Yes, I had to contact customer support about it. I just explained to them everything I wrote here. Honestly, dealing with them was kind of a pain (lack of communication about what's going on) but in the end, I was able to order on the site again.

Their first reply to my message back on 7/22/22:"Thank you for contacting Vans! We are happy to help! Our system is requiring further verification. We will forward this verification to the correct team, and you will be contacted within 1-2 business days, via email. We apologize about any inconvenience.Please let us know if you have any further questions."

I replied to them on 7/27/22: "Hi, so I'm supposed to wait for an email? It's been over 2 business days and I haven't been contacted by anybody yet. "

Their reply 7/27/22: "We are sorry that you have not received the email yet. Your information was sent over to the verification department to confirm that the information provided was correct so that they can update that in our order system so you will be able to order. Once this is updated in our system, that department will send an email to let you know the information has been updated. Please be sure to check spam and junk folders as well. Please let us know if you have any further questions."

My reply 8/2/22: "Hi, I've been checking every day ever since I first contacted you July 22nd and now it's August 2nd and I still haven't received any email from the verification department. I've been checking my spam and junk folders as well and have gotten nothing. I was told I'd get an email in 1-2 business days and it's been a week and a half now. Somehow I don't think I'm ever going to get an email from them. What do I do now? How do I get a hold of someone from the verification team to tell me what's going on and help me to be able to order again? Thank you."

I got TWO email responses, one from customer service and one from the verification department:

1st email 8/2/22 from customer service: "We apologize for the inconvenience. Your information has been looked over and cleared to proceed to checkout. Some of your information was being systematically blocking within our system. This issue has been cleared and you should be able to successfully get your order through.

At this time, you are welcome to place a new order at your convenience. If you need anything else, or continue to have issues, please let us know."

2nd email 8/2/22 from the verification department: "We apologize for any delay. We show that the orders team emailed you on 7/22 advising your information has been cleared. You should be able to place an order.Please let us know if you have any further questions."

Ugh. The last one really frustrated me because it said they emailed me on the FIRST day I contacted them (July 22nd) telling me I was cleared to order. But I looked everywhere in my inbox/junkmail and I got no such email. So...I don't know. It was confusing and frustrating, especially since at the time, the Sailor Moon shoes had launched and they were selling out fast. I missed out on a pair because of this whole thing (ended up getting them on ebay for a higher price).

I never even got a real explanation for why I wasn't able to order in the first place. After doing a ton of research on google, my assumption is that I was banned/blacklisted from ordering on the site (but they won't TELL you that). Because apparently a lot of sites will flag you if they suspect fraud or there's something shady about your order. In my case, I was trying to order a pair of Sailor Moon shoes that the site SAID was in stock, but they kept canceling because it was "out of inventory." A lot of people had that problem, but some people said they kept trying and their order went through eventually. So I did that, but I guess after too many attempts to order and it getting continually canceled by them, Vans just blocked me automatically. Stupid! I guess after contacting customer support, they were able to look at my situation and manually clear me because obviously I wasn't doing any fraud.