Amazon fees
Ruminations regarding Amazon's excessive fees, catalogue mismanagement and the downturn in book sales.
I have just sold a second-hand book on Amazon. The buyer paid £2.78 plus £2.80 postage, a total of £5.58.
Second-class postage bought through Amazon cost £1.55 (unusually the book weighed just under 100 grams, it would otherwise have been £1.90). Amazon's fees on the transaction were £3.12, leaving me with 91p to cover what I paid for the book, labour, packaging materials etc. Not so long ago I had this book priced at 49p, and would still have made a similar amount if it sold. Of course since then Royal Mail have considerably increased their postage charges, but it is the very high fees now levied by Amazon that have made it necessary to put up my prices. There has been a significant fall in the number of books I am selling (probably because of the higher prices, but also because I think book buyers are turning away from Amazon ) meaning that it is no longer tenable for me to pay £28 a month for Professional seller status, which in its turn means yet higher fees on each individual sale.
Adding to this the appaling state of Amazon's book catalogue with its millions of bogus listings, plus Amazon's failure to root out dishonest sellers, it comes as no surprise to me that book sales are falling. Anyone have any thoughts on this?
Amazon fees
Ruminations regarding Amazon's excessive fees, catalogue mismanagement and the downturn in book sales.
I have just sold a second-hand book on Amazon. The buyer paid £2.78 plus £2.80 postage, a total of £5.58.
Second-class postage bought through Amazon cost £1.55 (unusually the book weighed just under 100 grams, it would otherwise have been £1.90). Amazon's fees on the transaction were £3.12, leaving me with 91p to cover what I paid for the book, labour, packaging materials etc. Not so long ago I had this book priced at 49p, and would still have made a similar amount if it sold. Of course since then Royal Mail have considerably increased their postage charges, but it is the very high fees now levied by Amazon that have made it necessary to put up my prices. There has been a significant fall in the number of books I am selling (probably because of the higher prices, but also because I think book buyers are turning away from Amazon ) meaning that it is no longer tenable for me to pay £28 a month for Professional seller status, which in its turn means yet higher fees on each individual sale.
Adding to this the appaling state of Amazon's book catalogue with its millions of bogus listings, plus Amazon's failure to root out dishonest sellers, it comes as no surprise to me that book sales are falling. Anyone have any thoughts on this?
0 replies
Seller_76AUwmqvSyRIM
Sorry, we can all moan about the fees etc but the fees and postage costs are known to you in advance of listing the item so it is up to you to price the item accordingly to make whatever profit you need.
Seller_ZVAz3d5lZuGid
No new thoughts, but totally agree, as a fellow book seller. I have been doing a lot of culling of my stock, and absolutely horrified to see that books I used to be able to sell for £10-£20 are now all languishing at under £3-5, with sellers offering free postage. I cancelled my pro plan about a year ago as sales had dropped so significantly, and now lucky if I sell 15 a month. Long gone are the halcyon days of 2-3 a day and often 10+ at weekends.
The bogus duplicate listings are ruinous, yet Amazon will do nothing to root out those who create them, and the dropshippers who just 'blanket' list nearly every book in the catalogue. The search is atrocious too, and often brings up the bogus duplicates first in search results. I do sell on Ebay too, and often get more on there than Amazon, but the listing process is laborious.
Seller_N0kQDKMgwda6y
Amazons fees are ridiculous, they also charge their fees on the postage price, which itself is about four price rises behind the times. i just sold a book for £90 and ended up with about £65 after paying signed for postage on a heavy book. it was £8,50 postage ( due to weight and protection against scammers ) yet Amazon allowed me just over £2.00. I never bother with books under £12, it just isn't worth the effort.
Amazon book sales have been falling for ages, for many reasons. Less people are interested in books, the bucket shops are taking all the business and driving down prices and standards. And people don't like Amazon. Even when they buy stuff from it they don't like their business methods, their warehouses or Jeff Bezos' ridiculous wealth. And many people don't see past that to the small seller trying to make a living its just 'Amazon'. Amazon is not going to change, its a corporate monster, with more hopeful sellers signing up every day. So, eventually the only thing to do will be to leave, something that I suspect is not far away for most book sellers. The only thing I am certain of is that the bucket shops will NOT be getting my stock.
