Mistakes, Mayhem & Miscommunications
In the interests of keeping this short, I will only highlight the worst experiences, even though the whole process was full of mistakes, untimely delays and miscommunications. The two individuals I worked with, Ben and Sean, made many mistakes, including trying to convince me to pay $450 for them to apply for a copyright number for me, which I declined because of the cost. This additional cost, as well as another, was brought to my attention after I had paid them, even though I had asked Ben several times if there were any additional costs and he had repeatedly said no. However, there are two costs they then try to upsell you on. After I said no, Ben set me up on a conference call with a pushy salesperson, because he's a "good friend" of Ben's, who said he would do it for $350. But when I offered him $300, he declined because "it was too much work to do it for $300. The next day I went onto the government website and I did it myself. It took me 10 minutes (after watching the "how-to" video) and it cost me $60. Following that, there was an unnecessary delay of four weeks due to their inexperience and negligence because Ben was unaware that my receipt had the copyright license number on it. He said he needed the number before they could publish my book. Even though I asked him if the number on the receipt was the number he needed to publish the book, he said no, that I would receive the license in the mail in about four weeks and that had the number on it. How does someone in the business not know that the number is on the online receipt?
After several months of waiting for them to publish my book, with no more work needing to be done on my end, I asked them to do so by 11/11. Ben assured me with his usual "no problem, we are at your service" lip service but did not fulfill his promise to do so because Ben sent me an uncorrected, old version of my draft (I had submitted the corrected version weeks earlier) for confirmation to publish, which luckily I caught before publishing, but then he did not get it corrected and reformatted until late that day. We then underwent the process of my providing him access into my accounts, passwords, etc., in order to upload the draft onto the various platforms. At 4:00 p.m., he told me he had successfully done so and my book would be available the next day, on Saturday, 11/11. He was thrilled he had finished by 4:00 on Friday because his mom had just sent him a text asking him to come home early; however, my book was not published on Saturday. On Sunday, my book was published only on Barnes & Noble. On Monday, when I asked him about why it wasn't on Amazon, he accused me of having changed my password over the weekend thereby causing the problem. However, I spoke with an Amazon rep on Tuesday, and I was told the book was not published because Ben used the wrong email account (I have two accounts) and it was never uploaded. I know it was never uploaded, as promised, because he needed my assistance with password changes which took some time and work on my end to assist him, which was finally done on Wednesday. I am confused how someone who claims to be experienced can assure me the book was uploaded when he never even got into my Amazon account and, furthermore, didn't think to ask me which email my Amazon account is associated with.
My book had to be published three times! The first time was because their AI editing/formatting had obvious mistakes. The second time the book had to be republished because they put the WRONG FRONT AND BACK COVERS ON IT!! Even with this gross negligence, no offer of compensation was made to me by Sean, the senior consultant. He did offer, however, to suspend or fire the person responsible, most likely Ben, which did not happen and wasn't what I wanted anyway.
Lastly, after everything was finally over, a few weeks later, end of December, Ben informs me I have to resubmit payment (and now they're asking for a direct wire deposit) because their computer was hacked and they lost their payments. This did not surprise me since the credit card I used was corrupted shortly after I made payment to them and I received an email shortly after notifying me my information is now vulnerable on the dark web. Even though I thought I was finally finished with these two, the frustration, angst, and regret continued. It took about two weeks for me to get the charge reversed. Ben constantly texted me (I asked him to stop) regarding the payment even though I assured him I would do so once the charge was reimbursed. Finally, three months later after the first publication of my book, I hope to be finally finished with Authors Book Writer.
OVERALL: DISSATISFIED AND CONSTANTLY FRUSTRATED.
My one good takeaway is that I learned so much from their mistakes, that should I decide to write another book, I will self-publish it myself through Amazon
26 januari 2024
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