The email I received from Etsy informing me my account’s suspension appeal has been rejected stated they had come to this decision after “careful consideration” following a “comprehensive review” of my account and the information I had included in my appeal. They also said that they were “unable to reconsider this decision”.  That sounds pretty final doesn’t it? My heart absolutely sank. Years of work taken away just like that. What do I do now? How do I best start all over again? Whatever I decided, I absolutely needed to find out more as to how Etsy had come to this considered decision. The support ticket hadn’t been closed, so I sent a few follow up messages in the vain hope I’d get some answers. 

In the meantime the only other thing I could do was to start another shop on Etsy. I’d be starting from scratch but at least I could point my existing clients in that direction. There was still the worry however, that Etsy would just shut me down again, especially as I had no idea what happened with my original shop. I paid the setup fee anyway and got on with listing my items again. 

As an aside, it is amazing how many scammers prey on new Etsy sellers. In the day I started this new shop I received 8 scam messages and 1 email. If I was completely new to this and not so savvy this would not have been a great first Etsy seller experience.

The following day as I was finishing up in the studio, trying to keep my mind off the Etsy situation, I receive an email update from Alex at Etsy’s Trust & Safety Team. The same guy who had provided me with their very well considered and definitely final decision. Apparently they had made an error in suspending my account! Hmm…that considered final decision not looking so final or considered. They apologised for the inconvenience though so I guess that makes up for all the stress and hassle they put me through at the busiest time of the year!

So many mixed emotions. Of course I’m happy to have my shop back but my confidence in Etsy’s competence is seriously shaken. Who knows when this might happen again? I still have no idea what actually caused this all. Also, what if I had just accepted their “final decision” and hadn’t sent those follow-up messages? Would they have realised their error on their own? I’m sure many sellers would have just taken it. 

Again, I think of Etsy’s own core mission statement, “Keep Commerce Human”. I very much like it. It’s definitely something we need more of, keeping everything human really. I like to think my clients feel I do well at upholding this mission. I have enough regular clients that would lead me to believe I do. After all this nonsense with Etsy however, I don’t think they’re doing a great job of upholding their own mission statement though. I would say currently they’re keeping commerce complacent