Audible bows to pressure and changes returns policy

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From The Bookseller:

Audible has announced an alteration to its returns policy, following an open letter signed by over 10,000 authors and industry representatives calling for it to make changes.

From 1st January 2021, the company will pay royalties to authors for any title returned more than seven days following purchase. The company currently deducts royalties from authors’ and narrators’ accounts when a purchased audiobook is returned or exchanged within a year.

. . . .

“In instances where we determine the benefit is being overused, Audible can and does limit the number of exchanges and refunds allowed by a member. But as designed, this customer benefit allows active Audible members in good standing to take a chance on new content, and suspicious activity is extremely rare.”

Link to the rest at The Bookseller

PG can visualize how returning an audiobook an individual has purchased and listened to could be carried out. That said, thieves gonna thief and that has been a fact of life for centuries.

(“Visualize” means PG can imagine how it might conceivably be done, not that PG could actually execute his visualization with mere bits and hardware. PG’s visualized world works so much better than the alternative, it’s quite frustrating at times.)

3 thoughts on “Audible bows to pressure and changes returns policy”

  1. Why not just say, “if you listen to the book for more than 5 minutes, you cannot return it.” It’s not like they don’t know the info.

  2. OOOOKay.

    I buy audio books from Amazon regularly. I never want to, and I return them every time I figure out how.

    Now: I mouse towards the purchase button of a book, and a stray. Somehow (and I’m sure it’s usually my fault as I clicking away trying to buy my book while doing at LEAST 12 other things at the same time- I click the “add audio to your purchase” button.

    That’s how they get bought. What Amazon knows: I’ve NEVER accessed these audio purchases. Each time they have tricked my by putting the add audio button right up against the “buy this book” button. Usually, that button isn’t there, because most books I buy don’t have audio editions.

    Then, after a day, a month, or in one case, a year, I get angry enough at getting charge extra for a book when I look at my statement and see I’ve got four audio books NONE OF WHICH I ever INTENDED to buy and try to return them.

    This week I bought an audio book AND KNEW IT AS I LOOKED at what I’d done. and I went through several hoops like a trained dog, and returned the damn thing in minutes instead of days.

    Not sure what audio listeners do to return books. That’s just what I do. -tc

    • Your accidental purchases were never listened to; they know that.

      The problem is serial returns by people who DO listen to them and take advantage of a returns policy which encouraged returns, no questions asked, if you didn’t like the book, UP TO a YEAR later.

      Big difference.

      According to those who have figured out how often their books are returned (the data are not forthcoming), it is anything but ‘rare,’ and listeners have figured out, and shared with each other, how to have endless returns.

      I think I have returned only one book I didn’t intend to purchase since 2005.

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