LEGO Bans - Open Discussion

[TheBrickClique]

As for operating with a single account to stay within the vendor’s technically-enforced limits, I believe this is the current state of things.
 

Cliff notes: you’ll be fine as long as you don’t go on a spending spree at Target.com, and try not to bring attention to your buying patterns by dealing with online customer service for small gripes that can be dealt with in store instead.

Target - the easiest place to get banned based simply on purchase volume online and the most aggressive against resellers in store — employees trained to identify resellers loading up carts for example.  Can still use red card in store after online ban, but using with a new email account will result in repeat ban — start receiving auto cancellations and email about possible issues including payment purchase method.  Some people have bans lifted after a period in timeout. Others indefinitely. The amount of purchases that may identify you as a reseller and get a ban? One data point: I have been unable to purchase online going on 18 months now after two months of $5k purchases on the red card. Same red card still works fine in store.
 

LEGO shop at home — with the purchase limits mechanics implemented a few years ago, it is much more difficult to get the SAH ban hammer. If you exceed a limit on any item based on past purchases of the same item, they will cancel your entire order. Be warned that if they cancel an order with a VIP Rewards purchase, the reward is not automatically credited back to your account. Also, if they cancel an item due to inventory issues, the system still tracks it as qty purchased. Qty purchased in brick and mortar stores that are purchased with VIP accounts are not counted towards SAH limits and and limits in store are done at the individual store’s discretion. If you do have to call customer service to resolve an issue, they do have easy visibility to all of your previous orders and will make comments about you “really liking LEGOs”.  No indication that that is how the ban process starts, but unless you really have an issue that needs CS, might be best to just let the small things go. 
 

Amazon — shop away. Their limits are tracked to the second on a 168-hour FIFO.  Limits apply and are tracked in that window only to items sold and shipped by Amazon.com. Buy as many third party items as you wish. Anecdotal stories of bans for excessive returns, but no clear information on the metrics used. Generally, probably best to save the returns for the really bad boxes.  Creating multiple accounts will get noticed and is the quickest way to get the warning shot emails. 
 

Barnes and Noble — similar to LEGO, has a five qty per item lifetime limit online. Exceed that amount and just that item will be cancelled from the order. No reports of bans. In store purchases do not appear to be tied to online memberships as far as adding to your 5-count quantity.  
 

Walmart — most LEGO are limited to two per order, but they won’t say how often that limit is reset.  Doing a couple of multiple limit orders in the same day has worked.  Doing dozens has resulted in order cancellations of those specific items but no bans that I am aware of. Generally, I have found one limit order per day has never resulted in a cancellation. 
 

ShopDisney — some items have limits but they are selectively enforced. If you put in multiple limit orders at the same time, they might cancel those items. If you space them out, they will be fine. I ordered a dozen castles (limit one per customer) last year and they all went through. Sometimes two in two consecutive days. 
 

Costco — has item limits on some items, but I haven’t seen any on LEGOs. Even with items with limits, possible to space them out without issue.  In store limits are usually “per day”. 
 

Best Buy — unsure on LEGO as I’ve never pushed the limits on them. In the past, I would make 50 purchases at a time of 2-dollar items that had limits and they would all go through.  I have tried to make multiple purchases of Xbox consoles and those were cancelled.  So YMMV. But no reports of bans.

Anyways, those are my observations.

[Bold-Arrow]

5 minutes ago, Darth_Raichu said:

Unlike the other store, TRU is going to close its doors sooner if it continues repelling customers with money

 

Isn't BN in the same boat ? 

[Battrax]

4 minutes ago, Bold-Arrow said:

Isn't BN in the same boat ? 

I think B&N are in the old rubbish broken rowboat they have been in for a while. You know the story of the whaleship Essex, where an angry whale smashed the boat then the survivors ended up adrift in boats eventually bringing on the Law of the Sea and cannibalising each other? Amazon was the whale that B&N thought they were going to fight. I don't see B&N having much more of their own customer base left to cannibalise...

[Darth_Raichu]

5 minutes ago, Bold-Arrow said:

Isn't BN in the same boat ? 

BN still has an army of Starbucks drinkers who like to sit and read books in their cafes (ie. paying customers) for the most part of the year.

[Battrax]

5 minutes ago, Darth_Raichu said:

BN still has an army of Starbucks drinkers who like to sit and read books in their cafes (ie. paying customers) for the most part of the year.

See? Starbucks. The story of the Essex was something that inspired Melville to write "Moby **** "(who had a Starbuck character). 

IT ALL MAKES SENSE!

 

[Bold-Arrow]

Lol @ **** .... Cracks me up every time . 

[Battrax]

17 minutes ago, Bold-Arrow said:

Lol @ **** .... Cracks me up every time . 

I should have written "Moby That's-Not-A-Male-Member-Reference"

[dcdfan]

The thing that kills me about B&N is their employees act like I'm stealing from them when I hand them a coupon. I (so bad) wanna say "I'm saving your job" & then remind them of the other dinosaurs (CDs) that once existed...

BTW, I think if corporate didn't want me using the coupons, they wouldn't keep sending them EVERY week now...

[redcell]

18 hours ago, Bold-Arrow said:

So rumors have it that Tru.com is getting extra vigilant in banning resellers and referring them to the bulk department ( sounds familiar ) 

What's the story with TRU's bulk department? 

[force392]

7 minutes ago, redcell said:

What's the story with TRU's bulk department? 

http://www.toysrus.com/shop/index.jsp?categoryId=11986052

[Miami Bomb Squad]

TRU should have closed its doors a few years ago.  
They are just fleecing the Investors.
They lost $300 million in 2014 and 1 billion in 2013.  *and I think these #s are manipulated*

Its the same with Sears/Kmart.... 

[redcell]

Has anyone ever done a bulk purchase through TRU?  It looks like one of the big downsides is that you have to pay whatever the current price is for the item when it arrives in the store and you go to pick it up.  However, if you do it as a tax exempt sale and pick the items up on a Thursday with a TRU CC, you could presumably get everything at 10% off that price. 

[Bold-Arrow]

Target .... BN ...... And now TRU. Tough year . 

[mfortunek]

8 minutes ago, Bold-Arrow said:

Target .... BN ...... And now TRU. Tough year . 

Dude! I pm'd you about this. What happened?

[Poly 30286]

57 minutes ago, Bold-Arrow said:

Target .... BN ...... And now TRU. Tough year . 

If it helps, I'd still sell to you. You seem pretty swell.

Also, I'm sure this is an old issue, but... Why would retailers ban paying customers, regardless of their buying habits? It seems like bad business to me.

[Bold-Arrow]

7 minutes ago, Poly 30286 said:

If it helps, I'd still sell to you. You seem pretty swell.

Also, I'm sure this is an old issue, but... Why would retailers ban paying customers, regardless of their buying habits? It seems like bad business to me.

 ...... Because it upset their broader customer base. I just fault target mostly , they welcomed resellers then banned them without notice . BN is fighting the wrong group IMO . The same gcs are still valid in store .

[conceptmachine]

Man..everyone is starting to ban now huh?!

[Poly 30286]

11 minutes ago, Bold-Arrow said:

 ...... Because it upset their broader customer base. I just fault target mostly , they welcomed resellers then banned them without notice . BN is fighting the wrong group IMO . The same gcs are still valid in store .

So, how does it work? You buy too much of one thing and then they say you can't buy anything? I guess it's easier to impose a flat ban than cancel excessive orders. I am all about limits and leaving some for the end user, but sales of 50 items to 1 guy or 50 guys still yields the same profit, so why would the retailer even bother? It's just mean IMO

Edited December 28, 2015 by Poly 30286

[minicoopers11]

1 hour ago, Bold-Arrow said:

Target .... BN ...... And now TRU. Tough year . 

You deserve a super-banned badge. Not ideal!

[pickleboy]

Sorry, I tried to find the post I thought I saw before but if you get banned by lego shop at home...you CAN still use you points and VIP card in the physical stores?  Same credit cards etc?

Thanks in advance...sorry I know this has been posted before.  

Or do I have to go in and buy everything in cash and no VIP/banned credit cards?

Edited December 28, 2015 by pickleboy

[Robb]

I think the big issue is that we cherry pick their stock.  This makes them look bad to their customers when they "never" have the most popular product in stock. Also, we exploit their best deals. So, before a deal launches at a store they don't exactly know if the deal will do what they want or not, but I can tell you what they don't want is deal useage to sell 99% of stock they would sell just fine without the deals. And that's what we do! Use deals to kill the stock that they don't need deals to sale.

Edited December 28, 2015 by Robb

[cmartin33]

8 hours ago, pickleboy said:

Sorry, I tried to find the post I thought I saw before but if you get banned by lego shop at home...you CAN still use you points and VIP card in the physical stores?  Same credit cards etc?

Thanks in advance...sorry I know this has been posted before.  

Or do I have to go in and buy everything in cash and no VIP/banned credit cards?

You can still buy in store as normal and use/earn your vip points. But tread carefully as people have been banned from stores too I think.

I still want to know more about this Toys R Us ban. Was it in store or online?

[redcell]

Finally got confirmation today that I have been banned by TRU.  The customer service person I spoke to was actually fairly nice about it.  She told me that they changed their policies in October and apparently banned a bunch of people then, but didn't flag me until sometime later.  She also said that this didn't apply to in-store purchases.  If I had to guess, I would bet that the free shipping was killing their margins on customers like me and that's why they made the change.  

[Bold-Arrow]

7 minutes ago, redcell said:

Finally got confirmation today that I have been banned by TRU.  The customer service person I spoke to was actually fairly nice about it.  She told me that they changed their policies in October and apparently banned a bunch of people then, but didn't flag me until sometime later.  She also said that this didn't apply to in-store purchases.  If I had to guess, I would bet that the free shipping was killing their margins on customers like me and that's why they made the change.  

I'll make sure I send you an invite to my annual round table of banned Reeses

[redcell]

5 minutes ago, Bold-Arrow said:

I'll make sure I send you an invite to my annual round table of banned Reeses

I'll keep an eye out for it.  After going for years without a single ban, I managed to rack up four in one year in 2015 (Jet.com (on several accounts), Target, TRU, and a cashback site).  No more flying under the radar for me.  

[Bold-Arrow]

In all truth , it becomes close to impossible to expand the business and still fly under the radar .