Preguntas frecuentes sobre la Orden de restricción temporal

Offering for sale or selling products that infringe on the intellectual property rights of others is strictly prohibited on Wish. This behavior violates Wish’s Merchant Terms of Service and can expose Merchants to legal risks. Owners of intellectual property rights (Plaintiffs) can, and often do, initiate civil lawsuits against Merchants for offering to sell, or actually selling, allegedly infringing products. These lawsuits commonly result in the issuance of a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) and/or other injunctions.

Important Notes about TROs

Regarding TROs, please note the following:

1. A TRO typically requires that some or all of the following actions be taken against a Merchant’s Wish account: 

(a) suspender las cuentas del comerciante; 

(b) desactivar y eliminar todos los productos presuntamente infractores mencionados en la TRO; y 

(c) retener los desembolsos o pagos monetarios al comerciante, o tomar otras medidas similares relacionadas con las cuentas del comerciante. 

Ten en cuenta que las TRO pueden afectar la cuenta de Wish del comerciante en su totalidad y que, a menudo, no se limitan a medidas relacionadas con los productos infractores.

2. Un comerciante puede tomar cierta medida cuando es nombrado en una TRO, y el hecho de no hacerlo podría tener un impacto el negocio del comerciante. Por ejemplo, un tribunal podría emitir un fallo por falta de comparecencia contra el comerciante; esta es una sentencia monetaria que se dicta contra un comerciante por no comparecer en una TRO o por no responder a ella. A veces, tales fallos por falta de comparecencia pueden provocar una sanción monetaria por una cantidad superior a la de un acuerdo que el comerciante podría lograr con el demandante. Además, si se dicta un fallo por falta de comparecencia contra un comerciante, Wish puede estar obligado a hacer lo siguiente: 

(a) desactivar de forma permanente el escaparate del comerciante; 

(b) liberar todos los fondos de las cuentas de Wish del comerciante a los demandantes.

3. Aunque los comerciantes de Wish partes expresas de las TRO, este no es el caso de Wish. Por lo tanto, Wish no puede proporcionar asesoramiento jurídico a los comerciantes. Las medidas que Wish puede tomar con respecto a las cuentas del comerciante son requeridas por los términos de la TRO ordenada por el tribunal. Sin embargo, los comerciantes pueden optar por impugnar los méritos de los reclamos presentados por el demandante. Si este procedimiento es exitoso, podría causar la desestimación de la de la Orden de restricción temporal de un comerciante (o, posiblemente, sanciones monetarias más bajas o nulas). Por lo tanto, sería recomendable que los comerciantes busquen asesoramiento legal de un abogado. De forma alternativa, los comerciantes pueden considerar contactar directamente al abogado o representante del demandante.
4. Wish recibirá una confirmación de parte del abogado del demandante de cualquier acuerdo, desestimación, fallo u otra sentencia dictada por el tribunal con relación a una TRO. Según los términos de cualquier acuerdo u orden judicial, Wish podría hacer lo siguiente: 

(a) desembolsar el dinero adeudado al demandante por el comerciante; 

(b) reembolsar al comerciante cualquier dinero retenido pero no desembolsado al demandante, si corresponde; 

(c) reactivar el escaparate y las cuentas financieras del comerciante;

(d) eliminar de forma permanente los productos presuntamente infractores; 

(e) emitir multas monetarias contra el comerciante por cada producto presuntamente infractor publicado en el escaparate del comerciante.

5. Los comerciantes deben revisar cuidadosamente los anuncios de productos de su tienda para asegurarse de que cada producto cumpla con las Condiciones del servicio del comerciante de Wish y con las leyes aplicables (incluidas las leyes relativas a la protección de los derechos de propiedad intelectual). Asegúrate de revisar el título, la descripción, las imágenes y todos los demás atributos de los anuncios de cada producto para cerciorarte de que el producto que se ofrece cumple con todas las leyes aplicables y es correcto, y desactiva los anuncios que no cumplan con estas normativas. Los comerciantes también pueden obtener más información sobre cómo determinar si un producto infringe la propiedad intelectual aquí y pueden revisar las pautas sobre cómo crear anuncios que cumplan con las normativas aquí. 

Los comerciantes pueden considerar también consultar recursos en línea u obtener representación legal, como enlace 1 y enlace 2.

Potential Resources

Para el caso de los comerciantes que han sido designados como demandados en demandas relacionadas con supuestas violaciones de las marcas registradas o los derechos de autor de la marca del demandante, se debe tener en cuenta lo siguiente:

• You have legal rights to respond to such lawsuits, and an attorney may be able to help defend you. If you fail to defend yourself, the court might order Wish to transfer all funds in your account to the plaintiff brand.
• Te sugerimos que contrates un abogado que pueda ayudarte en este juicio. Por ejemplo, un abogado te puede ayudar con lo siguiente:
• A determinar si todavía puedes operar tu tienda y realizar ventas que no estén relacionadas con los productos que se indican en la demanda y en la orden judicial.
• A intentar llegar a un acuerdo con la marca para que Wish luego pueda transferirte los fondos futuros a ti.

If helpful, please visit this article to see a list of attorneys who have represented other merchants in similar lawsuits in the past.

 

Legal Injunctions & Temporary Restraining Orders Page on Merchant Dashboard

Merchants are able to view the details of each legal injunction and/or TRO that their stores receive by visiting the Legal Injunctions & Temporary Restraining Orders page via Account > Temporary Restraining Order on their Merchant Dashboard. The Legal Injunctions & Temporary Restraining Orders page presents all legal injunctions and/or TROs that the court issued against a merchant’s store, so that merchants may be equipped with information to try to resolve each case promptly.

Merchants are able to view the following on this page:

• A list of legal injunctions and/or TROs that the store receives
• Details of each legal injunction and/or TRO (if unsealed):
  • The type of court-ordered restrictions that Wish currently applies to merchants’ accounts (note that each injunction/TRO could have one or both types of restrictions applied) - e.g.:
    • Suspended Store: store is disabled and merchant account is frozen (i.e., products no longer for sale and no payments disbursed to merchants)
    • Payment Freeze: some of the merchant accounts are frozen (i.e., no payments disbursed to merchants)
  • The current case status of the legal injunction and/or TRO based on information received by Wish from Plaintiffs’ counsel
  • The case number, plaintiff’s name (in the example above, “Musicians, Inc.” is the plaintiff’s name), plaintiff’s legal counsel
  • Messages from Wish and/or the court (by clicking “View messages" next to the plaintiff’s name)
  • Intellectual property at issue
  • Wish merchants’ problematic product listings
• Injunction-related resources such as the Temporary Restraining Order FAQ and Intellectual Property Guidelines on Wish Merchants Help Center that help merchants prevent future injunctions and/or TROs.

Note that if certain cases are filed under seal in court, merchants won't be able to see the above details because they cannot be released to merchants yet (the plaintiff's name will also be displayed as "Undisclosed"). These cases under seal will be made visible to merchants as soon as Wish receives instructions from the court and/or the plaintiff's counsel that the case is now public; this will allow Wish then to display them to merchants on the Legal Injunctions & Temporary Restraining Orders page. Merchants will receive a notification once the case is unsealed and they are able to view case details.

As stated above, on the Legal Injunctions & Temporary Restraining Orders page merchants are able to view the current case status of the legal injunction and/or TRO based on information received by Wish from Plaintiffs’ counsel. Below are the definitions of each case status that merchants might see on the Legal Injunctions & Temporary Restraining Orders page and other information as to how restrictions on your account may be affected, if applicable: 

• Ongoing: based on Wish's records, the case is still ongoing. 

• Settled: based on Wish's records, the merchant and the plaintiff have reached a settlement agreement. 

The merchant might not be dismissed from the case, however, because there may be other agreed-upon obligations (e.g., payment to the plaintiff) that will need to occur before the plaintiff officially dismisses the merchant from the case. Hence, injunction restrictions are often not fully lifted until the merchant is officially dismissed by the court.

• Dismissed: the merchant is officially dismissed from the case by the court.  

  This happens in situations such as: 

  • Plaintiff drops the case against the merchant
  • Plaintiff settles with the merchant and the merchant is formally excused

Upon receiving notice of a merchant’s dismissal, Wish confirms the dismissal with the court/plaintiff and releases the restrictions associated with the injunction, usually within  1-2 weeks. 

• Defaulted: the court granted a default judgment against the merchants because they failed to take action; default judgments can include monetary judgments awarded against a merchant for failure to appear in, or respond to, a TRO.  Such default judgments can sometimes result in the award of a greater monetary amount than a settlement the merchant might reach with the plaintiff.  If a default judgment is entered against a merchant, Wish may be required to:
    
  • Permanently disable the Merchant’s storefront;
  • Release all funds contained in the Merchant’s Wish accounts to Plaintiffs; and/or
  • Take any other action as required by court order.

In addition, please note that Wish's actions, such as placing restrictions on a merchant's account, are strictly in accordance with a federal court order.

Aside from presenting details of each legal injunctions and/or TROs, the Legal Injunctions & Temporary Restraining Orders page also aims to establish a clear communication channel between Wish merchants affected by legal injunctions and/or TROs, so that Wish merchants will have information that might allow them to resolve such legal cases as quickly as possible.

In particular, merchants may click the “Send update” button to send various types of updates to Wish related to each injunction and/or TRO:

With the “Send update” feature, merchants may promptly communicate with Wish and accomplish the following:

• Send an update to let Wish know that merchants have retained an attorney
• Send an update to let Wish know that merchants’ legal cases have been dismissed or settled (supporting document is required for this type of update)
• Send any other updates pertinent to the legal injunctions and/or TROs received by the merchants’ stores
• Reach out to Wish about questions related to the Legal Injunctions & Temporary Restraining Orders page itself

We strongly encourage merchants to carefully review all information on the Legal Injunctions & Temporary Restraining Orders page, promptly take actions in response, and frequently communicate with Wish for updates.

Should merchants have any questions about the legal proceedings themselves, including how they may impact a party in or not in the United States, we strongly recommend that merchants retain an attorney to help advise them.