The overall wellness and safety of our community is our top priority. We are committed to being responsive to the needs of everyone who loves and contributes to Mercari — from users to employees — as the situation evolves.

Before you scroll down to the practical details, I’d like to reflect on the human dimension of this moment we are in.

We are all feeling the effects “social distancing” has had on ourselves and our families. While we stay safe, let’s draw closer in new ways. Mercari, at its core, is about connecting people.

Helping people from different walks of life find one another over a shared interest is what we do. We are empowered every day by the vibrancy of the marketplace and the sheer volume of daily transactions. We are immensely grateful that we are able to continue to power the Mercari platform during this time.

While Mercari’s business is founded on the idea of exchanging goods without the need to meet in person, this unique situation can still have an impact on how people engage on our marketplace.

A few practical guidelines and updates:

While we are seeing news about essential goods being depleted in stores, we have a strong moral belief (and legal imperative) that our platform should not be used to price gouge or mislead users. We are taking active steps to take down any items like masks, hand sanitizers, etc. that are overpriced or deceptive. Visit our Help Center for expanded information about these actions that are now in progress.

While the risks of transmitting the virus through physical items remain low, please clean and disinfect any item you are selling or have just purchased. Please refer to official sources for expanded information. Here is a guide from the CDC about home cleaning and disinfecting.

Helpful tip: you can always schedule the pickup of your package with USPS . Click here for details .

There are currently no restrictions on shipping. Should this change, we will work with our carriers to address shipping concerns quickly.

Many users are now facing situations where they need to work from home, requiring childcare and other expanded responsibilities. Please act with kindness and have extra patience as some users’ responsiveness may be affected.

We continue to work daily to better serve you. We’re all in this together. Let’s be understanding and patient with one another during this time.

If you have questions, visit our Help Center or tweet us @Mercari_app. We’re all in this together. Please continue to check back here for the latest information.

Update: March 17 (6:30pm PT)

We’re working as fast as we can to support the Mercari community and do our part as global citizens. As a marketplace, that means not enabling unfair or predatory pricing, especially for critical items during a time of crisis or temporary shortage.

Effective today, until further notice, we are no longer allowing new listings of the following items:

Medical masks (e.g. N95)

Hand sanitizers/gels

Disinfectant wipes

We will continue to monitor existing listings in these categories for items that are overpriced or deceptive.

The overall wellness and safety of our community, from users to our internal teams, continues to be our top priority.

Update: March 17 (8:30pm PT)

As the COVID-19 virus has continued to spread, we have modified our business operations. As such, we are focusing customer support first and foremost to issues related to payments and suspicious/fraudulent activities. During this time, chat functionality will be unavailable so that we can focus on these priorities.

Mercari continues to be fully functional; we are making these adjustments to better serve you. Please visit the Help Center for additional information. A sincere thank you for your patience and understanding.

__________

Warmly,

John Lagerling, US CEO

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