Has Amazon discounted your self-published paperback?

[Brian G Turner]

Has anyone else seen their paperbacks discounted?

Mine's supposed to be £7.99 in the UK, but for the past couple of days at least it's been discounted to £5.60: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0995625719/?tag=brite-21

Anyone else seeing that for theirs?

I've emailed Amazon support in case there's a problem at my end, but I suspect a number of books are being discounted.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

It’s happened a few times with me- they’re clearing warehouse stock

 

[HareBrain]

they’re clearing warehouse stock

Isn't Brian's POD, though? Is there any stock in that case?

The TGP paperback price dropped a while ago to below what I would have to pay for author copies, so I bought all three that they said they had in stock, after which they restocked and the price went up again. Does anyone know what would have happened if I'd ordered, say, ten copies, i.e. more than they'd had in stock? Would they have honoured the price?

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Isn't Brian's POD, though? Is there any stock in that case?

The TGP paperback price dropped a while ago to below what I would have to pay for author copies, so I bought all three that they said they had in stock, after which they restocked and the price went up again. Does anyone know what would have happened if I'd ordered, say, ten copies, i.e. more than they'd had in stock? Would they have honoured the price?

If a book is selling well they order in a limited number apparently (which is when your title doesn’t show a delay in availability), and then clear it if those don’t shift

 

[tinkerdan]

I have had my first book(Printed through POD from Xlibris) show discount three times,once for the hard edition and twice for the soft. I think in that case they printed some copies and had them in stock and they didn't sell all that well, so they periodically attempted to move them. I have not as yet seen either the paper or the hard edition of the second book offered for less; however I'm assuming after the first book they didn't make a run of the second. When they do discount it, it should not impact your income; however since in my case the money has to go to Xlibris on that book before it comes to me, it is harder for me to trace.

I'm hoping they put my createspace edition of that first book on sale sometime and I can check that. However I've ordered some copies from amazon and noticed that the print date is the same day I order, so there is likely no stock of the book at all.

 

[Edward M. Grant]

It's common for Amazon to discount paperbacks, both trade-published and self-published.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Has anyone else seen their paperbacks discounted?

Mine's supposed to be £7.99 in the UK, but for the past couple of days at least it's been discounted to £5.60: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0995625719/?tag=brite-21

Anyone else seeing that for theirs?

I've emailed Amazon support in case there's a problem at my end, but I suspect a number of books are being discounted.

I've received the following reply:

Hello,

It looks like your paperback book is being discounted.

Royalties you earn from books printed to fulfill orders through Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.es and Amazon.it will be based on the list price(s) you set for your book, not the retail customer price. A customer might purchase your book at a discounted price that’s lower than your list price due to promotions, but it won’t impact your royalties.

Per our terms and conditions, we retain discretion to set the retail customer price for the books we sell. Our decision to discount products is based on a number of considerations which vary over time. We suggest you set the list price for your book based on what you deem is a fair value for customers.

The list price is the price you enter on KDP’s pricing page. Amazon lists your book at this price. In certain marketplaces, the list price displayed to the customer will include local VAT which is added on to the list price you provide. Your paperback royalties are calculated using this list price.

For more details on paperback royalties, check our Help page:
Paperback Royalty | Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing

Please don't hesitate to reach out to us should you require any further assistance. We are happy to help!

Thank you for using Amazon KDP and have a lovely day further!

 

[Karn's Return]

Not a paperback, as I don't have any funds to make paperbacks of any of my work, but I checked Amazon this morning and apparently they dropped the price of season one of Tooninoot down to nothing. :|


The financially sad thing is, it got six more downloads after it went free. :|

 

[Phyrebrat]

Apologies for the OT, but...

Please don't hesitate to reach out to us...

.

‘Reach out to us?’ So now a huge literature platform like Amazon is devolving to management speak?

Regarding that:

The Plain English Campaign says that many staff working for big corporate organisations find themselves using management speak as a way of disguising the fact that they haven't done their job properly. Some people think that it is easy to bluff their way through by using long, impressive-sounding words and phrases, even if they don't know what they mean, which is telling in itself.

Maybe they were ‘swapping out’ their inventory or perhaps ‘switching up’ their marketing??

Whatever happens I hope they manage to ‘square the circle’.

There is no current emoji on Chrons to highlight just how sickened I am right now.

pH

 

[Scookey]

That happened to me too. It seems Amazon do sometimes print off more copies than ordered. I know this because each update of my book has the update date included inside and have been delivered a batch which included a copy with a previous update.
The workings and decisions of Amazon are very much their own internal demain. Thankfully there are forums like this where we can, piece by piece, uncover them. Yay

 

[Cathbad]

When they discount them, why do we make less??

 

[Scookey]

Do we make less? My margin is so small to keep the cover-price down I wouldn't really notice. Actually, in my case, it must have been Amazon making less as they dropped the price by £1 and my royalties were only 7p.

 

[Cathbad]

Do we make less? My margin is so small to keep the cover-price down I wouldn't really notice. Actually, in my case, it must have been Amazon making less as they dropped the price by £1 and my royalties were only 7p.

A book I sell regularly was the first sold one month. I noted I'd made less royalty than usual, so I checked - the book had been discounted. (The price returned to 'normal' a day or two later.)

 

[Scookey]

That is mean of Amazon. And very unfair as the minimum price they allow us to sell for is already significantly higher than their stated printing costs. Have you queried them about it?

 

[Cathbad]

That is mean of Amazon. And very unfair as the minimum price they allow us to sell for is already significantly higher than their stated printing costs. Have you queried them about it?

Ha! You ever queried Amazon? Does no good.

 

[Scookey]

Sometimes. And sometimes the result was constructive. But never when it was about them paying money - in that they are very much a law unto themselves. That's the mentality of the ever-hungry giant. On the plus side, it gives us writers opportunities for exposure we would not otherwise have.

 

[Cathbad]

Sometimes. And sometimes the result was constructive. But never when it was about them paying money - in that they are very much a law unto themselves. That's the mentality of the ever-hungry giant.

Yeah, that's what I meant. They have been very helpful when I'm paying money, or they aren't.

 

[Brian G Turner]

When they discount them, why do we make less??

According to the email I posted above:

Royalties you earn from books printed to fulfill orders through Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.es and Amazon.it will be based on the list price(s) you set for your book, not the retail customer price.

 

[Cathbad]

According to the email I posted above:

Yeah, I've gotten that too. But get them to admit to a mistake!

 

[Laura R Hepworth]

I had this happen last year. My paperback is supposed to be $16.95, but every time I checked it the price was lower and lower. At one point, it was just below $4 (happy to report it's almost back up to full-price now though). I e-mailed to ask them about it and got a rather vague answer about how sometimes the Amazon algorithm will put items on discount, but that I would still receive royalties based on the price I'd listed it at. Still seems really strange to me. I've also recently found out that the KDP royalty percentage of 70% only applies to book sales within certain countries, sales to readers in countries not on that list are calculated at 35%. Annoying, but nothing to do about it.