REINSTATED!

My Amazon KPD account has been reinstated and all my books are back and on sale again!

Thanks to everyone for their support and advice … and particularly to Graham Evans, who pointed me in the right direction when it came to communicating with Amazon KPD.

At 12.20pm I was sent the following email by Amazon KPD:

Hello,

Thank you for your email concerning the status of your account.

After reviewing your response, we have reinstated your account and you may submit titles for possible publication.

To ensure the account remains in good standing, take the following actions:

• Review your catalog and unpublish any titles that do not comply with the Content Guidelines: https://kdp.amazon.com/help/topic/G200672390
• Review your catalog and unpublish any titles where you do not have the necessary publishing rights
• Ensure that future titles comply with our Content Guidelines and that you hold the necessary publishing rights.

As a reminder, finding additional violations of our Content Guidelines may negatively impact your account status. You can find our Terms and Conditions here: https://kdp.amazon.com/help/topic/G200627430

If you have questions or believe you've received this email in error, please reply to this message.

Thanks for using Amazon KDP

SNEH

Amazon Content Review Team

It would appear that my ‘evidence’ was sufficient enough to prove that I had not published anything that I did not have the right to publish ... BUT in future I will be even more stringent when I check articles that have been contributed to the next (and subsequent) compendia.

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As an aside, I did give some thought as to the title of this blog post. I was unsure what the opposite of ‘terminated’ might be … and toyed with ‘ex-terminated’ … but decided that word had far too many Dalek/alien intelligence connotations. I settled for ‘reinstated’ instead … but I still think that ‘ex-terminated’ might have been more apposite.

Getting in contact with Amazon KPD

I have still had no reply to my original email to Amazon KDP, so this morning I followed it up with a second email, the text of which follows:

I sent a reply to the termination email that was sent to me but as yet I have had no reply. I attached screenshots to it that showed when I created the original document that formed the text on the book that was cited as the reason for the termination. When I uploaded the file for publication, I made sure that the book - which is a compendium of articles written by a group of people - listed all the contributors (including biographies) and made sure that they were cited as authors on the book's entry on Amazon's relevant bookstore webpage.

The reason given for termination was 'you do not have the necessary rights to publish the book(s) listed below.' (The book was DIID/ASIN: 58756726-Title: The Third Portable Wargame Compendium.) I would like to know how that decision was arrived at as the email seems to have been created automatically and that no human was involved in the process.

I am particularly concerned that I received no warning that there was a problem, especially as the book was published a year ago and you had plenty of time to determine that there might be a problem and informed me so that it could be sorted out. What seems to have happened in this case is that something has triggered your AI system and it has acted as accuser, judge, jury, and executioner ... and I had no right to defend myself before the termination took place.

What I do not understand is why my account was terminated and all my books published by Amazon KDP were removed from sale when there seems to be no issues with the other books ... which include two earlier compendia that were created and published in the same way as The Third Portable Wargame Compendium.

The Portable Wargame concept has been around for eight years and has spawned thirteen books since then ... and another is in the process of completion! It has a very active Facebook group with over 1,700 members and many thousands of copies of the books have been sold. May I strongly urge you to re-examine your decision and if there is a problem, begin a dialogue that can lead to a mutually beneficial conclusion.

Bob Cordery

I received an automatic response that assured me that I should get a reply withing twenty-four hours ... or longer if they have to investigate more deeply.

I am not holding my breath.

The current availability of the Portable Wargame books

Further to the 'termination' of my Amazon KDP account, the books previously published by them are no longer available. I therefore decided the list what PORTABLE WARGAME books are still available and from where.

• The Portable Wargame (2017): Available from Lulu.com, Amazon, and Wargame Vault
• Developing The Portable Wargame (2017): Available from Lulu.com, Amazon, and Wargame Vault
• Gridded Naval Wargames (2018): Available from Lulu.com. Amazon, and Wargame Vault
• The Portable Napoleonic Wargame (2018): Available from Lulu.com, Amazon, and Wargame Vault
• The Portable Colonial Wargame (2020): Available from Lulu.com, Amazon, and Wargame Vault
• The Portable Pike & Shot Wargame (With Antoine Bourguilleau, Alan Saunders, and Arthur Harman) (2020): Available from Wargame Vault
• ¡Arriba España! (Spain Arise!) including The Portable Spanish Civil War wargame rules (2021): Available from Wargame Vault
• The Balkan League: A Matrix Game Campaign, including the Portable Balkan Wars Wargame Rules (2021): Available from Wargame Vault
• The Portable Wargame Compendium (With David Barnes, Justin Barrett, Mark Cordone, Arthur Harman, Marc Pavone, Martin Rapier, and Mike Taber) (2022): Available from Wargame Vault
• The Portable Ironclads Wargame (By David Crook with Bob Cordery) (2022): Available from Wargame Vault
• The Second Portable Wargame Compendium (With Mark Cordone, Arthur Harman, Nick Huband, Paul Lesson, Marc Pavone, Ryan Recker, Gary Sheffield, and Stephen Smith) (2023): Available from Wargame Vault
• The Third Portable Wargame Compendium (With Archduke Piccolo, Mark Cordone, Arthur Harman, Nick Huband, Paul Lesson, Mile Lewis, and Gary Sheffield) (2024): Available from Wargame Vault
• Developing the Portable Ironclads Wargame: American Civil War (By David Crook with Bob Cordery) (2025): Available from Wargame Vault

It is worth noting that:

• The Lulu.com books are still on sale on Amazon because they were not published by Amazon KDP!
• The books on sale at Wargame Vault are all in PDF and not printed format ... at present!

TERMINATED!

I am in the final stages of putting together The Fourth Portable Wargame Compendium ... but I have had to put further work on hold because of the following email I received from Amazon KDP:

As the text of the email shown above is rather small to read easily, I have added it below:

Hello,

We have terminated your KDP account because we found that you do not have the necessary rights to publish the book(s) listed below. If you have documentation proving you have the necessary rights to publish this book, please reply to this message and attach it to your email.

DIID/ASIN: 58756726-Title: The Third Portable Wargame Compendium

We are committed to providing a bookstore built on trust between authors, publishers, and readers, and we take prompt action when needed to ensure a positive experience. As part of the account termination process:

• You can no longer access your KDP Account, Bookshelf, or Reports.
• We have removed your published books from the Amazon Store.
• You are not eligible to receive any outstanding royalties.
• You are not allowed to open a new KDP account.

For more information, view our Terms and Conditions: https://kdp.amazon.com/terms-and-conditions

If you have any questions or believe your account was terminated in error, please reply to this email. To help us respond quickly, please send a single email.

Regards,

Amazon KDP

There is no explanation as to why they have reached this conclusion, but I am at a total loss as to how I can provide the proof that Amazon KDP require.

I will share any updates as and when I can. In the meantime, I am going to find a dark room to sit in whilst I try to come to terms with what has happened.