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Amazon allegedly resells damaged books

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Re: Amazon allegedly resells damaged books

#91

Post by [deleted] »

hedgehog wrote: post #65
bmitc wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their packing has gotten comically bad, particularly for sensitively items like books and such. I've greatly reduced my Amazon buying over the years due to issues with damaged items, and lately, Amazon is getting more aggressive about discouraging returns. But I'm not going to pay $30+ for a new hardcover that comes damaged and covered with dirt and grime.

I ordered a gallon of urethane and they just stuck it in a comically large box with no padding. Miracle it didn't break all the way open in shipping. Edit: They also tried to send a replacement, marked it as undeliverable, and charged me for it. I don't think Amazon was always this bad.

[deleted]

Re: Amazon allegedly resells damaged books

#92

Post by Apocryphon »

RecycledEle wrote: post #88
joabaldwin wrote: post #44

Author from original post here! For clarification, this is not a new thing, but something I learned to do from this post: https://bsky.app/profile/kristadb1.bsky.social/post/3kb4wbix... In her case, she ordered author copies (that gives you no royalties, of course) and got the same copies sold again to herself as author copies. In my case, I also ordered author copies, but they were resold to a normal customer after…

I assume Amazon thought the author was too picky, so they shipped him another 14 books from their inventory and put the 14 he returned into inventory. I frequently get books that have the errors this author described. It's normal in cheap books. I've even seen those errors in guilt-edged, leather-bound collectible books.

You're replying to the actual author of both the post and the book.

Re: Amazon allegedly resells damaged books

#93

Post by willcipriano »

steve_adams_86 wrote: post #55
optshun wrote: post #40

My favorite, or I suppose least favorite…, was when I received a “new” book that came with a bookmark of a single square of toilet paper. Unsure about you all but there’s only one reason I might use a square of toilet paper as a bookmark.

This exact thing happened to me and for weeks it would spontaneously cross my mind. I thought one of my kids did it yet I couldn't guess why, until one day it hit me: they were on vacation with their aunt when I received the books and found the toilet paper, and the book was slightly damaged when I got it. Then it dawned on me that someone had read this book before, likely while on their toilet. For that and a few ot…

I used to work in a Brentano's. Typical retailers will flag any books that have been in the restroom to prevent this.

Re: Amazon allegedly resells damaged books

#94

Post by becurious »

pbnjeh wrote: post #13

They also ship books in oversized boxes with no padding. If you're "lucky", they combined your book order with your order for something hard and heavy that can help beat the book up while the box tumbles. Not always, but often enough that if I order a book from them, I try to remind myself to to wait to order until nothing else I've ordered has yet to ship. Then wait after I've ordered the book, until the book has sh…

It didn’t used to be this way. Books would ship in a tight fitting corrugated cardboard package that would protect them. I suspect it was some kind of custom packing machine that would fold and cut to size.

Now it’s either in a padded envelope - still space for the book to move around - or it’s in a box with whatever else.

Creased covers, ragged corners, torn dust jackets… It’s awful if you want to give a book as a gift.

Re: Amazon allegedly resells damaged books

#95

Post by low_tech_love »

RecycledEle wrote: post #87

I found this quote enlightening: > From: Joaquín Baldwin, @joabaldwin > Of note: if a customer orders a copy from Amazon, and a damaged, returned book > is shipped to them instead, no new KDP printing orders kick in. This means I > don’t get paid at all, because they only pay me when a book is printed. They > stole my money while scamming a customer. So the author wants to be paid royalties on books he says are "dama…

That depends on whether he got paid for the first printing of the damaged, returned book, which I don’t think he was. He mentioned in a comment that he got 50 author copies, checked them, and returned the damaged ones. I assume he was not paid for the free author copies..?

So if they sold a returned author copy that is known to be damaged then Amazon 1) failed to pay him for a sold book, and 2) broke some kind of rule in their contract where it promises to sell high-quality prints of his book to his readers. Sure, QA is not perfect and problems will happen, but selling a book that is known to be damaged does not count as an honest mistake.

Re: Amazon allegedly resells damaged books

#97

Post by mips_r4300i »

bmitc wrote: post #54
manicennui wrote: post #51

If you care about the condition of books you buy, don't buy from Amazon. They'll throw a $100+ hardcover in a lightly padded envelope and chuck it around. Or they'll put it in a box with some other random item and a few inflatable shipping bags, but not enough to keep things from shifting around freely.

Their packing has gotten comically bad, particularly for sensitively items like books and such. I've greatly reduced my Amazon buying over the years due to issues with damaged items, and lately, Amazon is getting more aggressive about discouraging returns. But I'm not going to pay $30+ for a new hardcover that comes damaged and covered with dirt and grime.

Ordered a new cable modem and received it today.

They put the shipping label ON the retail packaging. No box! This is FBA. Of course it was scuffed and scraped all to hell.

Re: Amazon allegedly resells damaged books

#98

Post by donor20 »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #85
gurchik wrote: post #72

From the author's perspective, this is not expected according to their agreement with Amazon. Unfortunately from the consumer's perspective, this is not surprising at all. Everyone I know has received a "used" item sold as "new, sold by Amazon.com." Whether it's due to commingling, or an attempt to reduce waste, or plain corporate greed, I have no idea. Just saying that if I returned a book on Amazon, I wouldn't be s…

It's blatantly illegal under federal law to sell used items as new, full stop, end of story. But Bezos gets invites to the white house pretty regularly so it seems federal regulators get the message that enforcement against Amazon is a no-go.

A returned unopened item can be sold as new

Re: Amazon allegedly resells damaged books

#99

Post by aifooh7Keew6xoo »

RecycledEle wrote: post #87

I found this quote enlightening: > From: Joaquín Baldwin, @joabaldwin > Of note: if a customer orders a copy from Amazon, and a damaged, returned book > is shipped to them instead, no new KDP printing orders kick in. This means I > don’t get paid at all, because they only pay me when a book is printed. They > stole my money while scamming a customer. So the author wants to be paid royalties on books he says are "dama…

My understanding is that Amazon is not accounting for the royalties after they are returned from an author purchase and resold under terms other than the royalty free terms.

It's not that he wants to get paid for the unsold inventory, it's that he believes he doesn't get paid at all when they resell as new the used inventory he rejected and returned in quality control of his royalty free author purchase.

Re: Amazon allegedly resells damaged books

#100

Post by justinclift »

manicennui wrote: post #51

If you care about the condition of books you buy, don't buy from Amazon. They'll throw a $100+ hardcover in a lightly padded envelope and chuck it around. Or they'll put it in a box with some other random item and a few inflatable shipping bags, but not enough to keep things from shifting around freely.

Aren't they also widely known to co-mingle with cheap counterfeit books as well?
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