Still Feeling the Squeeze

In a recent blog post, I went on quite a rant about Amazon’s policy of paying independent authors based the number of pages read in their books as opposed to a percentage of the retail price. One of the things that I took exception to was that as a reader, I’m not allowed to return a book I haven’t finished reading and get a partial credit for it.

Well, not only was I wrong, but I was wrong in a big way and I’m even more frustrated.

Readers can return e-books to Amazon, but this isn’t just limited to readers who read the book partway and realize it’s not for them so they ask for a refund. This is for any book, fully read or not and it gets even better. The reader has up to seven days to return the book for a full refund.

You read that right! Seven days to return a book for a full refund. I don’t know about you, but there have been many days where I have enjoyed a book so much that I have finished it in far less than seven days. If a book is really good, I have been known to finish it the day I purchased it.

In theory, this seven day return policy isn’t for voracious readers like me that enjoy the books they’ve purchased. It’s probably intended for people who buy a book but don’t have time to read it right away only to sit down a few days later and discover they don’t like the book or it isn’t what they expected.

The problem is that Amazon has no way to truly distinguish between legitimate return requests and those requests that are the result of some lowlife cheapskate looking to cheat the system and take money from the pockets of hard working authors.

I spend a lot of time and effort on my books and I have my price points set at $3.99 or less for all of my e-books. For someone to read my book, enjoy my book, not review it and then have the audacity to return it within seven days just so they can get their money back makes me more than sick.

It flat out pisses me off. The trouble is, there isn’t a damn thing I can do about it. Until or unless Amazon is willing to amend their return policy to be more equitable for authors and readers, this will be yet another way that I’m feeling the squeeze. Talk about sucking the joy out of what I love to do!