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Verified Merchant Program Catalog rejected

pelinelingerie
Just visiting
Labels (3)

Hi everyone,

I tried to submit a data source/catalog to Pinterest but it kept getting rejected hence I can't enter the Verified Merchant Program.

The message I get is: "Merchant does not comply with our policy on prohibited products.". I reviewed the merchant guidelines, made the necessary updates/changes and submitted an appeal twice but still wasn't successful.

My site: peline.com

Could someone please help me out?

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5 Replies
PinterestFernanda
Moderator
Moderator

Hi @pelinelingerie and welcome to the PBC! 

In order to keep shopping on Pinterest inspirational and actionable, we require merchants on Pinterest to meet our Merchant Guidelines. If you have any questions about the guidelines, please review them here, or in the initial email you may have received with more details. 

After making the necessary changes, feel free to reach back to the support team in order to have your merchant approved. 

Let me know if you have any questions! 

 

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pelinelingerie
Just visiting

Hi Fernanda, 

Thanks for the reply.

I have reached out to support, and submitted an appeal with the changes two times already. However, it got rejected again. I have done a thorough analysis of my website and products and I couldn't find what is blocking my catalog. 

Could you please help to understand what am I missing?

Thanks. 

 

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abundance_boutique_
Just visiting

Hello!

I have actually the same problem, I got 100 template-emails from Pinterest that I am not good enough, I already did some small and big changes on my website with products, policies... I wrote many emails to re-check my website with catalog, policies and... but I only get emails that I am not good enough, the most interesting thing is that I was verified merchant for 2 years, everything was fine and I did not make any big changes on my web-site, and one day I just got email that I am not good enough for Pinterest and it has started, I asked someone to speak with me, no one cares, is there any support from Pinterest Customer Support Team, I really got the same email many many times doesn't matter what I wrote or made with my website... Very sad, I expected more...

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DomesticPlatypus
Just visiting

Same situation. Zero actual support from Pinterest.

We started receiving "Product Pin Removal" emails last year in large volumes. Seemingly mostly either AI errors/misidentification or being targeted by a competitor as they initially came in batches of about 8-10 several times per day. Later figured it was almost certainly AI as only increased resulting in 80-100 emails per day from Pinterest.

I checked the Verified Merchant help documentation multiple times trying to ensure there wasn't an actual issue. The vast majority seemed well within guidelines and I both requested clarification from support about and took steps to remove any where there might be confusion.

I reached out to Pinterest multiple times for support - to determine cause (actual issue, AI errors, targeted harassment, etc.), how to address & ensure we maintained compliance, etc. -- and received only form responses pointing back to merchant guidelines. I requested transfer to supervisors, created a private board with infographics of removed pins & email quantities for support to reference, even reached out at one point directly to higher level support manager who simply redirected the inquiry to support... all of which resulted in the same form response.

99.9% of 'removed pin appeals' rejected, even when they'd approve/reinstate an image side-by-side with the same or a nearly identical image.

Ultimately, I removed similar products from the Pinterest catalog feed. Nothing changed. Despite the pins already being removed by Pinterest and taking them out of the feed, I continued receiving 'Pin Removal' notices for images of the products. I ultimately removed several of them from the website.

As recently as yesterday I'm still randomly receiving 'pin removal' notifications for products which were already removed, taken out of the feed and fully deleted from the site backend.

Two days ago they suspended the Verified Merchant status giving the reason as an excessive number of reported/removed pins. I filled the appeal, explained it all again, the steps taken which have not seemed successful in stopping the pin removals, pointed to the guidelines and requested clarification if it was actually anything on my end that needed to be changed/removed and otherwise expressed a desire to do whatever was needed to ensure I was complying with merchant guidelines...

It was rejected with the same form response pointing me to the guidelines. They also seemingly added another reason why the status was suspended: not having a region set in the 'shop' tab... which I'm certain was but is now inaccessible due to the VM status suspension.

Rather than risk the second appeal having the same result, I reached out to support through the help contact, went through it all again, explained that I'm just trying to figure out the cause, how to address it and ensure that I'm in compliance... this morning, same exact form response pointing me to the merchant guidelines page.

I really can't understand the total lack of actual support. I've dealt with a lot of different sales platforms, social media and other businesses support over the years and Pinterest may qualify as the absolute worst. One would think that if Pinterest is trying to build this side of things, it would be in their interest to identify and address issues not just clear support queues. However, at least a year into trying to address the same issue, I've yet to get a genuine, meaningful response.

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DomesticPlatypus
Just visiting

@PinterestFernandaThe issues that most are expressing on these forums is that the only 'Support' response that Pinterest ever seems to provide is to point back to the guidelines.

Most business users are very familiar with and understand the guidelines as written... The issues they are encountering are either not clear from or addressed in the guidelines and require further support.

When inquiries here consistently receive literally the same handful of responses from moderators pointing to guidelines and the suggesting that we can simply contact support (who then simply complete the circle) it only compounds frustration and feelings that either Pinterest's support staff seemingly has no interest in providing genuine support,but is simply working to response metrics & processing quotas or has been replaced with AI and automated responses.


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