Apparently...

I cannot work out June 2011, July 2011 and August 2011 royalty spreadsheets from Noble Romance Publishing.  At all. One of them has the picture above on it. It doesn't inspire confidence does it?

Answers? I have asked…a lot. Apparently there are none. Apparently I’m stupid.

Blood out of the stoned…

So, I spent a great deal of time wading through 16 spreadsheets of royalties payments during work today. No wonder ebook authors go Indie. Some publishers get it so very wrong. Obvious things like tax treaties between countries and the correct rate of withholding money due to said tax treaty should be a no-brainer. And I owe you money? Are you stoned? I have sent back notes as to why the spreadsheets are wrong. I shouldn’t have to. It’s not my job to do their accounts.

Thinking of writing? For god sake sus out the publisher first. Check who has had trouble with them. Ask an Indie author. They'll tell you who sucks because most of the Indie have been burned and they're not scared to say it. Learn from people who have been there and done that.     

Yes, we have your royalties, please tell us why we held on to them...

Okay, so I get this email from Noble Romance Publishing – copy most definitely kept -  saying that they had found all these royalties of mine that were kept to ‘the side’ by the previous owner/not owner person and could I explain why she did that? Well, I could suggest incompetence, lack of professional ethics and poor management. Actually, I did suggest that. They then went on to explain how it would take awhile to pay these royalties that were on the side. Why?  Good question. I pointed out if they know how much they have illegally withheld then they knew how much to pay. Pretty much a no-brainer huh?

Pay out the Noble authors and set my people free...

No payment from Noble Romance Publishing....

I want to assure that the process of calculating and paying royalties is prioritized so that you can always count on receiving a timely and accurate royalty statement when due along with appropriate payment.

Lies...

Certainly we also want to give the appropriate attention to books in process, support of author promotions, and other issues important to you, but my belief is that executing on these first two priorities will best serve NRP and it's strong group of exceptional authors.

Bullshit...

I look forward to working with each of you and invite you to email me at JGombart@NobleRomance.com.

Bollocks..

Quel fucking surprise...

Payment was supposed to have been made today Supposed to. Some got paid. Some didn’t. Some felt they didn’t get paid enough. Quel fucking surprise.

To All Noble Romance Authors:

Thank you for your patience, we have great news! We had promised to have payments and reports to you by the end of the week but due to some extra-ordinary effort today the third party sales data has been entered and payments and reports will be distributed tomorrow, ahead of schedule.

We greatly appreciate your patience and will make every effort to ensure that all future payments are made no later than the 20^th of each month.

Best regards 

The New Guy

Uh huh... 

Whatever...

You know, I’m trying to be real patient with the Noble Romance Publishing debacle that you’re all no doubt sick to death of hearing about as am I. I haven’t been paid for ages due to the previous CEO or whatever she was or wasn’t and her lack of communication and general ridiculous, hissy fit ideas when it came to royalties and tax for non US citizens. Every other publisher had no drama with it. Only that one couldn't get it.  The current CEO dude is being all happy faced and I’m waiting for the first promised payments this week. I expect a year's worth. Seriously.  A year. Yeah. To be absolutely honest I got so sick to death of dealing with the past whatever the hell she was that I just switched off from it for my own sanity. Several months ago I got back onto her and all the bullshit began again. I’m glad she’s gone. I hope the new CEO honours his promises but to be honest I’m real sceptical.  

As Anny Cook quoted on my facebook - Sigh. Yep. After a while you just take everything everyone says with a heaping cup or two of salt... 

Trust in epublishing? Go Indie. Trust no one but yourself. The rest as fcuk'd.

Writers beware....

Email from Jill Noble, Noble Romance Publishing, July 2nd...

"I have to go through and do some recalculating and figure out where we are. As soon as I deal with this week's releases, I'm going to handle this for you. I'm not ignoring you; I'm busy and I have other priorities. Once I sort everything out, I'll send you a statement as well as make certain you receive any monies owed. If you're using PayPal for royalty payments, you'll have whatever NRP owes you by the end of the week. If you've elected to receive a check, it'll go out in the mail before Friday."

Where's the money Jill? While I understand, from your authors, you like to be uncontactable, it's a professional business ethics to actually respond and honour what you say.

Writers? Beware...

I don’t understand…

….if one email from a publisher tells you every single author they have on their books has their cheques sent out on the exact same day then why am I still waiting weeks afterwards? When I question the ‘exact day’ thing, I get an email saying they ‘stagger’ the payments in batches. Right. A sceptical person would murmur ‘money problems’ because if you have the funds in you pay the funds out to the people who made you those funds. Pretty damn simple but then I get emails from authors in a certain publisher's loop that tell me I missed out on a fairy story about the cancellation of a hotel for the annual convention because someone supposedly saw the manager of the hotel apparently slap his wife/partner/woman so the someone apparently turned on their heel in disgust and said something like ‘we will no longer use this hotel because he’s an evil doer and we will tell all our minions.’

Two thoughts come to mind – anyone who watches another being assaulted should report it or try to stop it unless it was an mythical slap that was made up to explain to less than smart authors the reason a hotel was no longer being used. Saying ‘we can't afford it’ is not as dramatic as picking up your skirts and dramatically leaving – though it saying that I would have added to the story a sword, maybe a buxom heroine, who loves ménage sex, bondage, Daddy/incest themed sex, dressed in skimpy clothing and a hero, who can do all that including the skimpy clothing, who rushes in to help her as she avenges the wife/woman/partner who allegedly got slapped. My other thought? Authors know more bad plot lines than anyone else so it seems crazy trying to spin one as an excuse because less than happy authors like to share stuff like that.

Royalties…

It’s pretty bloody simple. You pay the authors first. Then yourself. It’s not rocket science. I believe if failed publishers had considered this philosophy before they started dipping their hands into the till they would not be failed. But then it’s all about life experience – some people are screw ups no matter what they do – and honour – some people were born without that trait and think nothing wrong with screwing others over.

Royalties. You publish books. You pay the authors. You bank the balance. Can it get any simpler?

So, this publishing company…

…sent me files today saying ‘do not send to author.’ Author = me. Uh huh. Dumb move. They were scrambled but I managed to unscramble them and it was quite interesting reading and yes, I can see why you wouldn’t want to send to an author. And yes, I’m considering how to use them. This is the same publishing company who decided to add a clause into their contract 6 months after I signed my contract. And yes, a normal company would have sent an amended contract and asked me to sign. No, not them. They have no honour whatsoever so I continue to battle with the useless nongheads over the proper royalties.

And hey, thanks once more for those files. Gifts should always be received with thanks.

Liar, liar pants on fire…

The most asked question of me as a writer? What is my inspiration? Finding myself alive every morning. Do I suffer for my art? Oh, fuck no. Do I have a muse? Oh, double fuck no. Actually the most asked question is from others writers and it’s about publishers paying royalties on time and did I get my payment because they didn’t.

E-book publishers? I reckon probably 2 out of 5 you can trust. Generally, from my experience they’re a dodgy bunch who rob Peter to pay Paul in an effort to tide themselves over to the next month and they blithely think the author won’t notice any slipshod behaviour because the author is so grateful to be published. Bollocks. Like anyone who works for a living a writer expects to be paid on time and the correct amount. That ain’t got nothing to do with gratitude especially in a market where many e-book publishing houses are going hungry for new releases because they have a bad name.

Now to me, alienating writers due to sloppy or non existent royalty payments begs the question – how do you run a successful business if you treat the merchandise and suppliers like crap? Answer is - you don’t. There are a lot of publishers who trade on past glory with very little stock. The solution? Pay your writers on time and the right amount or expect a revolt. It’s not rocket science.