Amazon.com Used to be my one and only online shopping site - NOT ANY MORE!

I've been a member of Amazon for at least 10 years! anything I ever needed to purchase online if they had it I bought it there, was always a better price, better service, never had a single issue with any product I ever bought!

5 days ago (September 25th) I went to look for an item I'd purchased, I was on the page with it and couldn't remember if I had ever written a review on it, It was a dash cam I bought in 2015 for my boyfriend for Christmas. However, when I clicked "Write a Product Review", I got this error "Your previous review of this product did not comply with our Customer Reviews Guidelines. Amazon does not permit reviews from customers whose relationship to the product or seller may be perceived as biased." I still have no idea what it means, as I purchased this product on my own, I spoke to no one, I did some google searching on Dash Cams, found the best one, went straight to amazon to find it.. I don't even know who the seller was!

So I went to my profile to go find this review to see what I wrote, every single review I'd ever written (which were a couple hundred) GONE, every one of them like they were never there! Every time any one ever clicked that my review was helpful - was  GONE. I contacted them through their live chat, and got an Agent named "Chad" by the end of the conversation this is what he had to tell me " 07:03 PM PDT Chad: Thank you for waiting, Kelli. 
And there you go! The form was submitted successfully.07:04 PM PDT Chad: I explained all the details you provided and you have experiencing about your reviews, and error while leaving a review. 
No worries, our community review department will update you via email about this."

I have waited very patiently, and I tried to write a review today for a product I bought my boyfriends oldest grandson a few weeks ago for his birthday.. still can't write a review, reviews are still missing. Today's chat agent named "Mitch" tells me the same thing basically as "Chad" did, only that it will apparently take the Community Review Department 10 days to get a hold of me, and let me know the problem.

Well I am pretty sure I already know the problem, Amazon took away my rights to write reviews, and deleted all my reviews, because I as an honest review blogger and honest reviewer in general have chosen to follow the laws , specifically in this case the FTC laws, Which state if you get a product for free in exchange for a review,or a discounted price on a product in exchange for a review, or paid to do a review you must put a disclaimer in your review for other consumers to know this! Which I have put the disclaimer per FTC Rules, and I've also made sure to always state it would not of mattered if this was a product I found at my local department store and bought it my review would of been the same! I do not write 5 star reviews unless I honestly believe the product deserves it, I don't write reviews for the person who I acquired the product from, they can beg and plead for a 5 start review all day long or until the cows come home, I wouldn't care! if I don't like a product I write that, and why I don't like it, and what could be changed about the product to make it better, If a product is worth 5 stars after I've used it for a while, then yes I'll give it 5 stars, but again I'm reviewing the PRODUCT, nothing else. I have had businesses send me messages asking me if I wrote my review yet - 2 days after I got the product, and I tell them don't rush me, I will get the review done, after I've used the product enough to write a review on the product.  I've also let them know ahead of time, if you think your going to get a 5 star review out of me, just because you send me a product, don't waste my time or yours, as that is not how I write my reviews. I'm not a push over, I don't candy coat anything including my reviews, my reviews are 100% honest! They always have been and always will be!

But Amazon apparently has chosen to punish me for not only following the FTC LAWS, but being honest, I am sure if I never put a single disclaimer in any review on a product I got for free in exchange for my review I would not be having this problem, and I would not be writing this Blog Post about them today!

I told Agent Mitch tonight on their live chat, I would be writing this blog, and giving my review on AMAZON, I also let him know it would not only be on my blog, but my social Media channels as well, He didn't seem to care, so apparently Amazon doesn't care! So here we are! I am writing to let you all know if you review a product that you got for free, and you follow the FTC rules, and state in a disclaimer you got it free, discounted price, or paid in exchange for your review, YOUR amazon account will eventually meet the same demise as mine did! All reviews no matter how the product was acquired will be deleted, you also will not be allowed to write any more reviews on their site! Apparently they only allow their own AMAZON VINE members (which is a private club through Amazon, that you have to be invited into by Amazon) to state they got the products free of charge in exchange for their reviews!  I also told Agent Mitch this evening, that Amazon is NOT the online shop I can make purchases, and until they fix my profile, and put all my reviews back, and give me back my right to write reviews, I'll start shopping elsewhere , Again he didn't care told me "You've got no worries this will be fixed as soon as the Community Review Department is able to review it", which by the way he stated that department was having technical difficulties - which I highly doubt was true!

So until they fix my stuff, and fix this problem with me personally, and make this right, I'm done with Amazon! Like I said they're not the only online shop out there, their heads have gotten way to big and they think they're the worlds best online shop - Naw sorry to deflate your bubble Amazon, YOU truly aren't the best Or the Cheapest - at least not any more! and if you can't seem to handle people following the law and putting the disclaimer that the FTC demands of us, then perhaps you Amazon are in the wrong business! Because I know as a consumer, I don't care how the person got the product, as long as the review is honest, and they actually used the product long enough to write a proper review on it, it is nice when they put a disclaimer, but to be honest now a days, I don't need to see the disclaimer, I can pretty much read the 1st line or 2 and know if the person is only writing a top rated review because they were given the product for free, or paid to write the review, they don't need to even state it any more. I have read enough reviews over the years I can tell!

I know writing this, posting this on here and social media won't make a difference to Amazon, they're a huge company, but it needs to be done anyway!