I think my kindle is buying books on its own. Has anyone else had that

Cafe Society
1

Right now I am not sure if it is user error or the kindle itself.

I got it for christmas and there have been 2 unrelated incidents where I would check my email and find that the kindle had bought a book I never agreed to buy.

Normally when you get a book it is a 4 step process

  1. Pull up the page in the kindle store that has the ebook
  2. Scroll down to the ‘buy’ button to highlight it, then click it
  3. a page comes up saying you just bought a book
  4. You get an email from amazon saying you just bought ebook XYZ.

For some reason sometimes if I do step one the kindle skips steps 2-3 and jumps to step four. I have just looked at the pages selling books, then found an email saying that I bought them. But I have bought actual books before and I didn’t agree to buy the book or see a page telling me I bought it.

So I am wondering if anyone else has noticed this. Is this some sneaky sales tactic amazon uses that applies to all kindles, am I doing something wrong or is mine possible broken? I am looking for info before I send it back to make sure it isn’t user error. I contacted amazon customer support and they seemed to imply user error.

I have a kindle app on my ipod touch and I have never had this problem. So I am not sure.

2

I’ve never had this happen. I assume you’re doing something wrong, can’t imagine how the Kindle would be buying stuff on its own.

3

Moved MPSIMS --> Cafe Society.

4

I have experienced this problem due to user error (with a little bit of poor design thrown in). When you pull up a book in the Kindle store on your Kindle, the Buy button is already highlighted by default. If you then try to scroll down, or go to the next page, but accidentally hit the enter button, you have bought the book. I’m not sure why you’re not getting a page from Amazon telling you that you’ve bought the book. When this has happened to me, I got the page, and immediately went in and canceled my order.

I really think that Kindle should update this function so that there is a “Did you really mean to buy this book?” option before the sale is final.

5

I’m assuming user error as well. I’ve had my new kindle since they came out in August, and I browse a lot of books and have never had that happen.

6

I’ve never had this problem but I’ve been buying my books online and “sending” them to my Kindle.

7

If my Kindle is buying books on its own, it has better taste than I do.

8

I disagree that this should be called user error. It is solely bad design. All financial transactions need some approval action. Even Amazon’s “one-click” shopping requires this.

The only redeeming bit is the ability to cancel.

9

All financial transactions SHOULD need some approval action, but they don’t. Case in point – the iTunes store. Once you’re logged in, one mishit on the “Buy” button, and it’s yours.

iTunes used to have a shopping cart where you could collect what you liked, then delete some things if you changed your mind, and then buy what was left. For some reason (I’m sure related to making them more money) they eliminated the shopping cart in one of their software “upgrades”. :rolleyes:

10

They just changed the shopping cart to the “wishlist” (which is completely useless as a wishlist and only useful as an ad hoc shopping cart, although not as useful of course as the original shopping cart).

In your preferences, there is an option for a pop up “are you sure you want to buy” message.

11

Are these books on your Amazon Wishlist? Could someone have bought them for you?

12

Someone should make an app that buys random KIndle books.