I last foamed at the mouth about Amazon not long ago, with their announcement that they were no longer going to accept payment from Visa credit card holders, myself being one. See my post Amazon are likely to lose a customer soon on 28th December. That issue has been resolved, and a couple of days ago Amazon emailed me to confirm that Visa payments would still be accepted. A deal has been done, and my guess is that Visa gave away the most ground. If so, Visa will be looking for ways to recoup lost revenue, which may mean slightly higher costs for other retailers, which will ultimately be passed on to Visa users. Nobody wins except Amazon. Huh. At least I can still use my Visa card - my only credit card - if I ever want to buy more stuff from Amazon.
But will I give Amazon my custom?
I dislike their business practices, and they've let me down in the past.
The only regular purchases I've ever made with Amazon have been mp3 music tracks, up to a dozen at a time, but often only two or three. And only now and then. The purchase process was once slick and easy. But for a long time Amazon has clearly wanted me to switch to their premium music-streaming service, and not to buy mp3 music tracks in irregular dribs and drabs, to download and keep as part of a personal music collection on 'physical' storage media. They've wanted me to become subscription-dependent, and give them a constant revenue stream regardless of my actual needs.
I have stubbornly resisted the pressure to comply. I have put up with a purchasing process that has become ever more difficult to deal with. But at least I have eventually got Amazon to accept my order, so that the music files can be downloaded to my phone, going into a file on the SD card, from which I can copy them elsewhere. And back them up, so that I will never lose them.
Now even that has become impossible.
I bought eight tracks from Amazon three days ago at a cost of £7.84. As usual, the whole selection and purchasing process was a test of patience and perseverance. Eventually I began my downloads. That at least seemed to go smoothly. But then I couldn't find those eight music files in the place they have usually ended up. I searched for them, diligently. But no joy. No trace of them on my phone! And guess what, they couldn't be downloaded again. At least, not without re-purchasing them. And I wasn't keen to try that, in case I got another download-fail.
And yet I found that those eight tracks could be played offline on my phone, using the Amazon Music app. I'm guessing that purchased-and-downloaded mp3 files no longer go to one's phone ordinary storage, but are instead locked inside the app. And can't be moved around, nor played by another app. Which is highly inconvenient. I want to use my regular music-playing app for everything. I don't want a separate Amazon music player as well.
It's obviously just a way of forcing me to maintain an Amazon account, for if I close my account, I can't access that Amazon Music app, and the music locked to it becomes unplayable.
My music collection - as it presently stands - is big enough and complete enough. There's very little I still hanker after. I might be able to fill gaps by ripping the soundtrack off YouTube music videos, although maybe that's no longer possible either. There remains iTunes. Well, we'll see. But whatever I do in the future musicwise, Amazon are not going to be part of it. Effectively they've filched £7.84 from my purse. It's too little to make a fuss about, but it annoys me intensely.
But I have power and choice!
I've now closed my Amazon account, and uninstalled the Amazon Shopping and Amazon Music apps from my phone. There are plenty of other places to shop online. I'll help them out instead.
An over-reaction? Probably. But I am very irritated, and this latest straw has broken the camel's back.
What about Amazon's great prices and offers? And their famed delivery? Ha, I just don't care. Cutting the connection isn't going to make the slightest difference to my day-to-day life. And I feel I've struck a blow for the put-upon consumer.
Really? You can live without Amazon? Yes, with glee. Watch me do it.
