A worker prepares packages for delivery in an Amazon warehouse in Brieselang, Germany.
Sean Gallup | Getty Images
Amazon is under investigation by German authorities for proven abuse of its market position during the coronavirus pandemic.
The investigation, led by the German Federal Antitrust Bureau, looks at Amazon’s relationship with third-party sellers on its platform. It started around April and comes after the Cartel Office received a number of complaints.
A spokesman for the regulator told CNBC that it “is not up to a private platform to be a price regulator like the price police.” Amazon uses “unknown mechanisms” to regulate sellers on its platform, she added.
Amazon did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment, but on March 23, Amazon said in a blog post that price gold had “no place” on its platform.
German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung was the first to report the investigation. “We are currently investigating whether and how Amazon affects the prices of retailers in the market,” Cartel Office president Andreas Mundt told Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in an interview.
The regulator told CNBC that Amazon had given it a statement after asking the e-commerce giant a number of questions. The answers in the statement are now considered.
Germany is the second largest market from Amazon to the US
The Cartel Office, which has the power to find companies hundreds of millions of euros, declined to comment on how long the probe will take.
Amazon Coronavirus Response
It comes after Amazon blocked some retailers for their claim of inflating their prices early in the pandemic. For example, there have been several instances of third-party Amazon retailers raising prices on items such as hand sanitizers and masks.
Amazon shrugged off a number of vendors, leaving people like Tennessee resident Noah Colvin sitting on more than 17,000 bottles of hand sanitizer and selling nowhere.
The German probe is the latest in a series of problems that Amazon has had since the coronavirus spread around the world.
For example, Amazon has been dealing with coronavirus-related deaths, protests and its response to the pandemic has been more heavily criticized than that of other e-commerce giants, such as Alibaba and JD.com in China.
Warehouse workers in Germany went on strike in June after staff at several logistics centers tested positive for the coronavirus. The strikes took place at six of the company’s warehouses across the country over two days. German trade union Verdi said Amazon was endangering the lives of warehouse workers.
At one point, an Amazon spokesman said: “We strongly believe that our colleagues did not spread the virus at work, given the robust security measures we have in place. Unlike others, there is always a confirmed diagnosis that we “warn every person on the site. Employees will receive an instant message noting when the person with the confirmed diagnosis last sat in the building.”
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