Merchant Center · focused work
Merchant Center policy compliance
Shopping policies apply to three things at once: the product data, the landing page and the business behind both. Most account problems are not caused by selling something forbidden. They are caused by a price that disagrees with the page, a returns policy nobody can find, or contact details that do not exist anywhere on the site.
This is the right work if
- An account notice has appeared and nobody can say which requirement it refers to
- The store sells in a category with extra requirements and nobody has read them
- The total at checkout differs from the feed price because a fee is added late
- The site has no visible returns policy, contact route or business address
- An earlier notice was appealed without changing whatever caused it
What it is
The three layers policy covers
The first layer is product data. Price and availability have to match what a shopper finds, images have to show the product without promotional text or badges added over them, condition has to be stated accurately, and identifiers have to be real rather than invented. The second layer is the website: a way to contact the business, an identifiable business behind it, a findable returns and refund policy, secure payment, and a checkout that completes without undisclosed costs appearing. The third layer is the category. Alcohol, medicines and health products, supplements, tobacco, weapons and financial products each carry their own requirements, and some need certification or restricted targeting before they can be promoted at all.
Enforcement runs at two levels. Item disapprovals affect individual products and are usually a data problem. Account level notices affect everything and usually point at the site or the business. The broadest category, and the one behind most account trouble, covers unclear pricing, undisclosed costs, products that cannot actually be bought and business details that cannot be verified. The work is an audit against the requirements before a notice appears, a fix applied at the cause rather than at the symptom, one review request, and a routine that catches a policy change or a site edit before it becomes a suspension.
How it is done
The work, in order
What changes
- Notices are resolved at their cause instead of being appealed and repeated
- The site meets the requirements that apply no matter what the store sells
- Restricted lines carry the certification and targeting their category requires
- Policy checks happen on a schedule rather than after listings disappear
Read the notice precisely
Establish whether it applies to items or to the account, which policy is named, and which examples are cited. A notice about pricing and a notice about business identity look similar in the interface and need completely different work, so this step decides everything after it.
Audit the website first
Check for a working contact route, an identifiable business, a findable returns and refund policy, secure payment, and a checkout that reaches completion with every cost disclosed before the final step. Do this as a visitor would, from the country being targeted.
Audit the product data
Compare price and availability against the page in every currency and market served, check images for overlaid text or badges, confirm condition and identifiers, and look for items being offered where the category rules do not allow them to be shown.
Handle restricted categories on their own terms
Read the requirements for the category, obtain any certification that is required before promoting, and limit targeting to the countries where the product may be advertised. Attempting to serve a restricted item everywhere is a reliable way to lose the whole account.
Fix at the cause, then request review once
Make the change where it originates, confirm it is visible to an anonymous visitor and to a crawler rather than only to a logged-in user, then submit for review a single time. Repeated resubmissions before the fix is live make the situation worse.
Put a routine in place
Read policy notices weekly, re-check the site after any theme, pricing, shipping or checkout change, and keep a short written record of what was changed and when, so the next notice starts from evidence rather than from memory.
Platform notes
Shopify
Currency conversion apps, subscription pricing and apps that display a different price to some visitors are frequent causes of a mismatch between the feed price and what a shopper is shown, and they are easy to miss because staff usually see the base currency.
WooCommerce
Tax display settings decide whether prices shown include tax, and a feed generated from a different setting than the storefront uses will disagree with the page in every row without anything looking wrong in the admin.
Why does the misrepresentation policy catch so many ordinary stores?
Because it covers far more than deception. Unclear pricing, a cost added at the last step, a product that cannot actually be purchased, a business whose identity cannot be verified, and promotional claims that are not backed on the page all fall under it. Most stores caught by it were not trying to mislead anyone.
Do health products and supplements need extra approval?
Requirements vary by product type and by country, and some need certification before they can be promoted at all while others are limited to certain markets or cannot be advertised. Check the rules for the specific product and destination country rather than for the category in general, because they differ sharply.
How long does a review take after the fix is live?
It varies with the type of notice and the queue, and it is measured in days rather than hours for most account level issues. The important thing is that the fix is genuinely live and visible before submitting, since a review that finds the same problem restarts the clock.
Can a handful of disapproved products endanger the account?
Individual data errors generally stay at item level. A pattern does not. Repeated instances of the same policy issue across a catalog, particularly around pricing accuracy or restricted goods, is what escalates from item disapprovals to an account level notice, so clusters deserve attention that single items do not.
Related work and answers
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