BANNED Icon and Discussion...

[legodelorean]

I was surprised when I received this email on a secondary account today:

 

 

Interesting things of note:  

- I've never claimed nor requested any replacement parts.

- They must be so angry, they didn't even bother signing the email beyond the "Kind regards".

- This account has only ever attempted to make 4 orders:

  - Successful - 9 Vampyre Hearses on sale. (3/6/14)

  - Cancelled - 2 Ecto-1 (6/1/14)

  - Cancelled - 2 Exo suit + Trevi Fountain (8/1/14)

  - Cancelled - 2 Exo suit + PAB (8/1/14)

 

Best I can figure, it was already flagged for warning (without sending any emails) after buying the VHs and it was triggered for the online order I made via Pick-A-Brick.  I don't know why they would refuse a Pick-a-brick order though...

So are you banned from buying anything or just replacement parts? It sounded like just replacement parts but I could be wrong. Looks like you just earned your ban hammer badge. Congrats!! ;)

[chinchy]

So are you banned from buying anything or just replacement parts? It sounded like just replacement parts but I could be wrong. Looks like you just earned your ban hammer badge. Congrats!!

No idea, but other than the initial order, all of my orders have been cancelled...  Not sure if I'm going to try.

[Deez_Brickz]

I was surprised when I received this email on a secondary account today:

Interesting things of note:

- I've never claimed nor requested any replacement parts.

- They must be so angry, they didn't even bother signing the email beyond the "Kind regards".

- This account has only ever attempted to make 4 orders:

- Successful - 9 Vampyre Hearses on sale. (3/6/14)

- Cancelled - 2 Ecto-1 (6/1/14)

- Cancelled - 2 Exo suit + Trevi Fountain (8/1/14)

- Cancelled - 2 Exo suit + PAB (8/1/14)

Best I can figure, it was already flagged for warning (without sending any emails) after buying the VHs and it was triggered for the online order I made via Pick-A-Brick. I don't know why they would refuse a Pick-a-brick order though...

There must be more to this story. What is the status of your primary account?

[justafrog]

Interesting - have you requested free replacement parts on any of your other accounts? If they've linked them, that could be part of the answer.

 

Either that, or they're having another drunken dart game over at TLG and your wedge got hit.

[chinchy]

There must be more to this story. What is the status of your primary account?

 

No failed transactions.  More than $100 in VIP points available to spend...  I buy a mix of in-store and on-line.  Never had a problem on this account..

[chinchy]

Interesting - have you requested free replacement parts on any of your other accounts? If they've linked them, that could be part of the answer.

 

Either that, or they're having another drunken dart game over at TLG and your wedge got hit.

 

Nope, I've never requested any free parts.  Primary account has only ever done 1 PAB order for various parts, but I fail to see how that would qualify for free/paid replacement parts...

[Alpinemaps]

What about your eBay account? User name the same as LEGO Shop at Home? Same as your Lego Ideas account?

[tonysbricks]

When I was reading your email my spidey sense was tingling. It's probably legit but they worded it like a phishing email.

[chinchy]

What about your eBay account? User name the same as LEGO Shop at Home? Same as your Lego Ideas account?

I don't have an ebay account with the same name, and even if I did, I've never sold any Lego.  As far as Lego and myself knows, I'm strictly a builder/collector.

[mlncs]

Banned icon for me please. My second account got banned last month. 13 different purchases to get the balloon cart freebies.

[asharerin]

What does the infamous warning email say? Is there a way to correctly respond to it and prevent bannage?

 

"Hello,

In an effort to reinforce existing LEGO

[Madd]

So Odd that they ban people from buying......

[marcandre]

Someday legos won't be the hot toy and they may be crawling back to all of us evil resellers. 

[Ed Mack]

I was surprised when I received this email on a secondary account today:

Interesting things of note:

- I've never claimed nor requested any replacement parts.

- They must be so angry, they didn't even bother signing the email beyond the "Kind regards".

- This account has only ever attempted to make 4 orders:

- Successful - 9 Vampyre Hearses on sale. (3/6/14)

- Cancelled - 2 Ecto-1 (6/1/14)

- Cancelled - 2 Exo suit + Trevi Fountain (8/1/14)

- Cancelled - 2 Exo suit + PAB (8/1/14)

Best I can figure, it was already flagged for warning (without sending any emails) after buying the VHs and it was triggered for the online order I made via Pick-A-Brick. I don't know why they would refuse a Pick-a-brick order though...

I'm on an IPad, so I cannot see what country you are from, but won't 4 Exo Suits trigger a ban?

Sent from my iPad using Brickpicker

[mr_cotta]

"Hello,

In an effort to reinforce existing LEGO

[No More Monkeys]

Someday legos won't be the hot toy and they may be crawling back to all of us evil resellers. 

Something tells me that those will be the days when you will be interested the least in reselling Lego...

[TheBrickMeister]

I'd like to ask a clarifying question to those who have been banned. The way I'm reading it, your Lego VIP account is what's being blocked from buying sets, correct? Have you tried ordering from Lego without using your VIP account (i.e. checkout as a guest) after being banned? I'm trying to understand if Lego is not allowing any sales to your home address or just sales associated with your VIP account. Yes, I realize you wouldn't get the benefit of VIP points by checking out as a guest, but I'm thinking it may be nice to still be able to buy the true Lego exclusives.

[stoltzjl77]

To me, the ban seems pretty arbitrary & random based on the stories read on here in the past. No definitive pattern on what triggers the initial warning, other than the obvious blatant over-purchasing by some. If the multiple promos were a trigger, I should've had at least a warning months ago. I mainly only purchase from LEGO Shop at Home to get the promos & I've done the 2 purchases in a row that DNIIM mentioned on more than one occasion & not a word from them (knock on wood b/c I do like the promos!). What if I have 2 or 3 kids (only have 1 at the moment), are they supposed to share one Darth Revan? Maybe this thread will help decipher a pattern, but the fact that Lego is spending money (man hours) to track customers down to prevent them from spending money is a head scratcher for me. 

I have 8 children and therefore a legitimate reason for buying multiples, yet somehow I doubt TLG would accept that as an excuse were I to fall under their wrath. I've already decided I won't get upset if/when it happens. The banhammer is random like a lightning strike. You can't get upset at an irrational phenomenon for acting in a purposeless and irrational manner; TLG's bans are the same way. You can take some steps to protect yourself against a lightning strike, but in the end it's going to strike where it strikes and if you're in the way, there's not much you can do.

 

If I do get banned, I want 8 badges. And I do have a spiffy flame email ready to send out letting them know about 8 future consumers with high earnings potential who *won't* be buying directly from TLG or frequenting their retails stores due to TLG's wacky policies. 

[legodelorean]

Someday legos won't be the hot toy and they may be crawling back to all of us evil resellers.

I don't think that'll ever happen. Legos have always been popular and pricey since I was a kid.......even more so now.

[minicoopers11]

I'd like to ask a clarifying question to those who have been banned. The way I'm reading it, your Lego VIP account is what's being blocked from buying sets, correct? Have you tried ordering from Lego without using your VIP account (i.e. checkout as a guest) after being banned? I'm trying to understand if Lego is not allowing any sales to your home address or just sales associated with your VIP account. Yes, I realize you wouldn't get the benefit of VIP points by checking out as a guest, but I'm thinking it may be nice to still be able to buy the true Lego exclusives.

I haven't tried checking out as guest, but my wife's account was banned from LEGO Shop at Home. The warning was never sent to me, but my account was shadow-banned (anything ordered is later cancelled). This didn't affect our VIP accounts in B&M stores.

[asharerin]

I'd like to ask a clarifying question to those who have been banned. The way I'm reading it, your Lego VIP account is what's being blocked from buying sets, correct? Have you tried ordering from Lego without using your VIP account (i.e. checkout as a guest) after being banned? I'm trying to understand if Lego is not allowing any sales to your home address or just sales associated with your VIP account. Yes, I realize you wouldn't get the benefit of VIP points by checking out as a guest, but I'm thinking it may be nice to still be able to buy the true Lego exclusives.

 

They blacklist your address, your VIP account, your name, your ph#, your email, your IP address, your cc#,  and anyone other VIP account, address etc ever used from that same IP address, cc# etc. Don't take it personally it is just business. TLG knows they cannot compete with our packing and level of customer service lol. From there you don the black hat and continue business as usual.

[Ciglione]

I have 8 children and therefore a legitimate reason for buying multiples, yet somehow I doubt TLG would accept that as an excuse were I to fall under their wrath. I've already decided I won't get upset if/when it happens. The banhammer is random like a lightning strike. You can't get upset at an irrational phenomenon for acting in a purposeless and irrational manner; TLG's bans are the same way. You can take some steps to protect yourself against a lightning strike, but in the end it's going to strike where it strikes and if you're in the way, there's not much you can do.

 

If I do get banned, I want 8 badges. And I do have a spiffy flame email ready to send out letting them know about 8 future consumers with high earnings potential who *won't* be buying directly from TLG or frequenting their retails stores due to TLG's wacky policies. 

 

 

Reading this topic so far... One may conclude that our footprint as investors or resellers is smaller than I thought. Cause if we would have such a big impact on lego sales, lego would be stupid to ban us. I think we might just be a stone in their shoe. An inconvenience which blurs the art of estimating production and sales quantities. 

 

On the other hand I can imagine some retailers complained to lego that there are many resellers out there and they feel the competition. Lego could ban some random people occasionally to keep the retailers happy and showing them they are doing something against it. Even if they do not really want to. Cause in my opinion, with a little research they can filter us all out easily.

 

Just a theory.

[Darth_Raichu]

Bottom line, TLG is a business and can do what they damn well please. Let's put it this way, should eBay or Amazon allow you to block (ban) any potentially problem buyers, how many of you would take that opportunity ? To TLG, resellers are the potential problem buyers, regardless of what we think about it.

If this is detriment to your business, a more effective way to send TLG the message is to VOTE WITH YOUR WALLET by:

a. Stop buying LEGO altogether from ANY retailers

b. Sell all of your LEGO sets at below MSRP (ie. take away their potential customers)

To be honest, the running around exploiting any holes to buy more than limits from LEGO stores STRENGTHEN their case for banning the resellers. In turn, this would make it harder for anyone to buy multiple sets for any reason

Just keepin' it real ;)

[chinchy]

I'm on an IPad, so I cannot see what country you are from, but won't 4 Exo Suits trigger a ban?

Sent from my iPad using Brickpicker

 

I'm in the US.  Yes, 4 Exo Suits would probably trigger a ban.  Although what I can't figure out is why they didn't send the normal reseller email instead of one about illegitimate claims for free parts...  That one just makes no sense...  

[Ed Mack]

I'm in the US.  Yes, 4 Exo Suits would probably trigger a ban.  Although what I can't figure out is why they didn't send the normal reseller email instead of one about illegitimate claims for free parts...  That one just makes no sense...  

It was most likely a mistake.  LEGO Customer Service has several "form" letters to choose from and they replied with the wrong one.  The 4 Exo Suits is what triggered your ban.  No doubt.  They are watching that set like a hawk.