Amazon have issued new guidance for the sale of alcoholic products with up to 1.2% ABV (alcohol by volume) on Amazon UK.
To sell ASINs that have greater than 0.5% ABV, you must possess licences before selling them on Amazon. The licences should permit you to sell alcohol to customers from UK premises. These ASINs must be listed under the Beer, Wine & Spirits category. During the listing creation process, you will be asked to upload your licence certificates in order to unlock your selling privilege in this category. Products up to 1.2% ABV can be described as ‘low alcohol’, but if they contain more than 0.5% ABV, they require licences.
Don’t forget that you will also need sufficient procedures in place to verify that your customer is aged 18 years or over. If you deliver yourself you will need a courier that supports age verification but if you use Amazon FBA or Amazon Logistics then they can handle this for you – they’ll check the customers age and record their date of birth at the point of delivery – even if your customer is over the age of 19 they won’t deliver if a minor answers the door to accept the delivery.
Alcoholic products licence exemptions
To sell ASINs that have 0.5% ABV or higher, you may be exempted by the Licensing Act 2003 from possessing licences to sell alcohol to customers from a UK premises. In this case, you will list these ASINs under the Grocery category. You need to clearly state the ABV percentage in the product title and in the product attribution (alcohol content) for every ASIN.
For more information on selling alcohol on Amazon, go to Category, Product and Content Restrictions for Alcohol and Categories and products that require approval – Beer, Wine, and Spirits.
