Want to get promoted in operations? A company: Register an account with your personal information first

In the cross-border e-commerce industry, multi-account operation model is quite common.

In terms of account sources, cross-border companies mainly register and accumulate accounts through subsidiaries; in addition, using employee information to open stores is also a common practice in the industry. Yibai Network has registered a large number of stores through employee information authorization.

If an employee and the company reach an agreement on borrowing information, this practice is understandable, but if the company sets it as a promotion threshold, the rationality will be greatly reduced. Recently, an operator received a request from the company leader that if he wanted to be promoted, he must apply for an account with personal information. According to feedback from everyone, similar operations are not uncommon.

Some operators who have had such experiences said that information authorization is annoying and recommends that their peers not provide it. If the company provides a corresponding compensation plan, would you consider this form of cooperation?

A company: To get promoted, you must register an account with your personal information

Recently, a seller in the industry posted a blog saying that he received a help message from an Amazon operator, the content is as follows:

Today, my boss told me that if I want to be promoted, I must register a company with my identity information, and then use it to apply for an Amazon account. I would like to ask, if I give this set of information, what will be the impact on me in the future? For example, if the account is closed, will the company registered with my information be useless? If I leave the company later, can I successfully cancel the company myself?

In this regard, most people in the industry believe that relying on information in exchange for promotion is not advisable.

One seller said: "Employees come to work, not to become partners. I don't think I have the obligation to provide information to the company to open an account!" This is the view of most people. The company's requirements have also aroused the disgust of many people. Some people directly advised the operator in question to change jobs during the peak recruitment season: "Don't seek promotion, just achieve results and have enough experience to wait for a job change. This company is not good."

According to the feedback, similar situations exist in many cross-border e-commerce companies. An operator said that several senior operation colleagues in the previous company just refused to provide personal information, so they could only be senior operators and could not be promoted to team leaders. As a person who has experienced this, he suggested that the operator should not provide information.

Some of the operators who provided information to the company had bad personal experiences. "My previous company was the same. At the beginning, they wanted to form a partnership and used my information to register, but in the end, the partnership didn't work out. Moreover, it was very restrictive. When I left, it was very troublesome to change the legal person and cancel a series of information. I really regret it."

Insiders revealed that in addition to registering companies and accounts using employees' identities, a few companies also collect university student entrepreneurship subsidies in the name of their employees, and are very skilled at taking advantage of the situation.

However, some operators hold a neutral view on this matter, believing that if you do not plan to work alone in the future and your boss is reliable, then personal information can be provided, but an agreement must be signed to make it clear. Otherwise, it will be rejected.

Regarding the practice of employees authorizing information to companies to open stores, Daxin's legal officer Lao Yang said that this is quite common in the industry and is almost the mainstream practice of large retail companies. As long as both parties reach an agreement on this, there is no problem and it is not illegal. As for the possible impact of authorization, people know it well, and it mainly depends on whether the compensation is equivalent.

Regarding the issues raised by the operators, such as whether the company can be cancelled after leaving and whether there is any risk of tax payment, Lao Yang said that these issues can be clarified when signing the agreement. The two parties sign a joint operation contract, stipulating full responsibilities, profits and conditions for contract expiration, etc., which is legally effective.

Some large cross-border sellers also use employee information to register Amazon stores.

Big sellers have significantly reduced the use of employee information to register accounts

Taking Yibai Network as an example, public information shows that as of the first half of 2020, the number of Yibai Network stores on third-party platforms has reached 1,846, including 379 AliExpress stores, 367 Amazon stores, 264 Wish stores, 164 Lazada stores, and 94 eBay stores.

In 2020, Yibai Network’s 1,846 stores came from accumulation in previous years.

In 2017, Yibai Network had 217 stores; in 2018, the number of stores was 597, almost three times that of 2017; in 2019, Yibai Network added 798 new online stores, of which 105 were newly opened in the first four months. A total of 208 new Amazon stores were added throughout the year; in the first half of 2020, Yibai Network added 232 new online stores.

(Number of new online stores added by Yibai Network)

Big sellers often have thousands of accounts, which is beyond the reach of ordinary sellers in the industry. But as we all know, many cross-border platforms have strict restrictions on the number of stores that sellers can open, and Amazon is the most strict. The platform requires a principal identity and a set of company information to open only one store.

According to insiders, many large retail companies will use employees' identity information to register stores and promise to provide certain subsidies. One practitioner said that companies will regularly "brainwash" employees , asking them to take out their ID cards to open new accounts for the company, and promise to provide subsidies ranging from 1,000 to 2,000 yuan a month, which is quite tempting for employees.

Many of Yibai Network's new online stores were registered using employee information, a fact that its parent company Huakai Creative has also publicly mentioned. In 2018 and 2019, Yibai Network opened the most stores using employee information.

Data shows that in 2018 and 2019, Yibai Network opened 223 and 333 online stores on third-party e-commerce platforms in the name of employees or third-party entities, contributing RMB 388 million and RMB 668 million in revenue to the company respectively.

(Number of online stores opened by Yibai Network in the name of employees or third-party entities and sales revenue)

Since 2020, Yibai Network has greatly reduced such operations, and the number of stores opened in the name of employees or third-party entities has dropped from 333 in 2019 to 34 in the first half of 2020.

Later, Yibai Network gradually transferred these stores to the company or its subsidiaries, and promised to close all the online stores that had not been rectified by the expiration date. It can be seen that there are great uncertainties and risks in opening online stores using employee information.

Regarding the issue of Yibai Network using the information of employees and third-party entities to open online stores, its parent company Huakai Creative was once questioned by relevant institutions. Huakai Creative mentioned in public information that Yibai Network is actively rectifying and has changed most of the third-party online stores back to Yibai Network and its subsidiaries.

It is understood that obtaining information authorization from employees or third-party entities through agreements and opening online stores on third-party e-commerce platforms is a common practice for cross-border sellers to conduct business and expand their operations on mainstream platforms such as Amazon, eBay, and AliExpress. Other big sellers in the industry also use employee information to open stores.

In the face of risks, large sellers have significantly reduced the use of employee information to open new stores and have made timely changes. Small and medium-sized sellers should be more aware of the dangers of such operations and act with caution.

Amazon

account

personal information