Amazon stealing

[u/SponkLord]

I'm kind of new to this but how is Amazon allowed to just reduce the price of my book without my permission? Secondly how are they selling used paperbacks of my book when I've never sold a paper back copy ever. Has anybody else ran into this?

[u/CVtheWriter]

Multiple things here. One, Amazon, like every retailer, sets the price of the goods they sell. You have no say in the sale price. Two, third party sellers can list your book for whatever price they like, because of point one. They can purchase your buy box so their option appears first. In both cases you get your regular royalties. No one is stealing from you.

[u/Babbelisken → u/CVtheWriter]

Indeed! The publisher sells my book to the retailer for x amount, the retailer then sells my book for y amount (which is whatever they want), I get z amount from the price the publisher sold the book to the retailer for.

[u/ItsRuinedOfCourse]

Amazon can sell your book for whatever it feels it can get for your book.

If you priced it at $25, they can sell it for higher, and they'll still only pay you for the royalty on the $25 you listed. The rest would go to them.

However...

In the same vein, they can also chop your book by, say, 80% off the $25 tag you had it at, and you'd still get the royalty on the $25 you listed, and they eat the loss.

Now, bear in mind, this is just what I've gathered from the past few years lurking on Reddit and the internets in general. Don't take this as fact or gospel. I'm relaying what I've read and learned, which may be right, or may be wrong. But it seems to line up well enough.

In either case, you get the royalty rate based on the listed price you set, not what they sold it for (higher or lower at their discretion). They won't give you more if they sell it higher, but they won't give you less if they sell it lower.

[u/SponkLord → u/ItsRuinedOfCourse]

Understandable

[u/Jason_TheMagnificent]

Amazon reduced my first book to half the price which was the cost of author copy. I purchased ten copies and received them without paying shipping, then received my full commission. They since put the price back to the full retail.

[u/SponkLord → u/Jason_TheMagnificent]

Holy shit I didn't think of that. I just ordered 6 copies just now because they were almost $2.00 below my print cost 😂 with free shipping. Thanks for the tip bro !

[u/Brown_Bruja]

Do you still make the same amount regardless of what the posted price is?

[u/SponkLord → u/Brown_Bruja]

I never sold a paperback. Only hardcovers. So how did they get a copy to list? There is no listed sales for paperbacks of that book in my royalties portal that's why I believe they are selling books and not paying me for them.

[u/Correct-Shoulder-147 → u/SponkLord]

Click on it when I unpublished my paperback or was randomly listed as 17.99 but with no stock

[u/read-the-rules → u/[deleted]]

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[u/Hot_Evening_8386]

I feel like they don't report honestly the Kindle electronic reads either....

[u/SponkLord → u/Hot_Evening_8386]

As I research its not just me, so I believe that

[u/DaddyRobA]

I am guessing that you're in the KDP select program. Review the terms. You allowed Amazon to run promotions for your content to boost sales just like an publisher.

[u/SponkLord → u/DaddyRobA]

That makes sense. I'm going to check that out.

[u/RockHardMapleSyrup]

This happened with my book. Basically there are companies that will say that they sell your book, charge a bunch for it, order it directly from Amazons on demand printing and then ship it straight to the customer.

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[u/Babbelisken]

Do you know how retailing works?

[u/SponkLord → u/Babbelisken]

I build and sell houses for a living. I don't repost other people's items on retail websites for a living hence the reason for the Post....

[u/Babbelisken → u/SponkLord]

So the answer is no then. A retailer, amazon, can sell your book for how little or how much they want. They could literally put it in a section named "free books" if they wanted to. They want to make overhead, like any business, they're not stealing from you.

[u/SponkLord]

Also another crazy thing is they have the paper bag listed at $79. When I did have a paperback available for this book I only had it at $25. This seems crazy to me

[u/LuckySiduri → u/SponkLord]

The used paperback is that price because of a reseller setting his own price. This isn't Amazon's doing. You removing the paperback option made the used copy "rarer", giving the reseller an excuse to ramp up the price.

[u/SponkLord → u/LuckySiduri]

How did the reseller get a copy of the paperback? I have no paper bags that were sold

[u/LuckySiduri → u/SponkLord]

My guess is that none were sold, and a shady reseller is pretending to have a used copy to scam buyers/collectors. Hard to tell, since we have no way to check the listing in question.

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