer that's the most common reason you would transfer an account second one I've seen over the years is the seller has potentially changed the legal entity um and therefore they need to transfer the account over to that new legal entity and then the third one is aggregators consolidating Brands so aggregators you currently have Brands across multiple legal entities putting them um consolidating them to One Core mother legal entity um whatever the reason um well aware that transferring a seller account can be a high pressure process especially if it is due to a sale um again that's why we put these steps together to help you do this as efficiently as possible so what are the methods of transfer really there is two main methods of transfer either a Seller Central account transfer which is where you transfer the entire Seller Central account or a listing transfer and this is where you manually transfer the listings and the seller keeps the account and the listings go to the buyer's account a Seller Central account transfer is highly highly pref preferred you can get a Seller Central account transfer done in 48 to 72 hours it is the most efficient way to transfer an Amazon business if you're doing a listing transfer there is a ton of additional steps and you're also going to be moving across physical inventory in my experience this can take anywhere from two to three months sometimes upwards of 3 to six months depending on how fast Amazon is with removal orders how efficient buyer and seller are with Logistics and supply chain so I would if you have the option to do a sell Central account transfer and avoid a list and transfer I would very much urge you to go down the sell Central account transfer route and that is what we're going to focus on in this video um just to note also this video is going to be focused on US and Canada transfers um UK and Europe have a bit more of a convoluted process I do have a process for UK and European businesses if you are interested in that just leave a comment and I can put a video together for that but for the purposes of this video we're going to be focused on us Seller Central account transfers so first thing you need to do is get prepared for the transfer um so firstly as a buyer just make sure that you're eligible to sell on Amazon what does that mean essentially you uh have not been banned or ran into any other um issues in terms of suspensions with Amazon Seller Central in the past if you have been banned or ran into any sort of account violations um of a serious nature in the past um then yes you won't be able to take over um a seller's account um also on the sellers side so review the account make sure there's no outstanding VI viations no outstanding um suspensions or serious warnings once that's done and you know that both buyer and sell are eligible um to operate a sell a central account um the buyer needs to prepare the following details ahead of the transfer um a credit card and bank account that have not been associated with a seller account in the past and I would for the credit card just do a few charges on it ahead of the transfer and that's just going to let um the credit card company know that the card is active I've seen situations in the past where the buyer has got a fresh credit card a few days before the transfer um and it wouldn't register on Seller Central due to the fact that it wasn't registering with a credit card company um as an active credit card so get a new credit card as the buyer or use an existing credit card if it hasn't been used in a seller account in the past use it a few times just log some transactions just to make sure it works um then the buyer needs a registered address I domestic just helps to make things easier um and when I say domestic I mean domestic to the US or Canada um if it is abroad it can work as long as you're in one of the approved Amazon selling countries there is a list that you can find online um but yes ideally domestic if possible uh and then buy a legal entity um ideally um us LLC um or us uh any type of US legal entity really um and also that legal entity cannnot be used in any other cell essential accounts very important point if a legal entity has been used in another cell essential account it should not be used under any circumstances to take over this new account one legal entity per Seller Central accounts um yeah uh also bua ID documentation um not a guarantee that Amazon will request this but always good practice just to have their this ready and on hand in case Amazon do a manual review of the account and request this information from the buyer um so typically that's going to be a passport or driving license plus a utility or credit card statement that's dated within the last three months and then finally a phone number uh again a phone number not associated with any other Seller Central accounts so make sure all your ducks are in a row in terms of those different details and then once you have all of that prepared you can then move on to the next stage in the process so next stage in the process is on the sellers side and um here you're just going to create a script um standard support script with Amazon Seller Support in The Help section of your seller account and you're going to put the following uh dear Amazon Seller Support I am contacting you to let you know that I'll be traveling over the coming weeks and we'll be logging into the account from various locations please put a note on my account to ensure that no safety locks are put in place so here we're just letting Amazon know that look different IP addresses are going to be logging into the account over the next few weeks um don't put any sort of account restrictions in place or log us out of the accounts or anything of that nature um I would not mention the fact that the account has been sold from my experience it's not necessary and it's not advisable when you contact Amazon Seller Support you're likely just going to go to the first line of support which um you know can be uh can be um 5050 let's say at the best of times so I would just not even mention the fact that the account has been sold I've sent this script hundreds of times I've never encountered any issues with this um and yes it's not a necessity to let Amazon know that the account itself has been sold and it's likely going to cause more issues than um than Solutions so just let them know that different IP addresses will be logged in and um yeah then you can move on to the next stage which is the actual transfer of the account itself so I like to do this by getting both buyer and seller on a call having the seller um set up a screen share logging into the Seller Central account and then changing out the different details in the account um in this order which we'll which we'll run through now um also just a note here try and follow these steps in the exact order just because this is the order I've been following um of the successful seller seller account transfers that I've completed in the past and this generally seems to work the best um so both on a screen share call sell logs into the account go to settings account info and the first thing I would change out is the legal entity and tax information um so buyers going to give you the details of their legal entity and they're also going to give you their EI I number and that's going to be used in the tax information stage so once that's all complete I would then just change out the returns information so if the seller currently has set up a manual returns address just change this over to the buyer's address if the seller just has returns going directly back into FBA you can leave that setting in place if you wish or if the buyer wishes to set up a manual return address you can also um enter that in place and change the settings so once that's complete then we're going to change out the credit card details and this is underneath charge method again buyer just provides their credit card details seller changes those over if there are multiple countries so for instance Canada Mexico and North America um you're going to have to change out the credit card details for each of those countries um as Amazon doesn't unilaterally CH unilaterally change it out for you so change out the credit card details for all the countries associated with the account if there is going to be any point in this process which is a little bit sticky It's usually the credit card and Bank information now nothing bad will happen to the account itself but Amazon can sometimes log you out keep the sellers details in place ask you some authentication questions just due to the fact that this is a financial aspect of the account and um yeah it's a bit more sensitive so don't worry if any messages pop up don't worry if anyone from Amazon contacts you um just let them know that you're trying to change out your details and you won't have any issues so once credit card details have been changed out next we're going to change over the banking information again uh buyer provides their new bank details seller changes that out and do that for all countries associated with the account at this point uh seller can now go into their registered email and just confirm that Amazon has changed over all of the information once that's all confirmed and successful you can now change the login information over to the buyers before actually carrying out this um stage of changing out the login information I would advise that the seller just has um a little click around the account to make sure that everything um anything that needs completing over the next day or so is complete so customer service messages any shipments that need creating or working on Logistics wise um any PPC data that needs changeing over or adjusting um yes I would just advise that the seller goes ahead and does that now or ahead of the call as once we change these login settings we're going to have a 24-hour cool down period when no one could log into the account so seller change out or any details that need changeing or complete any tasks in the account that just need doing over the next 24 hours so we're going to now move on to changing the login settings again just in cell Central settings login settings and try and follow these steps in order so store name sometimes people leave the store name in place sometimes buyers want to change this over obviously completely down to you but go ahead and change it here if required next we're going to do phone number buyer is going to provide their phone number which hasn't been used in a seller account in the past sellers going to change that over authentication method um so here either the buyer can use their phone number or potentially can use Google Authenticator or Orie any of those is completely fine just get that changed over and then remove any um seller authentication methods that are in place email buyer's going to provide their email again seller change it out and then the final point is the password so to note here once you change out the password you will automatically be logged out of the account once you're logged out of the accounts I advise buyer and seller not loging back into the account for a period of 24 hours this is what's known as a cooldown period and that just lets Amazon register all the settings less likelihood of a um Security check going in place because if you think about it from Amazon's perspective Financial details have been changed the new IP is logging in and yeah there's a lot going on so just try and minimize that as best as possible and I just advise a 24-hour cool down period to help out to help ease that process essentially what the buyer can do at this stage is because the email address have been transferred over the buyer can now just log into their email account to just make sure that everything um just make sure they have a confirmation email from Amazon letting them know that um the uh email is now associated with their accounts so no logging in for 24 hours at this point transition period so after the 24-hour cooldown period the buyer can now log into the Seller Central account and should begin to review the following items firstly I would just check the product pages so go through the listings make sure everything's live make sure nothing funky has happened over the past 24 hours prices are still the same PPC is still running as intended and all listings that should be live are currently live then go through and re review Financial information so bank account and credit card details just to reminder credit card details are underneath charge method and make sure that the ones in place are actually yours as a buyer rather than the sell's uh previous details I have seen a few times in the past um with a successful account transfer Amazon for whatever reason has still reverted credit card details back to the sellers probably because of a security flag or something of that nature um so yes I would just give that a bit of a check and make sure that not that has been reverted back over to the seller and just do the same with legal entity and tax information I've never seen legal entity or tax information get reverted um but still just good hygiene practices to make sure that that information is now formally yours as the buyer and you have formal control of the account and then of course just make sure that anything that should have been done over the past 24 hours uh now gets done customer service messages um checking PPC working on any shipping plans Etc the only other thing you could consider here is potentially adding the seller onto the account as a secondary user what this means is just during the transition period you know the seller's likely still going to have some input in terms of helping you guide helping guide you through the different processes of the business so how to run advertising how to create shipments uh and stuff of that nature if you want them to have a bit more of a Hands-On approach you can consider adding them as a secondary user and you can also set them up with restricted access so whatever you feel comfortable than having certain reports certain sections of the account Etc so at this point Seller Central account should now be fully transferred over and in your control um I hope that was useful as I said I've transferred over hundreds of seller accounts in the past I do offer this as a service through our agency if you're interested in having us either help you out with the process or handle the process for you feel free to drop me an email at George Elevate Brands studios.com and we can talk some f we can talk further about helping you out with getting that done thank you