Amazon Product Compliance: Which US Rules and Documents Come Before a Listing

Amazon will sell a product only if the listing survives two tests. The first is the law that applies to that product in the United States. The second is Amazon’s own request for the documents that prove it. Fail either one and the ASIN is suppressed, the offer is removed, or the account collects a policy violation. Since November 2, 2026, products in Amazon’s enhanced-safety categories also need a USD 1 million liability policy on file; see Amazon’s $1M liability insurance rule. Those are different events. They get conflated because they all show up as “compliance.”

AEG prepares this file for brands and factories entering the US, inside US Market-Entry Strategy. The work is the document, not a dashboard tour. Category gates, which are about permission to sell, are a separate essay: restricted categories.

Where Amazon asks

Amazon told sellers that, starting 29 May 2025, product and food-safety compliance would move from the Manage Your Compliance dashboard onto the Policy Compliance area of Account Health. The migration was expected to finish that July. In Seller Central the path sellers are directed to now is Performance, then Account Health, then the Food and Product Safety section. That view lists ASINs that still need documents, and the status of what you submitted.

Use the page you have, not a screenshot from a 2024 webinar. During a migration Amazon itself told sellers to check both places. If your account still shows a legacy compliance queue, read it. A document submitted to the old queue and never accepted is not “done.”

Account Health is also where order-defect rate and, for seller-fulfilled orders, late shipment and cancellation sit. A compliance suppression and an account suspension are not the same enforcement. Do not answer a document request with an appeal about your shipping metrics. The suspension path is the account-suspension essay.

The law is upstream of Amazon

Amazon does not invent the safety file. It asks for evidence of rules that already exist. Which rules apply depends on the product. A soap, a children’s toy, a charger, and a food are four files.

Cosmetics. Amazon’s own guide to selling beauty products lists, among the documents an approval application might request, a GMP certificate, a certificate of analysis, and Modernization of Cosmetics Regulation Act documentation. MoCRA is US law: facility registration and product listing with the FDA sit with the responsible company, not with the Amazon account manager. If you are the brand of record, you should already know who that company is. Retailers that require chemical, aerosol, or battery data before item setup use WERCSmart registration.

Food and supplements. Amazon’s grocery-selling guide points at compliance documentation from the FDA or the USDA, depending on the product. A label that was legal in the home market is not automatically a US label. Ingredients, allergens, and claims move together. A claim you cannot support is both a listing problem and a regulatory one.

Children’s products. When a product is a children’s product and is subject to a children’s product safety rule, the Consumer Product Safety Commission requires a written Children’s Product Certificate, based on tests at a CPSC-accepted laboratory, unless a specific exception applies. The CPSC’s page lists the elements the certificate has to contain. Amazon asks for that certificate when the product is in scope. A factory report written to a different standard is not a substitute you should invent your way around.

Electronics, chargers, and anything with a battery. These often sit in Amazon’s dangerous-goods review as well as in product safety. The review is about how the unit is classified and packed for the fulfillment network. It is not the same form as a children’s certificate.

Read the request Amazon actually sent. It names the missing attribute or the missing file. A generic PDF from the home office, emailed to the wrong case, does not clear it.

What an imported brand should assemble once

Do this before the first shipment, not after the first suppression.

1. Name the US responsible party. The factory, the home brand company, and the US distributor are often three legal entities. The company on the label should be the company that can produce the file.
2. Match each ASIN to the rule that applies. Do not build one “compliance folder” for the catalog. A candle and a lip balm do not share a certificate.
3. Keep the test report, the certificate, and the artwork of the label that was tested. Amazon and a retailer will ask for the version that matches the unit in the carton. A revised label that no longer matches the test is a new problem.
4. Put the same facts on the listing. A claim on the bullet that is not on the tested label is how a page gets flagged after the certificate was accepted.
5. Store the file where the person who answers Account Health can reach it. A certificate that lives in a founder’s inbox in another country is not a control.

Brand Foundation is the right place to decide the responsible party and the claims. The marketplace team cannot repair a label the brand has not chosen.

Images, claims, and suppressed pages

A suppressed listing is often a content failure that looks like a safety failure. Drug claims on a cosmetic, a missing warning, a children’s age grade that contradicts the certificate. Fix the words. The listing essay is how the page should argue. The image essay is how the product should look. Neither replaces a certificate.

If a previous distributor created the ASIN, you may be uploading documents to a listing you do not control. Brand Registry is how the owner gets the catalog tools. It does not, by itself, make the product compliant. Registry requirements are in the Brand Registry essay.

What we will not pretend

We will not give you a universal checklist. Amazon’s request is product-specific, and the law is too. We will not quote a “typical” time for a document review. We will not tell you that a home-market CE mark, or a home-market registration, clears a US ASIN. It does not.

Direct Product Validation, Amazon’s program that connects sellers with accredited labs through Account Health, is described on Amazon’s product-safety pages for specific programs and stores. Do not assume every US ASIN is in it. If your account offers it for a product, it is a way to have a lab submit results. It is not a shortcut past the underlying standard.

Questions

We already sell this in Europe. Is the file done?

No. GPSR and a responsible person in the EU are EU obligations. Account Health in a US store asks about US rules. Keep the files separate. A European certificate can be background. It is not the US submission unless Amazon’s request says it is.

The ASIN says “document required” but sales have not stopped. Can we ship more?

You can, until you cannot. A pending request becomes a suppression on Amazon’s clock, not yours. Do not inbound a season of inventory against an open safety case. The receiving problem that creates is in the forecasting essay.

Who should sign the certificate?

The company that is the importer or manufacturer of record for that product, under the rule that applies. An agency login should not invent a signatory. If you do not know which legal entity that is, stop and name it. That decision is the brand’s.

Sources

• Amazon notice: product and food safety moving to Account Health. The 29 May 2025 migration off Manage Your Compliance.
• How to sell beauty products. Documents Amazon says a beauty application might require, including MoCRA.
• How to sell groceries. FDA and USDA documentation as examples of what an approval can ask for.
• Children’s Product Certificate. The CPSC’s description of the certificate.
• FDA: Modernization of Cosmetics Regulation Act. The US cosmetics law Amazon’s beauty guidance points at.

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