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AMS Billing error - Advise me please!

6.5K views 27 replies 20 participants last post by  MajesticMonkey  
#1 ·
Just got this fun email from Amazon and need to know how I can bring back my ads to life again in the next 24 hours (preferably).

Dear Advertiser,

Unfortunately, we have been unable to charge the default payment method on [Name]'s Account's account for an outstanding balance of $[balance]. As a result, all active campaigns have been paused. Please click here to update your settings.

You can also log in to Amazon Marketing Services directly at https://ams.amazon.com and click on the 'Payment Method Settings' option found in the drop-down menu for Name]'s Account's account.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us.

Thank you for advertising at Amazon.
* My card doesn't expire for another year or so.
* The card is far from maxed out.
* Card was charged at least 8 times successfully in the past by AMS.

I can't change payment methods because that's the only card I have.

From AMS Dashboard
Important Message
All failed payments will be retried
Advertising Payment Failure
We were unable to successfully charge you for an outstanding balance in your account. At this time your ads are no longer being shown on Amazon and will not be shown until this problem is corrected. You may need to:

Switch to a different payment method
Choose an alternate credit card from your account
Enter a new card
Contact your bank about your card

When a payment method is changed, failed payments will automatically be retried. The retrial may take up to 72 hours. This message will disappear once the payment is successful.
Any advice on how to get my ads up and running again? I just clicked the card that they failed to charge and clicked "Set as current payment method". Than it gave me this message.

Thank you for your payment. Your payment method has been changed.

Credit or Debit card
has been set as the new payment method. Any unpaid charges would be added to the next statement as an adjustment.
What to do?
 
#2 ·
I got the same thing!!!

I called my bank, and they said everything is fine on their end.

Like you, there is certainly nothing wrong with my card or my account.

I used the "contact us" link in the email they sent and told them nothing was wrong with my account and to process the payment. If enough of us who received this message (I wonder how many there are?) do so, I bet it will make a difference.
 
#5 ·
Seems like I'm not the only one unfortunately....

I just checked my statements, it does look like Amazon is glitching.

Amazon issued a payment request on Aug. 2. My credit card was charged on Aug 3. However, my statement shows I was charged too little. If my AMS ads bill was $150, I was only charged $112 for example. So not sure what to do.
 
#6 ·
When they screwed up charging my credit card, I emailed the jeff email and got this response:

Dear Ms. Oneil,

My name is Brandon Wrigley with Kindle Direct Publishing Executive Customer Relations. Jeff Bezos received your email and am responding on his behalf.

I have been in contact with our Amazon Marketing Services team, and they have confirmed that we successfully charged your credit card $9.77 as of yesterday. When a new credit card is added to you account it can take a few days to reprocess unsuccessful payments. I apologize that this information was not made clear to you. Your ads are now again live for customers to view.

Thank you for your patience while we worked to correct this issue.

Regards,

Brandon Wrigley
Executive Customer Relations
Kindle Direct Publishing
http://kdp.amazon.com/
 
#8 ·
I got a similar email from them a couple of years ago re: my credit card info being invalid and AMS stopping my ads until I corrected it.  I contacted AMS support, told them my credit card info as entered should be alright, and they were able to verify my credit card information was okay and they then started my ads back up again.  Don't know for sure, but I wonder if it might be something like your account happened to be being updated when some associated Amazon process went down and so some aspect of it got left in an in-between state.
 
#11 ·
Whoa! I'm so glad I saw this thread since my email address for AMS is not often checked. I got the same message and wouldn't have known it if it weren't for you guys. I tried verifying that my payment information was correct on AMS (to hopefully jumpstart that reissue 72 hour waiting period) and am contacting them via the link in the email. My credit card currently has about 5% utilization on a five-figure limit and is working fine for everything else. And I refuse to change the payment method since I get 2% cash back on everything with this one. Ha.

This is quite the issue. What a waste of time and for no fault of our own. Let's hope we get a quick resolution to this...and some advertising credit for the inconvenience.
 
#14 ·
Thank you, they gave a link in the email, but when I clicked on it, it gave me a "the browser has encountered a serious error" message, which is how I ended up talking to the regular Amazon peeps to begin with. Yours actually brings up a page where I can send a message.
 
#19 ·
I got the same email. Not for AMS, but for a normal purchase. My bank said it was fine, so I went to look at my amazon account, at the details on the cards, and noticed that instead of my name, it wrote: Visa under "the name on the card." I corrected this and resubmitted the order. It went through without a problem.  You should check if maybe the same glitch that affected my account, affected yours too.

Since I'm quite certain that I didn't put Visa under "the name on the card" I send an email to Amazon, saying they should look into it, why it happened and if others have been affected too, just giving them a heads up. I got back a nice reply, how my card payment was proceeded and the order was on its way. It was quite clear that the one who read it didn't read past the few first sentences, or just didn't care.
 
#23 ·
dgcasey said:
I got this email last month and went in and re-verified the only payment option I have on file with AMS. The charge went through almost immediately and my AMS ads went live again within a few minutes.
I should clarify that I did the same thing. I don't know if it was that or my email to CS that did it, but everything's worth a shot.
 
#24 ·
dgcasey said:
I got this email last month and went in and re-verified the only payment option I have on file with AMS. The charge went through almost immediately and my AMS ads went live again within a few minutes.
Yep, I've just done the same. Everything cleared within fifteen minutes and ads running normally. I can't help feeling that Amazon is a balloon which will eventually burst!