Kindle as gift for world traveller

[menevets]

I want to buy a Kindle, the $69 wifi 6" for my cousin and want her to be able to buy books from the US Amazon store from wherever she is as she tends to travel a lot - Denmark, Hong Kong, Singapore, Shanghai, Toronto, New York.

If I buy a Kindle, send it to myself, setup an account for her with my credit card and then give it to her but then she changes the credit card number, she should be able to buy from the US Kindle store from anywhere, yes?

If so, can she change her credit card number from Canada?

[Barbara1955]

You don't Need a Credit card to set up an account or buy. I use Amazon Gift cards.

[susan_cassidy]

If she is a Canadian resident, shouldn't she be using the amazon.ca store?

[menevets]

Originally Posted by susan_cassidy

If she is a Canadian resident, shouldn't she be using the amazon.ca store?

She's not a Canadian resident. Citizenship status is... complicated, dual citizenship not Canada, both countries don't have an Amazon store.

[HarryT]

People in countries in which there isn't a local Amazon store use the US store.

[piperclassique]

I use the US store in France....we have a local store ...I get a do you want to change your country? message, but I don't do anything about it and it keeps on working.

[susan_cassidy]

Do you know that she doesn't already have an Amazon account?

[ProfCrash]

People from other countries without a Kindle store use the US store but face geographic restrictions. Is there a way she can register a US based account using your address? Does she have a US based credit card? It sounds like no, otherwise this wouldn't be an issue.

If not, and you really, really trust her, you could set up an account for her and have her pay for gift certificates that you add to the account. The first time she buys something without a gift certificate, pull your credit card.

If you set up an account for her, I would let her register the Kindle to it but not give her the password. That way she can buy books (she emails you the gift certificate codes) but not use the account for other purchases.

Then again, the only people who I have on my Kindle account are my Mother and MIL.

[Mike L]

Citizenship status is... complicated, dual citizenship not Canada

Citizenship does not enter into the picture. Where there are geographic restrictions, these are based on your country of residence (or, in practical terms, the country of the address associated with your "payment method [ = credit card]). Neither Amazon nor the publisher knows or cares what your citizenship is.

If she needs a credit card with a US address, rather than giving her access to your own card, would it be possible for you to get a pre-paid credit card, registered to your address, but give her full access to it, and let her be responsible for topping it up? I don't know if that would work, but if it does, it might be an easy solution.

Mike

[menevets]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

People from other countries without a Kindle store use the US store but face geographic restrictions. Is there a way she can register a US based account using your address? Does she have a US based credit card? It sounds like no, otherwise this wouldn't be an issue.

If not, and you really, really trust her, you could set up an account for her and have her pay for gift certificates that you add to the account. The first time she buys something without a gift certificate, pull your credit card.

If you set up an account for her, I would let her register the Kindle to it but not give her the password. That way she can buy books (she emails you the gift certificate codes) but not use the account for other purchases.

Then again, the only people who I have on my Kindle account are my Mother and MIL.

I like this idea. I trust her, so I setup an account with her e-mail, associate my credit card with it, she buys herself a gift card, makes that the default payment? All my credit cards are already associated with my own Amazon account. Can I still use one of them to associate with her account?

Originally Posted by Mike L

Citizenship does not enter into the picture. Where there are geographic restrictions, these are based on your country of residence (or, in practical terms, the country of the address associated with your "payment method [ = credit card]). Neither Amazon nor the publisher knows or cares what your citizenship is.

If she needs a credit card with a US address, rather than giving her access to your own card, would it be possible for you to get a pre-paid credit card, registered to your address, but give her full access to it, and let her be responsible for topping it up? I don't know if that would work, but if it does, it might be an easy solution.

Mike

I'm not sure if there's a pre-paid credit card I can get where she can re-up her balance from any country. Is there?

Originally Posted by susan_cassidy

Do you know that she doesn't already have an Amazon account?

She does, but I'm not sure with which country. I'd just open her another one specifically for her Kindle.

This is a headache. I should just get her a scarf or something. :-) She's a voracious reader though and I want to show her what she's missing. Worse case is if she can't use the bookstore to its full selection, she can offline anything written on the web.

[ProfCrash]

If she uses her email address she can change the password. Remember, the credit card is associated with the entire Amazon store.

If she has a US based credit card she sets up her own account.

If she does not, you set up an account for her. Maybe a new email address that she can have later. You want to control the password so that you can remove your credit card if needed.

[Mike L]

Originally Posted by menevets

I'm not sure if there's a pre-paid credit card I can get where she can re-up her balance from any country. Is there?

Yes. You should be able to top up a pre-paid card from any country - but at a cost.

You simply transfer the money from your own bank account, in your country, to the card's bank account, in whichever country that happens to be in. The card operator does not know or care which country the payment originates in, provided they receive the full amount in their own currency.

The problem is that your bank, and the recipient bank, will impose charges on the transfer, and will also make a profit on the exchange rate. These charges can add up. And that's on top of the ordinary charges you pay for using the pre-paid card.

So, yes, a pre-paid card is a definite possibility, but you've got to decide if the costs are justified.

Mike

[HarryT]

I'm afraid I'm a little confused by all this. If your cousin already has an Amazon account, then why does she need you to do anything? She has an Amazon account, she can register her Kindle to it, and buy books through it. Where does the problem lie? Why do you need to set up a new account for her? Apologies if I'm missing something, but it all seems like rather a non-problem.

[ProfCrash]

She wants her to have access to the US store which has more books available. The gift receiver is not a US citizen and does not appear to have a US based credit card.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

She wants her to have access to the US store which has more books available. The gift receiver is not a US citizen and does not appear to have a US based credit card.

Is the actual number of books in the store a real problem? As long as it has a sufficient number of the type of books that she wants to read, that's all that really matters, isn't it? The Amazon UK store theoretically has few books than the Amazon US store, but, given that it has far more books than I could conceivably read in any lifetime, I've never considered it to be of the slightest important.

If the cousin lives in Canada, my honest advice would be to just register the Kindle to the Canadian account and have done with it. I'm sure there's no shortage of books available to people in Canada. Trying to "beat the system" is probably not a very good idea.