Previously a cheap and efficient way to get your Amazon packages in the post, Amazon Prime’s price is reportedly set to increase in a big way.
No one very much likes to wait. It is, perhaps, the only downside to online shopping. The wait for your brown, niftily put together packages, emblazoned with the familiar Amazon logo, can be a long and arduous one; if you want to save money with the cheapest delivery option, that is. It’s the sitting in front of the letter box waiting for the satisfying thud of a parcel hitting the mat and the seconds dripping away slowly from the listing-to-checkout clicks of your mouse to the arrival of your product. But as Amazon somewhat helped to cancel this out some time ago, by bringing in Amazon Prime, a service that gets orders to your door in just two days, there have been few of these extended waiting periods. However, as Amazon Prime’s price is set to increase, speedy deliveries may become a luxury that many of us can’t afford.
The news of a price hike comes in a recent Amazon investors call, with Tom Szkutak, Amazon’s CFO, saying that the online retailer were “considering” a an increase on Amazon Prime’s current $79 price tag. Should Amazon actually follow through, as suggested, the service, which includes free two-day shipping, could add between $20 and $40 onto that, making it almost twice as expensive for Amazon Prime’s “tens of millions” of customers, a figure that the company cited in December. Also interesting is how much these same customers will be left in the lurch, as Amazon have failed to offer a timeline for when the possible price increase could take place when asked by an analyst, which is especially unhelpful given that users are automatically re-enrolled after a year of Amazon Prime.
Reasons for the price increase aren’t clear either as while Szktuak explained that Amazon Prime Instant Video and the digital Kindle Owners’ Lending Library (two features that Amazon Prime subscriptions give access to) were pricey for the company, rising fuel and shipping costs were also cited. However, another reason for the Amazon Prime price increase could actually be down to Amazon looking to increase their profit margins, as while they earned billions in revenue in the recent financial year, they almost failed to make a profit entirely, suggesting that extra charges will be used to boost not only their bottom line but future business ideas too, such as an Amazon Prime Air drone delivery service.
We’ll keep you posted once we know more.
Source: The Huffington Post
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