Overview

Amazon has refreshed the criteria that determine whether a seller’s promotion can be displayed, especially ahead of high‑traffic events such as Prime Day, Black Friday and Cyber Monday. The new standards tighten verification of discount authenticity and reference‑price accuracy, and non‑compliant offers may be hidden from shoppers, directly affecting visibility and sales during the busiest periods of the year.

Key Points

• Eligibility reviews intensified — Amazon now runs deeper algorithmic and manual checks on every deal, flagging offers that appear to use inflated “was” prices.
• Peak‑event enforcement — During Prime Day, Prime Big Deal Days, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Holiday Dash and Spring Sale, the platform applies the strictest scrutiny to promotional listings.
• Reference‑price verification — Sellers must prove that the strike‑through price reflects a recent, widely sold price point; otherwise the promotion is suppressed.
• Transparency on suppression — The Promotions dashboard separates active deals from those blocked, showing the specific reason for each suppression.
• Impact on deal badges – Only promotions that pass the new checks are eligible for Lightning Deal, Best Deal or Deal of the Day badges, which drive a large share of traffic during events.
• Timeline for compliance — Amazon advises sellers to audit pricing and promotion setups weeks before a major sales event to avoid last‑minute rejections.

How Promotion Eligibility Works

1. Create the offer — A seller selects a promotion type (coupon, Lightning Deal, Best Deal, etc.) and inputs the sale price, reference price and start/end dates. For example, a seller may set a 30 % discount on a kitchen gadget with a “was $49.99, now $34.99” label.
2. System validation — Amazon’s automated engine checks the reference price against recent sales data. If the “was” price was only listed for a single day three months ago, the system flags the deal as potentially misleading.
3. Manual review (if needed) — For promotions that trigger a risk flag, a compliance analyst examines the pricing history and the seller’s inventory turnover. In a scenario where a seller raised the price to $59.99 a week before the event and then dropped it to $39.99, the analyst would likely suppress the promotion.