Amazon Shuts Down Associates Affiliate Program In Connecticut

[travelin cat]

Similar to a move made in Illinois a few months ago, Amazon has shut down its Associates program in Connecticut after the state imposed a sales tax measure that would tax any purchases made online starting July 1

[techcrunch.com...]

[Leosghost]

I suggested that further up, but apparently the "founding fathers" didn't think to write the possibility into the constitution, at their time who would have? ..so it can't happen.

[diberry]

You can plan for that by moving your family to a more friendly environment for advertisers and affiliates (WHO SELL NO PRODUCTS ANYWAY, uncle sam).

I'm wondering if that'll even be possible. California's legislature passed the bill under Schwartzenegger, who vetoed it, but now they've just passed it again in hopes Brown will sign it because he's a Democrat. Two Tennessee governors promised Amazon no sales tax because Amazon was building fulfillment centers to bring TN lots of jobs, and then suddenly two Republican TN legislators decided Amazon must pay sales tax and have introduced a bill there, declaring that the fulfillment centers are "physical presences". Amazon is threatening to stop building the fulfillment centers and go to Indiana and provide the jobs to them instead. TN people I've read online are not happy - they need the jobs, even if they aren't the best of jobs.

It's not just a few states. It's not just the Democrats. This feels to me like somebody's buying state legislators, and they're going to keep buying them until they get what they want.

But what IS that? Even if Amazon charges me sales tax, they still have lower prices, better selection, free shipping and save me frustrating time in traffic compared to shopping at brick stores. I'll still buy most stuff from them. I doubt I'm alone.

And in any case, these bills won't get Amazon charging sales tax. I am convinced Amazon will shut down the whole aff program (do they even need it?) rather than give in on this. So all Wal-Mart & Pals will have accomplished is: killing Amazon's aff program and lowering a lot of online earners' income. What's the point of that?

Can anybody figure out ANY sensible objective to all this?

[MamaDawg]

Can anybody figure out ANY sensible objective to all this?

Only to the big box stores who are a driving force behind the legislation...

There's no state sales tax in Delaware, Montana or Alaska.

[frontpage]

You can plan for that by moving your family to a more friendly environment for advertisers and affiliates

Like pro-business states that are currently have budget surpluses, personal and economic freedom. Something you don't see much in the Nanny states of the West Coast, North East, and Upper Middle portions of the USA.

If I was an webmaster that derived a large portion of my income from Adsense, these tax grabs by these certain states should make me see the writing on the wall.

[diberry]

As I stated above, even extremely business friendly Republican TN may be turning and reneging on the deal they made with Amazon, trying to push through sales tax on the basis that Amazon is building fulfillment centers and providing jobs. So... which business friendly states should we be moving to?

I think in the end, the states will get their sales or use tax on Amazon purchases, and I really don't have a problem with that as a consumer. The problem is how the states are going about it, and I support Amazon's position in response, even though it'll hurt me if it goes through in my state.

Jeff Bezos supports the Main Street Fairness Act or something like it: [nationallawforum.com...]

That seems like a more fair way to go:

First, states voluntarily join the Streamlined Sales Tax Agreement by adopting its provisions as state law and conforming to the tax administration procedures set for by the Agreement. Second, interstate retailers voluntarily register with the Project’s online system. Sellers only register once and are thenceforth obligated to collect and remit sales taxes to member states when they sell products to residents of those states.

The Agreement reduces the administrative burden of tax compliance by focusing on two main goals: uniformity and simplification. The Agreement promotes uniformity in multistate sales tax collection at five levels: terminology, tax bases, registration, sourcing, and reporting. It simplifies sales tax collection and reporting by focusing on four areas: limited tax rates, seller liability for incorrectly reported exemptions, simplified tax forms, and electronic tax remittances. Additionally, it provides for sales tax software that, if used, would provide immunity to users from audits and corresponding liability.

That would make it less of a burden for smaller companies that may have brick stores AND online sales. If something like this passed and got used, there would be no reason for Amazon to avoid affiliating with any state. Nor would sales tax be a consideration for where it builds fulfillment centers and so on.

[aleksl]

bwnbwn: I am almost positive all states are working on this.

YES

JackieBlue: Remember, when rebelled against Britain and won, we became 13 countries who relunctantly gave up some sovernty when the constitution went into effect.

need to correct. You rebelled against British Central Bank. Then you rebeled against it another 3 or 4 times, and unfortunately lost completely in 1913 with the creation of "Federal" "Reserve" "Bank" (which is a private cartel, neither Federal, nor Reserve, and not even a Bank, who prints dollars for a fee whic his rolled as debt, which is why US is in a permanent debt).

Educate yourself, and hopefully there will be enough educated folks to REBEL (at least against another tax) this time around.

diberry: As I stated above, even extremely business friendly Republican TN ...

Republicans and Democrats are run by the same oligarchy, the same head. It is irrelevant which label one puts on it, although there are still some republicans left who are not sold to THE BANK. on democrats end, there are none.

[henry0]

I am in CT, was away for a few days.
My driver told me about it yesterday.

What a happy welcome back.

I told every one I knew not to vote for that guy!

He just killed many good scripts written to benefit from Amazon affiliate program on a new site not yet finished
got to find a new book affiliation, any idea?

[ken_b]

I'm beginning to think that these affiliate program shutdowns are more about Amazon deciding they no longer need the affiliates and using the tax issue as a handy excuse to dump them than they are about the tax issue itself.

How many other affiliate programs have sent shut down notices? Maybe the others just don't get the same amount of press.

[MamaDawg]

How many other affiliate programs have sent shut down notices? Maybe the others just don't get the same amount of press.

Hundreds of others, including a lot of big names. Overstock, CSN Stores, Home Shopping Network ...

[ken_b]

Hundreds of others, including a lot of big names. Overstock, CSN Stores, Home Shopping Network ...

Thanks, I had no clue :)

[shallow]

I'm beginning to think that these affiliate program shutdowns are more about Amazon deciding they no longer need the affiliates and using the tax issue as a handy excuse to dump them than they are about the tax issue itself.

You may have a point.

Same with Google Panda (bye-bye a good number of sites created by hard working individuals that were with Google from the beginning and played by all the rules).

Now Apple is only permitting downloads of their OS upgrades from their own App Store, impacting retailers who have sold their products through the years:

[computerworld.com...]

Now Amazon dropping associates.

I have mixed emotions about entities like Amazon not collecting sales tax. Why should they be exempt and not others such as Best Buy?

There are equity issues that really need to be addressed.

[diberry]

Why would Amazon need an "excuse" to dump the affiliate program? I don't know how many affiliate programs I've been in that suddenly came to an end when the business no longer felt they needed them. That's business as usual in affiliate marketing, isn't it?

Mind you, I'm not sure Amazon DOES need the affiliate program, and I've been expecting it to come to its natural end any day now ever since I started making money on it. But for now, my guess is it's still worthwhile to them, but not at the expense of the accounting, administration and theoretical lost sales* Amazon would have to deal with if they complied with the states.

*I say theoretical because maybe it's just the area I'm in, but paying sales tax won't change my Amazon shopping habits a bit. Not unless the stores in my area want to start stocking a decent selection at affordable prices... which of course they won't.

[shallow]

But for now, my guess is it's still worthwhile to them, but not at the expense of the accounting, administration and theoretical lost sales* Amazon would have to deal with if they complied with the states.

*I say theoretical because maybe it's just the area I'm in, but paying sales tax won't change my Amazon shopping habits a bit. Not unless the stores in my area want to start stocking a decent selection at affordable prices... which of course they won't.

Maybe the stores can't start stocking a decent selection at affordable prices because of their "expense of the account, administration and theoretical lost sales."

The fact of the matter is that stores like Best Buy do now offer a larger selection online, in addition to what they sell in their stores. But they still have all the administrative and other costs including collecting sales tax. So, it seems to me, they and other online retailers are at an unfair disadvantage.

Believe me, I'm not a fan of too many taxes, but I do want things to be equitable.

[tangor]

The problem, kiddies, is that all US STATES have Use and Sales Tax laws.... have had them for YEARS, which requires the PURCHASERS of OUT OF STATE PRODUCTS (ie, their residents/citizens) to VOLUNTARILY REVEAL what they bought out of State (or by Mail)... and that ain't worked. So here we are. In another thread I queried a "huh" regarding Amazon distribution centers in Nevada (to escape an Arkansas shutdown by Amazon) as a taxable source (oh, no! they aren't selling! Only fulfillment centers!) and what part of "doh" is not apparent?

State by State the revenue starved legislatures are after this revenue stream... which SHOULD BE VOLUNTARILY done by the BUYERS... but isn't... so, here we are, and here we will be going. It's not IF it will happen, only a matter of WHEN...

[diberry]

Maybe the stores can't start stocking a decent selection at affordable prices because of their "expense of the account, administration and theoretical lost sales."

That's not a new expense for these stores, and most of them are much older than Amazon, so they coped with that cost a long time ago.

No - I live in a very congested city, where businesses can get buy with stocking crap at outrageous prices, and there are so many people competing to get stuff that the stores still have trouble keeping up with demand.

Just FYI, I'm not necessarily against a Constitutional sales tax requirement for online merchants. I just don't think sales tax is what's actually giving Amazon its advantage. Even when they're trying (and I have lived in cities and towns where businesses really had to compete for business), brick stores can't possibly stock the selection Amazon does because that's not what they're designed to do.

[diberry]

Question: the Target affiliate program links take people to Target, but at checkout, they're offered the option of signing in either with their Target account or their Amazon account. If your state is shut out of the Amazon program, I assume this means you don't get paid on any Target customers who use Amazon for checkout?

[Musicarl]

got to find a new book affiliation, any idea?

That's part of the problem Henry. I've tried buy.com and pricegrabber to see how they do, and they don't come anywhere near Amazon. I think people trust Amazon, already have accounts with them, and are much more likely to make purchases there. Haven't tried half.com or ebay, which folks might also buy from, but not even sure they have programs.

[johnnie]

How about incorporating in a different state?

[dibbern2]

I moved when they did this in my state. I now am a Nebraska corporation. Took my attorney about 35 minutes to register.

[diberry]

It would probably work fine, but for Californians, if that law goes forward, it could cost them more than they would make on Amazon. Californian law holds that you have to pay them tax on your out-of-state corporation because you, the president of the corp, live here.

[ScubaAddict]

I'm curious, will your links still work and you will just not get paid? Or do the links break? If they are collecting money from your links and not paying you, that really is unethical.

Yes, the links will still work, but you will be blocked from accessing your Amazon account, and obviously will no longer make any money from sales.

As a Colorado resident, I left the links and started using viglink as an intermediary. Unfortunately, I am unsure as to how honest they are with sales. I get very little in sales through them, and even have bought an item from amazon (through a link on my site) that should have been reported and paid by viglink. Unless I did something wrong, I was not paid for this from viglink. (FYI- viglink is code that auto-changes amazon links to make viglink the beneficiary of the amazon link sales on your site. Then they are supposed to take a "cut" and send you the rest).

[JackieBlue]

Aleksi: need to correct. You rebelled against British Central Bank. Then you rebeled against it another 3 or 4 times, and unfortunately lost completely in 1913 with the creation of "Federal" "Reserve" "Bank" (which is a private cartel, neither Federal, nor Reserve, and not even a Bank, who prints dollars for a fee whic his rolled as debt, which is why US is in a permanent debt).

Educate yourself, and hopefully there will be enough educated folks to REBEL (at least against another tax) this time around.

Aleksi, you need to check that again. I agree with your thoughts about our central bank, not a big fan myself. However, the revolutionary war was really about the authority of the crown government to tax the colonies. The colonies felt because we were not represented in Parliament that the taxes imposed were not valid. Granted, it was a small group that felt this way but the government reacted so badly, time and again, that it actually caused more people to come over to the rebel cause.

Greeting from Virginia - home of Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, George Mason, George Washington, James Madison, George Wythe and other tax hating traitors to Great Britain ;-)