Amazon Issues

I’m breaking Authors Guild rules by posting this, but who’s gonna rat on me? Nobody here, I hope!

This lengthy post by an Authors Guild member addresses a current practice by Amazon that basically cheats authors and publishers alike using Amazon’s “Buy Box” feature. Just something to be aware of as you all move toward publication….

Posted on November 20
by Mieke Eerkens

Since my book, right after release, was affected by this issue, I have been following it and am getting more and more concerned, while other writers around me seem clueless that their main source of royalties is being drastically affected and don’t seem that bothered. I am wondering how aware other published authors (non self-publishing- traditionally published) are of this issue. See below.

This past week, Publishers Weekly ran an article about Amazon reducing its orders to publishers for new books that they sell on their platform: https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/bookselling/article/81708-amazon-reducing-orders-to-publishers.html. This is obviously a huge issue for publishers. My publisher, Macmillan/Picador, has already had issues.

It seems pretty likely to me that this is connected to the whole “Buy Box” issue: https://www.vox.com/culture/2017/5/19/15596050/amazon-buy-box-publishing-controversy. Basically, Amazon has started auctioning off (as in, they make money off this, adding insult to injury) the “buy box” to third party sellers for our books. The customer won’t notice when they purchase a “new” book from Amazon by clicking “order”, but their order will be fulfilled by a third party. Now, it doesn’t matter if that third party has just one book to sell or more; they can pay Amazon 50 cents or whatever, and sell their copy as new through Amazon. *Technically*, of course, they are supposed to be selling a brand new book they bought from the publisher as a reseller. But it’s obvious this system is designed to make it easy to sell books sourced elsewhere and cut the publisher and writer out of the sale of a book (and income) they would have gotten had Amazon sold the book from their warehouses.

A couple of weeks following my book release, I saw that my buy box had been won by a third party, and multiple different third parties won my buy box over the next period, because it kept changing names of who would fill the order (sometimes the buy box reverts back to Amazon itself for a while, until another third party wins the buy box.) Months after my book release, my mother told me one of her friends said she had ordered my book new from Amazon, and had received a galley from a third party- an uncorrected proof for reviewers. Andrew Sean Greer mentioned on Twitter that his book was being sold on Amazon and people were receiving poorly printed counterfeit books (this is the worst thing about this whole buy box thing- counterfeiters now have an easy way to distribute thousands of copies of books.) I saw a thread by Amazon sellers in which one seller wants to unload a bunch of books he got in a liquidations sale (in other words, not purchased from the publisher), and others telling him they sell “as new” books (aka secondhand books) via the buy box all the time, writing, “I spoke to an Amazon FBA Assistant and they said I didn’t need publishers invoices for NEW books. I’ve sold tons of books in NEW condition and was never asked once.” : https://sellercentral.amazon.com/forums/t/will-amazon-ever-give-the-buy-box-to-book-sellers-in-new-condition/311490?fbclid=IwAR1swqwH2fGm2fmi1qBiJCnsWkSTY-W8Q0s3ZxMQsKElL3AyxLjiQ-SVQjQ Writers and publishers do not earn a cent on these sales. The third party sellers earns, and Amazon earns, but we don’t.

When I have complained about this, Amazon responds that they will penalize sellers who sell books that aren’t genuinely new, and that I should send them a report of sellers who are breaking the rules. But their whole system is designed to make that a completely useless form of control. First of all, a customer is not going to know to report receiving a book that isn’t new, and often they won’t know the source of the purchase so they won’t be aware that the writer and publishers aren’t earning anything from their purchase on Amazon. Second, even if you do report it, the damage is done and if a seller can sell one book then it’s just playing whack-a-mole, where you won’t even hit 90% of the moles.

And now Amazon has stopped ordering as much inventory from publishers, probably because they are shifting from filling orders from their warehouses, to basically just being a platform for nameless, faceless third party sellers who have very few regulations imposed on them. The end result is that writers and publishers will lose a huge chunk of income and royalties they have worked hard to earn, since Amazon unfortunately remains the largest seller for our books. It’s beyond unfair and unscrupulous, but I get the sense that most writers (and even editors and publishing industry people) don’t quite understand how this works or how many sales they are getting cut out of.

I would love for the Authors Guild and other writers to start pressuring Amazon (and for their publishers to pressure Amazon) to only allow third party sellers of books to be pre-screened official booksellers (independent bookstores) who (importantly) have to upload a scan of their purchase order from the publisher as a reseller (verified by the publisher) in order to sell a particular book. This is the only way to safeguard against abuse of this system, which currently seems to encourage abuse by its design.

I’m hopeful that pressure will be brought to Amazon to adopt a more transparent process so that publishers and their authors will be protected from predatory third party vendors….