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.

[gmpirate]

I got banned years ago from online.  Support at the time said it was because of gift cards.  He said I could call their fraud dept and probably get it resolved but I never did.  Couple years ago I opened a brand new account with different address, new cc with different billing address, ordered from different computer with different internet provide and still I'm insta cancelled.  Actually had the same issue with Bloomingdales at the time but at least as of a couple years ago I can order from them now.

Some companies just have a disconnect with their fraud dept.  My boys play baseball and I have been ordering custom gloves and bats from Rawlings for years.  About a month ago I ordered another glove and the order just would not go through.  I called to see what was wrong and they told me my account was flagged for fraud and would not be able to order with it anymore.  No gift cards involved -- go figure.

[Bricklectic]

For the advanced here, will lego cancel orders made from different accounts but to same address. Say for example, my sister living in a different state orders for me and puts my address for shipping, will the flag the order? Or since its made from a totally separate legit account, Lego wont care about the shipping address being the same.

[gmpirate]

Let’s put it this way.  “If” I was to setup a separate account, I definitely would not include same addresses.  I’m sure you could call and explain if something happened but do you really want to be in that position?

[landphieran]

5 hours ago, Bricklectic said:

For the advanced here, will lego cancel orders made from different accounts but to same address. Say for example, my sister living in a different state orders for me and puts my address for shipping, will the flag the order? Or since its made from a totally separate legit account, Lego wont care about the shipping address being the same.

They match shipping addresses. You can use various tricks to try and avoid it. Sometimes their validation picks it up and both accounts orders will be cancelled. If you can use different address's entirely its your best bet.

[brickvoyeur]

They do shadow unbans from time to time, but they like to lock it down for life.

What would be fun is moving into a house with a banned address already. Imagine being the customer service person having to tell someone they can't buy a gift for their kid in their new home because some scummy reseller lived there before.

Edited November 24, 2023 by brickvoyeur

[gmpirate]

5 hours ago, brickvoyeur said:

They do shadow unbans from time to time, but they like to lock it down for life.

What would be fun is moving into a house with a banned address already. Imagine being the customer service person having to tell someone they can't buy a gift for their kid in their new home because some scummy reseller lived there before.

There should be a law that requires sellers to disclose such circumstances.

[thegraverobber]

Does anyone know who to talk to about Bricks and Pieces Replacement Parts bans? I have used this service very sparingly over the past 12+ years, and typically only for mangled stickers, but I was banned a couple years ago and any replacement part I order is instantly cancelled. Purchased orders and parts are unaffected.

The problem is that all of LEGO customer service placed offers go through this same system, so they are all cancelled. If I am missing a GWP and contact them for a replacement - instantly cancelled. Today I called to check on a Christmas present parts order and was told it would be later than Christmas, so the customer service rep generously offered a $20 gift card - instantly cancelled.

It's becoming quite frustrating and is tainting my view of the brand. I'm not abusing this service at all, I'm not reselling anything, and considering the amount of $$ I spend at LEGO it's insulting that I'm banned for having requested genuinely missing pieces or mangled instructions. I was missing two pieces in a $500 LOTR set and had to personally purchase them secondhand. 

I called in and talked to people a while back but got nowhere and was told they are unable to do anything about it or connect me with the team that manages that system for an appeal or anything. Has anyone else had any success?

[Pseudoty]

26 minutes ago, thegraverobber said:

Does anyone know who to talk to about Bricks and Pieces Replacement Parts bans? I have used this service very sparingly over the past 12+ years, and typically only for mangled stickers, but I was banned a couple years ago and any replacement part I order is instantly cancelled. Purchased orders and parts are unaffected.

The problem is that all of LEGO customer service placed offers go through this same system, so they are all cancelled. If I am missing a GWP and contact them for a replacement - instantly cancelled. Today I called to check on a Christmas present parts order and was told it would be later than Christmas, so the customer service rep generously offered a $20 gift card - instantly cancelled.

It's becoming quite frustrating and is tainting my view of the brand. I'm not abusing this service at all, I'm not reselling anything, and considering the amount of $$ I spend at LEGO it's insulting that I'm banned for having requested genuinely missing pieces or mangled instructions. I was missing two pieces in a $500 LOTR set and had to personally purchase them secondhand. 

I called in and talked to people a while back but got nowhere and was told they are unable to do anything about it or connect me with the team that manages that system for an appeal or anything. Has anyone else had any success?

Try an email that might get forwarded to the correct person.

[thegraverobber]

19 minutes ago, Pseudoty said:

Try an email that might get forwarded to the correct person.

Tried and was told there was no appeal process and no way to get it to that team. Was just curious if there were any keywords I could use or anything to help out if anyone else had been in a similar boat. Ultimately not the biggest deal, just leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

[gmpirate]

Well, I think it goes to the old saying "you can't please all the people all the time".  Personally I've never had a set missing a piece and it never entered my mind to have them replace instruction books because they may have got twisted around in the box or sticker sheets for that matter.  Amazon will ban people from buying if they return too much.  If I could ban buyers who return things I certainly would.  A certain percentage of people are not profitable to sell to.  Not saying that you may not have have legitimate issues but you certainly do more than most.

[thegraverobber]

3 minutes ago, gmpirate said:

Well, I think it goes to the old saying "you can't please all the people all the time".  Personally I've never had a set missing a piece and it never entered my mind to have them replace instruction books because they may have got twisted around in the box or sticker sheets for that matter.  Amazon will ban people from buying if they return too much.  If I could ban buyers who return things I certainly would.  A certain percentage of people are not profitable to sell to.  Not saying that you may not have have legitimate issues but you certainly do more than most.

Yeah, makes sense. It was probably 5 sticker sheets max, going back 12+ years, so I just didn't expect it. And only 2-3 missing pieces ever. I go through a lot of LEGO for the personal collection and rarely have missing pieces, Rivendell was the only recent occurrence. I'd also purchase stickers if they made them available....can't believe they aren't.

If I knew that I was abusing the system, it wouldn't feel so bad. Just a bummer to have a great experience with customer service, leave all 5-stars for them, and then get the e-mail that my replacement is cancelled.

[Pseudoty]

45 minutes ago, thegraverobber said:

Yeah, makes sense. It was probably 5 sticker sheets max, going back 12+ years, so I just didn't expect it. And only 2-3 missing pieces ever. I go through a lot of LEGO for the personal collection and rarely have missing pieces, Rivendell was the only recent occurrence. I'd also purchase stickers if they made them available....can't believe they aren't.

If I knew that I was abusing the system, it wouldn't feel so bad. Just a bummer to have a great experience with customer service, leave all 5-stars for them, and then get the e-mail that my replacement is cancelled.

1 UCS sticker used to be an insta ban. Right before they started printing UCS plaques the stickers had become more prevalent in lower cost sets, so not sure if that was it. I had misprinted stickers on the Batman Gotham City set and requested sheet 1 of 2 and they sent both, but as you know the nice friendly customer service department that sends them are not the ones that ban you. I usually just buy the sticker sheets off of BL if I need them. 

[thegraverobber]

10 minutes ago, Pseudoty said:

1 UCS sticker used to be an insta ban. Right before they started printing UCS plaques the stickers had become more prevalent in lower cost sets, so not sure if that was it. I had misprinted stickers on the Batman Gotham City set and requested sheet 1 of 2 and they sent both, but as you know the nice friendly customer service department that sends them are not the ones that ban you. I usually just buy the sticker sheets off of BL if I need them. 

Good to know, I guess I’ll follow suit. Thanks for the feedback/advice as always.