Come and have a look! What should we do when we encounter cross-border e-commerce infringement and the fund account number is frozen?

In cross-border e-commerce, it is often heard that sellers say that their products have only been sold once in the US station, and then they received a notice that their accounts were frozen from the platform. It is because of this order that “phishing” buyers in the United States chatted with sellers in China on the grounds of buying counterfeit goods at a high price, and obtained a PayPal account (an international third-party payment platform). Subsequently, related brands filed a lawsuit in the United States with the chat records. Most sellers think of the high cost of litigation in the United States, and often run away, instead of actively responding. As a result, their PayPal accounts and funds are frozen or even cleared. So what should we do in the face of intellectual property disputes and the dilemma of frozen fund accounts?

First of all, you should not panic when you receive the freeze notice email. Generally, the freeze notice will tell the seller what to do next. Generally, it will include the reasons for freezing, the action plan and the documents to be provided. Some notices will require the seller to reply within a certain time, and some even contain tips telling the seller what to do. Sometimes they will ask the seller to find the complaint that caused the account to freeze, and make corresponding measures to prevent the related problems from happening again in the future. Therefore, we should first calm down, and then carefully read the notice of account freezing sent by the platform, learn all the information in the email, find the plaintiff’s law firm and plaintiff’s brand information, case number/search 21-cv(2021 case) in all emails; At the same time, you can contact the platform to further confirm the cause of this fund freezing event.

Secondly, analyze the reason why the account is frozen, find the source, and make a comprehensive understanding of its own infringement. Determine whether the account is frozen due to unknown product source or poor performance, deeply understand the sales activities, and comprehensively analyze the orders involving ASIN in the past 365 days. In particular, it is necessary to check whether the customers who have returned the money have made comments, see where the problem lies, and check whether the infringing links are real infringement or not, and analyze the specific problems.

After investigation, immediately stop selling the products accused of infringement and take them off the shelves. Of course, this practice does not mean that we admit infringement, but that we should reduce the possible amount of compensation as much as possible to prevent further losses.

Because the time from receiving the email notification from the e-commerce platform to the court hearing is very short, our cross-border e-commerce sellers in China usually miss the court hearing time when they realize that the account funds are frozen. Therefore, when the merchants receive the email notification from the e-commerce platform, they can inquire about the progress of the whole case through the WeChat WeChat official account supported by Maijia, and see which step the case has reached, so as to know fairly well. If the case has just been put on file and PIO has not yet come down, the infringing seller should grasp this time period well, and contact the lawyer at the first time, and respond accordingly whether he chooses to settle or respond to the lawsuit. The information obtained in the frozen email will be analyzed in detail in combination with the cases handled in the past by professional American lawyers. It is suggested that most cases should be handled by American lawyers, and individual cases can be handled by senior China lawyers. (Here’s the difference: American lawyers > lawyers have a slightly higher cost, are proficient in American laws related to intellectual property rights, and have a small circle of American lawyers, some of whom have personal friendship with plaintiffs’ laws, so negotiation and settlement are efficient and general compensation will be easier to talk about; China lawyer > lawyer has low cost, is familiar with American law, and the negotiation of compensation may be slightly higher. Here, China lawyer is suitable for docking American law firms that have been dealing with for a long time. Only by contacting the plaintiff as soon as possible can we highlight our own advantages, avoid taking fewer detours and finally achieve satisfactory results.

Thank you for reading, and today’s sharing is over. Maijia Support continues to bring you the latest infringement news. More exciting content can be found on the WeChat public platform-“Maijia Support” to instantly check the latest trend of your US case, whether there is a default judgment and the counterclaims of other sellers [real-time synchronization of US judicial case system data]. If a seller with frozen funds needs legal assistance in litigation and settlement, you can contact us through WeChat below, and we will provide you with the best legal consulting service.