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Antitrust watchdog to question Amazon Japan over new rewards program

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Basically, the scrutiny is over foreign companies because the domestic companies that want to scam the consumers won't be able to compete.

How convenient for Japan. Inc? Protectionism much?

18 ( +26 / -8 )

Well said silvafan

6 ( +13 / -7 )

So, the fact that all products purchased on Rakuten, and on Yahoo shopping earn rewards points is not important? Only for the foreign company? The black ship that is Amazon?

10 ( +15 / -5 )

Curious if Rakuten and others have similar issues? Or is it like @Silvafan says?

9 ( +11 / -2 )

I remember reading how Amazon is offering this service in order to better compete with the Japanese sites like Rakuten and Yahoo which give points, with Rakuten's Super Point Up program you can end up getting a large number of points from buying stuff and I can't imagine that Rakuten is eating all the costs themselves. Oh, but once Amazon does it now it's apparently unfair and antitrust? The antitrust agency seems to be completely toothless and uninterested in doing investigations until it's a foreign company having some success...

8 ( +10 / -2 )

To all posters above, please stop with your conspiracy theories and just read the article. They are concerned that Amazon is changing the contract without giving its sellers any say in it. This has nothing to do with Rakuten since their point system has already existed for years, and thus sellers already know about it when they sign up.

-3 ( +8 / -11 )

Rakuten and Yahoo do eat it by either having the merchants mark up the price or like Yahoo do not place a commission on sales through their portal.

Amazon is silent on the scheme they are going to adopt drawing skepticism and scrutiny by the authorities.

4 ( +7 / -3 )

To all posters above, please stop with your conspiracy theories and just read the article. 

Reading isnt the problem with the conspiracy theorists here, comprehension is!

3 ( +5 / -2 )

Rakuten their competitor here, up to dirty tricks with the gov out of jealousy of Amazon, by the looks of it.. Rakuten US already failed too. And Rakuten Japan was hacked several times last year but thrown under the rug and not much media coverage on stolen credit card information being leaked.

4 ( +5 / -1 )

To all posters above, please stop with your conspiracy theories and just read the article. They are concerned that Amazon is changing the contract without giving its sellers any say in it. This has nothing to do with Rakuten since their point system has already existed for years, and thus sellers already know about it when they sign up.

This!

Just because the government often takes measures to prop up domestic industries against foreign competition doesn't mean that every time a government agency takes action against a foreign business it is without merit. Amazon is trying to screw vendors over by foisting the cost of this scheme onto them, something they never bargained for. Its actually a good thing that the FTC is taking Amazon to task for stuff like this.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

To all posters above, please stop with your conspiracy theories and just read the article. They are concerned that Amazon is changing the contract without giving its sellers any say in it. This has nothing to do with Rakuten since their point system has already existed for years, and thus sellers already know about it when they sign up.

YES exactly. People need to read the article before coming to their own conclusion. I don't understand people here always have this assumption that Japanese government is trying to disadvantage foreigners and foreign companies...

2 ( +4 / -2 )

about time... i spent 500k yens last 3 months.. and got only 406 points LOL

1 ( +2 / -1 )

How soon some forget though... Amazon does have a track record of running afoul of antitrust laws here,

https://toyokeizai.net/articles/-/130910

Amazon Japan Raided on Suspicion of Antitrust Practices

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/15/amazon-japanese-headquarters-raided-regulator-antitrust-fair-trade-commission

Amazon's Japanese headquarters raided by nation's regulator

0 ( +0 / -0 )

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