'It's not a questin of whether Amazon is too big in the market... Amazon IS the market': Claims of bullying small businesses and the truth about the w

By HELEN LOVELESS and MARTIN DELGADO

A worker preparing an order at a Milton Keynes depot

Online shopping giant Amazon has been accused of artificially inflating prices by banning firms that trade on its website from selling goods more cheaply elsewhere on the internet. Thousands of shops and small businesses, ranging from record stores to perfume suppliers, sell their products on Amazon, which has seen its worldwide sales surge by 44 per cent.
Under draconian new restrictions introduced by the American corporation, traders who sell products more cheaply on other sites face expulsion from the Amazon catalogue unless they agree to raise their prices.

The company is being accused of bullying small firms and inflating prices

Amazon has ordered them to ‘maintain parity between the terms on which you offer or sell each item through Amazon’ and the amount they charge for the same product on other sites.
Last night consumer protection lawyers called for an investigation.
Jill Paterson, a partner at law firm Leigh Day, said: ‘This is potentially anti-competitive behaviour. It has the potential to distort the market, which means consumers are losing out. It is possible the Office of Fair Trading have not been alerted yet but I think they should look into it.’
Business organisations and independent traders accused the company of ‘bullying’ smaller firms.

Orders stacked up at an Amazon warehouse in Swansea

Conservative MEP Malcolm Harbour, chairman of the European Parliament’s Consumer Protection Committee, said: ‘It is time for the European Commission to investigate whether firms such as Amazon are exploiting their market power in a way that is detrimental to consumers.’
In the UK, Amazon has achieved an extraordinary domination of the online shopping industry. The company refused to give figures, but analysts estimate it has a 20 per cent share of the market, accounting for £1 in every £5 spent by online purchasers.

The distribution centre in Swansea is packed with goods ready to be distributed

Amazon said in a statement: ‘We work very hard to expand choice for online shoppers. As well as increasing the selection of items that we sell directly, there are over two million sellers who regularly add to the catalogue of products that they sell on Amazon Marketplaces around the world.
‘We simply ask Marketplace sellers not to charge customers higher prices at Amazon than the prices they charge customers elsewhere.’

source: dailymail