Macmillan and Amazon Pay Lost Royalties

In a letter accompanying royalty statements, Macmillan CEO John Sargent told many authors they will receive 25% of net receipts in e-book royalties instead of the 15% most contracts called for, citing 25% as the emergent industry standard.

Macmillan will also pay royalties on sales “lost” when Amazon removed the “Buy Now” buttons on all books published by Macmillian during their contractual dispute over switching to the agency model. The payment is being called the “Amazon Kindle Outage Adjustment,” and Amazon has agreed to split the expense with Macmillan.

Sargent says, “We believe it was not fair that authors should suffer from the Amazon buy button takedown imposed on us for a week last year when we switched over to the agency model.”