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[deleted user]
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Feb 03, 2015 05:34PM
I'm wondering if anyone knows why Amazon tinkers with the US selling prices. I priced my new novel at $4.99. Amazon sold a few for $4.91; the lowest sale was for $4.04. And, yes, my royalties drop with the price drop. They must have a reason, such as matching lower prices of competitors, but I checked all the markets where my book appears and their prices match the price I set on Amazon. Does anybody have a clue why they're selling at a discount?
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I don't know, but I do know Barnes and Noble discounted one of my books. As it happened, I didn't mind.
Email title-submission@amazon.com and they can answer that for you. They usually respond within 24 hours with solid answers.
J.M.D. wrote: "Email title-submission@amazon.com and they can answer that for you. They usually respond within 24 hours with solid answers."
I'm waiting on a follow-up reply now. Their first reply didn't really get to the problem.
I'm waiting on a follow-up reply now. Their first reply didn't really get to the problem.
Ken wrote: "J.M.D. wrote: "Email title-submission@amazon.com and they can answer that for you. They usually respond within 24 hours with solid answers."I'm waiting on a follow-up reply now. Their first repl..."
Well, good luck!
This is their response: "I hope this email finds you well. I'll be more than glad to assist you today.
I can confirm that the prices shown on the report are correct.What happens is the price of your book can change depending on some factors from the customer directly, that affects the average list price of your book; please allow me to explain a bit more about it.
Royalties paid under the 70 percent option are calculated off of your list price, unless we sell your book at a price below the list price to match a third party's price for a digital or physical edition of the book, or Amazon's price for a physical edition of the book. In that case, the royalty will be equal to 70 percent of the amount equal to the price at which we sell the book, less the delivery costs.
Your sales report will show the weighted average of the price at which we sold your book, so that you are able to determine the royalties due.
Our reporting does not specify what other sales channels price matches occur with, or the individual sales prices of each unit sold.
Please visit the link below for more details on the 70 percent royalty option: http://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing..."
This appeared to tell me nothing. I answered with this:
"Your response told me a lot of things I already knew, but said nothing about why the US price of my book is being discounted, sometimes by nearly a dollar. I've already checked; the book is not being discounted in any other markets that I could confirm online, so that would seem to remove price matching as a reason. The only other reason for showing a sale price lower than the price I set is that many of the books were sold to foreign countries that have a VAT or other tax, and that the tax is being deducted from the price before computing the royalty. This is all well and good, but I have no way of confirming it. I contacted you in the hopes that you could confirm it, or explain it clearly. That appears not to be the case."
If it's the VAT tax, I'm wondering why it appeared only in later sales, and seemed to escalate as sales progressed.
I can confirm that the prices shown on the report are correct.What happens is the price of your book can change depending on some factors from the customer directly, that affects the average list price of your book; please allow me to explain a bit more about it.
Royalties paid under the 70 percent option are calculated off of your list price, unless we sell your book at a price below the list price to match a third party's price for a digital or physical edition of the book, or Amazon's price for a physical edition of the book. In that case, the royalty will be equal to 70 percent of the amount equal to the price at which we sell the book, less the delivery costs.
Your sales report will show the weighted average of the price at which we sold your book, so that you are able to determine the royalties due.
Our reporting does not specify what other sales channels price matches occur with, or the individual sales prices of each unit sold.
Please visit the link below for more details on the 70 percent royalty option: http://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing..."
This appeared to tell me nothing. I answered with this:
"Your response told me a lot of things I already knew, but said nothing about why the US price of my book is being discounted, sometimes by nearly a dollar. I've already checked; the book is not being discounted in any other markets that I could confirm online, so that would seem to remove price matching as a reason. The only other reason for showing a sale price lower than the price I set is that many of the books were sold to foreign countries that have a VAT or other tax, and that the tax is being deducted from the price before computing the royalty. This is all well and good, but I have no way of confirming it. I contacted you in the hopes that you could confirm it, or explain it clearly. That appears not to be the case."
If it's the VAT tax, I'm wondering why it appeared only in later sales, and seemed to escalate as sales progressed.
Well, if you don't get answers from them, you can email Jeff Bezos directly. jeff@amazon.comHe likes to pay attention to issues and has people screening them. I've heard from others that they've had success with emailing him.
I find that kind of comforting that people have been able to contact Bezos directly. It shows good intent in taking care of the people who use the service. Not often easy to reach the top people in a company like Amazon.
I got another response from Amazon, and this one seems to explain it:
"I’m sorry for any inconvenience caused.
I've checked your account and see that some units were downloaded at the lower price.
Apart from US, customers from around the world like South Korea, Slovakia, Norway, Czech Republic, etc can visit http://www.amazon.com or connect wirelessly via the Kindle or mobile device to download titles from the Kindle Store.
If you're browsing in the Kindle Store from a location outside of the United States, you may see a price higher or lower than what you listed on the KDP website. This is the reason you are seeing the list price in the sales reports as $4.96. Please note that the price listed in the Prior Six Weeks' Royalties is average list price.
Please note, we only have 13 Kindle stores, US (Amazon.com), UK (Amazon.co.uk), FR (Amazon.fr), IT (Amazon.it), ES (Amazon.es), JP (Amazon.co.jp), BR (Amazon.com.br), AU (Amazon.com.au), CA (Amazon.ca), IN (Amazon.in), MX (Amazon.com.mx), NL (Amazon.nl) and DE (Amazon.de). While UK, FR, IT, ES, JP, BR, AU, CA, IN, MX, NL and DE store are for the UK, French, Italian, Spanish, Japanese, Brazilian, Australian, Canadian, Indian, Mexican, Netherlands and German customers exclusively, US store is used by customers worldwide.
At this time, international customers can buy the Kindle books from Amazon.com only.
Therefore the sale will still be recorded on Amazon.com but the location of the sale could be anywhere.
All items available in the Amazon.com Kindle Store are listed in U.S. dollars (USD). The availability and pricing of titles in global Kindle Stores may vary by home country or region, including taxes and other operating costs.
Rest assured, customers in the US will be able to see the price as $4.99.
If you've any issue or need further clarification, please don't hesitate to contact us. We're happy to resolve the issue for you."
"I’m sorry for any inconvenience caused.
I've checked your account and see that some units were downloaded at the lower price.
Apart from US, customers from around the world like South Korea, Slovakia, Norway, Czech Republic, etc can visit http://www.amazon.com or connect wirelessly via the Kindle or mobile device to download titles from the Kindle Store.
If you're browsing in the Kindle Store from a location outside of the United States, you may see a price higher or lower than what you listed on the KDP website. This is the reason you are seeing the list price in the sales reports as $4.96. Please note that the price listed in the Prior Six Weeks' Royalties is average list price.
Please note, we only have 13 Kindle stores, US (Amazon.com), UK (Amazon.co.uk), FR (Amazon.fr), IT (Amazon.it), ES (Amazon.es), JP (Amazon.co.jp), BR (Amazon.com.br), AU (Amazon.com.au), CA (Amazon.ca), IN (Amazon.in), MX (Amazon.com.mx), NL (Amazon.nl) and DE (Amazon.de). While UK, FR, IT, ES, JP, BR, AU, CA, IN, MX, NL and DE store are for the UK, French, Italian, Spanish, Japanese, Brazilian, Australian, Canadian, Indian, Mexican, Netherlands and German customers exclusively, US store is used by customers worldwide.
At this time, international customers can buy the Kindle books from Amazon.com only.
Therefore the sale will still be recorded on Amazon.com but the location of the sale could be anywhere.
All items available in the Amazon.com Kindle Store are listed in U.S. dollars (USD). The availability and pricing of titles in global Kindle Stores may vary by home country or region, including taxes and other operating costs.
Rest assured, customers in the US will be able to see the price as $4.99.
If you've any issue or need further clarification, please don't hesitate to contact us. We're happy to resolve the issue for you."
Ken wrote: "I'm wondering if anyone knows why Amazon tinkers with the US selling prices. I priced my new novel at $4.99. Amazon sold a few for $4.91; the lowest sale was for $4.04. And, yes, my royalties drop ..."Not exactly knowing, more of a suspicion. They lower the price if your book isn't doing well so it does better. I'm trying to get into their head to figure this out since they've done it to me too.
Robert wrote: "Not exactly knowing, more of a suspicion. They lower the price if your book isn't doing well so it does better. I'm trying to get into their head to figure this out since they've done it to me too..."
If that was the reason, Amazon would have picked one of my other books, not this one, which was selling well. See their explanation in my previous comment.
If that was the reason, Amazon would have picked one of my other books, not this one, which was selling well. See their explanation in my previous comment.
I've noticed this when someone purchased my book, the price went down at least a dollar and then gradually over the week it started going up. I have no explanation for it other then it's just a weird thing Amazon does. As you found out Ken, if you account all the discounts, places the book is and what not it well tend to go down a bit but I don't believe it drops rapidly to a low price. I know the price is different in other countries and sometimes thee author receives more money from royalties from another country then they would here, I believe China is big or the exchange just makes it seem that way. In any event, I wouldn't worry too much about it. A few cents isn't going to hurt, however if it's a dollar or more then I'd be suspicious and concerned.
It's never happened with any of my other books. This one is selling much better than those did, so maybe it's reaching markets where none of my books ever sold before. Just looking at it optimistically. :)
Hmm that is odd. Well as long as it all works out for you in the end! :)
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