US safety regulator, Amazon in tussle over hazardous products’ recall

The US safety regulator has sued Amazon for not recalling hazardous products being offered by its third-party sellers in the right manner, a charge the e-commerce giant has rejected.

Since 2019, Amazon has sold nearly 4 lakh ‘faulty’ hair dryers, 24,000 carbon monoxide detectors that didn’t detect carbon monoxide and an unspecified number of “children’s sleepwear garments” that didn’t meet flammability requirements, according to the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).

The Verge reports that the US safety regulator wants to force Amazon to recall those products.

Amazon said that it has already stopped selling these products, notified its customers and provided full refunds.

“As the CPSC’s own complaint acknowledges, for the vast majority of the products in question, Amazon already immediately removed the products from our store, notified customers about potential safety concerns, advised customers to destroy the products, and provided customers with full refunds,” the company said in a statement.

“For the remaining few products in question, the CPSC did not provide Amazon with enough information for us to take action and despite our requests, CPSC has remained unresponsive,” it argued.

The US safety regulator, however, appears not happy with Amazon’s action on recalling dangerous products.

“For every product which CPSC determines a recall is necessary, a lengthy negotiation must first take place about the threshold question of whether that sales platform is even subject to our laws,” said CPSC acting chairman Robert Adler in a statement.

“We are seeking Amazon to be responsible for the ‘fulfilled by Amazon’ products on their site; Amazon does not see themselves legally responsible for these products. We assert Amazon has legal responsibility as a distributor for the safety of these products,” the CPSC told The Verge.

Amazon disagreed on being categorised as a distributor.

“We disagree with CPSC’s assertion that we are a distributor under this statute, and our perspective was reinforced by Chairman Adler’s statement. However, more importantly, Amazon has always believed that we have an obligation to our customers to provide the safest shopping experience,” the company said.

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