A certain short-form video app (*cough*TikTok*cough*) has caused considerable issues for authors. You know, those people who write books? Amazon’s about to correct those issues or, at the very least, make it harder for authors to lose money just because people want free books.
Amazon is about to change how ebook refunds on the platform work. It used to be that ebooks could be returned for a refund within seven days of purchase, no questions asked. Well, the online shopping giant’s about to start asking questions.
An Amazon expedition
For starters, the seven-day, no-questions-asked policy is about to go away entirely, according to the Author’s Guild. Seven days is more than enough time to finish basically any novel. Heck, serious readers can hammer through a great book in less than a day. Exploiting that policy has led to purchases costing authors money. The rise in exploitation is being blamed on TikTok. That’s nothing special, everything else is blamed on the platform these days, but there might be a grain of truth in there.
So, instead of a time-based window, the no-questions-asked policy will only apply to books where less than 10% of the words have been read. Anything over that will require a customer service request sent to Amazon. A human will check those out and readers found trying to abuse that policy will also find themselves penalised. What the punishment looks like isn’t certain but it probably involves paying for purchases somehow.
Amazon’s ebook returns policy isn’t changing immediately, so if you’re messing with an author’s bottom line, enjoy it while you can. The change should be implemented by the end of the year.
