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.

[cladner]

10 hours ago, Bricklectic said:

So after 10 months my Target account has been unbanned. I placed a trial order every month and insta-cancelled each time. Cancellation orders even came before the order confirmations. But today my first order shipped. Gonna take it easy with them. I did reach out to CS a month ago and apologized and asked them to reinstate me and the rep said she would email the ban team for me, but im thinking its unrelated. Happened to me once before so i think it just resets after a while.

TLDR: Try making orders if youre currently banned at target.

yes - mine is now unbanned as well - instacancel earlier this week.  for the record, i did not apologize to target.

[Sfcommando14]

So after 10 months my Target account has been unbanned. I placed a trial order every month and insta-cancelled each time. Cancellation orders even came before the order confirmations. But today my first order shipped. Gonna take it easy with them. I did reach out to CS a month ago and apologized and asked them to reinstate me and the rep said she would email the ban team for me, but im thinking its unrelated. Happened to me once before so i think it just resets after a while.
TLDR: Try making orders if youre currently banned at target.

Might be related to your contact. I just tried and still banned. It’s been a year now. I’ll reach out and see if I can get it to work.


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[cladner]

3 hours ago, cladner said:

yes - mine is now unbanned as well - instacancel earlier this week.  for the record, i did not apologize to target.

actually i'm still banned at target also - the ban monkey was on their bathroom break.   they don't even send a cancellation email anymore -just shows up as cancelled under account history.

[Bricklectic]

12 minutes ago, cladner said:

actually i'm still banned at target also - the ban monkey was on their bathroom break.   they don't even send a cancellation email anymore -just shows up as cancelled under account history.

Mine actually shipped.

So maybe it was related to the email? I called and chatted at the same time with 2 diff. Target CS. Both said nothing they could do personally, but one offered to email the ban monkeybots team for me. Basically just apologized, claimed ignorance, and professed to be compliant going forward.

[Gonkalin]

So I ordered 10 yesterday from target. Today I got 5 separate shipping notifications. 2 sets in each shipment. 
 

my wife won’t be happy when 5 boxes arrive on my doorstep. 

Edited August 26, 2021 by Gonkalin

[redcell]

2 minutes ago, Gonkalin said:

So I ordered 10 yesterday from target. Today I got 5 separate shipping notifications. 2 sets in each shipment. 
 

my wife won’t be happy when 5 boxes arrive on my doorstep. 

This is what I absolutely hated about ordering from Target when they did not apply quantity limits and would actually let me order online.  It was such a PIA to deal with 100 units spread across 50 boxes.  First world problem for sure, but one of the things I don't miss now that I can't order from Target online.

[cladner]

5 minutes ago, redcell said:

This is what I absolutely hated about ordering from Target when they did not apply quantity limits and would actually let me order online.  It was such a PIA to deal with 100 units spread across 50 boxes.  First world problem for sure, but one of the things I don't miss now that I can't order from Target online.

you forgot about the bright orange or red  F'U stickers across the front on every box - not hard to peel off but still not fun x 100. 

fortunately the better deals at target lately have been instore .

[Bricklectic]

31 minutes ago, Gonkalin said:

So I ordered 10 yesterday from target. Today I got 5 separate shipping notifications. 2 sets in each shipment. 
 

my wife won’t be happy when 5 boxes arrive on my doorstep. 

5 boxes? Darn. My friends arent gonna be happy. I promised them this time would be small storage. They annoyed from last time with the creeper mines.

I guess this means its store fulfilled at this point already? If so it's gonna poof soon.

Edited August 26, 2021 by Bricklectic

[$20 on joe vs dan]

37 minutes ago, Bricklectic said:

If so it's gonna poof soon.

pretty sure Amazon, Target and Walmart are petitioning LEGO to extend its life because it's selling like TP during a Pandemic

[donbee]

I’ve been banned from target for a while.
Lego started it, but I got completely banned. They even froze my target red card. I tried different credit cards, addresses. The account was frozen.
Made a new account. Canceled.

Then a couple months ago a non lego order went through. I couldn’t order lego, but other stuff worked.

All this time, my wife’s account worked on her phone. Same address, different credit card. I thought it was device maybe?

Then I let her use a gift card to place a grocery order. Canceled. Eventually found out it was the gift card. It was also loaded on my account. Now she’s banned too.

I can use the gift cards in store, but not online.

I only use discounted gift cards. So either I got a bad gift card, or they realized that I bought more than $300 worth at the last 10% off sale.


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[gmpirate]

2 hours ago, donbee said:

I only use discounted gift cards. So either I got a bad gift card

Could be that.  Years ago I had that happen at B&N.  I started getting insta-cancelled and I was not ordering heavy.  Called CS and the guy said there was fraud associated with the card. Said I could call a manager/supervisor and probably get it resolved but I just never got around to it.

Had it happen at Bloomingdales around the same time but they wouldn't even tell me what the issue was.  Just said I could purchase in store.  No discussion.

[coelian]

Lego SAH is strictly enforcing the gwp limits for hogwarts griffindor room for me. Anyone else experiencing that, or is ban hammer coming for me soon? 

[Voltron]

1 hour ago, coelian said:

Lego SAH is strictly enforcing the gwp limits for hogwarts griffindor room for me. Anyone else experiencing that, or is ban hammer coming for me soon? 

I found that for certain GWP, orders were being auto cancelled I.e. Adidas mini shoe. The recent dickens promo didn't get cancelled for multiple orders.

Not sure what's going on, maybe they are limiting specific GWP, or our accounts have been labelled reseller scum.

[coelian]

2 hours ago, Voltron said:

I found that for certain GWP, orders were being auto cancelled I.e. Adidas mini shoe. The recent dickens promo didn't get cancelled for multiple orders.

Not sure what's going on, maybe they are limiting specific GWP, or our accounts have been labelled reseller scum.

I got cancelled for sailboat after 2 or 3 I think. But griffindor room was the first time I got one and that's it. I hope I'm not flagged as reseller scum. The nearest lego store is like 2 hours away. 

[Voltron]

1 minute ago, coelian said:

I got cancelled for sailboat after 2 or 3 I think. But griffindor room was the first time I got one and that's it. I hope I'm not flagged as reseller scum. The nearest lego store is like 2 hours away. 

It could possibly be that some of the items you bought, you went over the lego limits.

[coelian]

1 hour ago, Voltron said:

It could possibly be that some of the items you bought, you went over the lego limits.

Yes I lost track for some of the brickheadz I bought and am now flagged I guess. 

[Voltron]

Any UK folks ever had there orders cancelled going over the John Lewis limits?

 

[severalads]

1 hour ago, Voltron said:

Any UK folks ever had there orders cancelled going over the John Lewis limits?

 

Yeap, it may go through once or twice. But then account gets flagged and from that point it's pretty strict. First they send an email as a warning. If you continue to buy using different email address etc., they will block you.

[gmpirate]

It's not the promos, it's what you are buying.

Personally I keep a spreadsheet of every S&H purchase to avoid issues.

[KShine]

Once again, avoid going over the limits (and if you are uncertain, just don't buy more).

It will usually simply end up with the transaction being canceled, but in time, it can also lead to you being canceled.

[Ogelwoc]

I recalled reading it somewhere but unsure.
Do LEGO combine the limits when buying from LEGO Shop at Home and from the store? I think I exceeded limits on one set but perhaps I got lucky.


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[Aib84e]

29 minutes ago, Ogelwoc said:

I recalled reading it somewhere but unsure.
Do LEGO combine the limits when buying from LEGO Shop at Home and from the store? I think I exceeded limits on one set but perhaps I got lucky.

Limits for a set are combined instore and online purchases.  It's all linked under VIP account, so forgo the points instore and don't be known to store associates. 

[ravenb99]

That is absolutely 1000% untrue.  

[gmpirate]

38 minutes ago, ravenb99 said:

That is absolutely 1000% untrue.  

I was going to say 10000% but I wasn't sure if it was possible to go over 1000%.

[exciter1]

Incognito is the way.