Complaint Review: Amazon / Createspace

 I authored a book through Createspace, which is owned by Amazon on June 18, 2010 ( see link for book ) http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Touch-Plate-Consciousness-Spiritual/dp/1450581684/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1282153425&sr=1-1 I have the ability to monitor my account online but can only get minimal information, such as the date a book sold, if it was amazon who sold my book or another distribution channel and how much royalty I will receive.  It does not show any information as to who bought my book or the transaction numbers that would connect a sale to my account. Keeping this information from me in the beginning made me feel left in the dark. Since the day my book started selling I have been promoting it at most of the metaphysical book stores in the valley, restaurants and through many online channels such as forums and an interview on an Internet radio program. I even have an agent with an associate who are promoting my book who receive 15% of what shows up on my account. I also teach classes at Alpha Book Center once a month and they advertise my class and my book in their Omega Directory every month which has a printing of 10,000 and is distributed around the state and on the Internet. (see link) http://www.aznewage.com/omega_flip19.htmI have personally sold over 400 books. In the beginning I watched my sales go up and then I watched them drop to less than the amount sold the first week. I continued to promote my book and had spoken to many who said they were going to buy my book, but the numbers on my account did not climb any higher each month. In the month of January I kept watching my account every day, on the 5th one book sold to a single person, then on the 12th two books sold through an expanded distribution channel. On the 13th I talked to a friend of mine who said she was going to buy the book at Borders books on Camelback Rd. in Scottsdale. She told me she was to busy that day to go to Borders and said she would buy it online instead, I said either way is fine.  For the next few days I kept checking my account to see if she had bought the book, but the numbers were not changing, it still said three sold. On the 26th I called my friend and she said she has the book and is reading it, I told her my account was not showing it was sold and that I was going to call my publisher and find out what is going on. I called Createspace and explained to them I did not get credited for a book that was bought by a friend, the person on the phone said, did she buy a used one or a new one?, because if it was used I would not get credit for it, I said I believe it was a new copy but I would find out for sure. That day I received a mail from my publisher stating they were investigating the issue and that I may wish to provide the order number to the order that I have concerns with.  I thought to myself, they should have every order number concerning by book whether it was used or new since they Amazon and Createspace are the same company. I called my friend and got the order number and gave it to Createspace over the phone. On February 3rd I received a mail from Create space that said the order was filled with a book that was returned, then a few sentences down it says a copy of my book was manufactured to fulfill an order, which was then canceled. when this occurs, you receive a royalty for the book that was manufactured and the book may be placed in Amazon.com's inventory to be used to fulfill a future order. Was this a returned book or a canceled one, and when did this happen, I never heard about it until I made a complaint. I was a private investigator for years, and this would be considered CYA. All this information should have been available the first day I called without me getting them the order number. I believe Createspace is printing books and Amazon is selling them while randomly giving credit to the author. My book sells for less than most books and there are a lot of authors who are in my position and have been trusting Creatspace and Amazon as our publisher and sales team. Amazon can make a lot of money by just printing up books and selling them without any one of us knowing about it. When every author finds out about this, they will be devastated and will have to find a new publisher. It would take an audit to find out how many books are truly printed and sold.