Amazon Raises Free Shipping Minimum to $35

[Catlady]

I had a free trial of Prime a couple of years back and lately Amazon's been offering me another free trial--I will wait till holiday time to sign up so I can have Christmas gifts shipped direct to a number of people. I don't think Prime is worth it for me otherwise, though--I wouldn't take advantage of anything but the shipping.

[CWatkinsNash]

Originally Posted by Ravensknight

For those of you who do have Prime, how's the streaming service? I have netflix and really enjoy it. Wondering how Prime stacks up against netflix.

I have both. I find that Amazon's stream quality is now more consistent than Netflix, but that wasn't always the case so I can't say firmly that it is better and always will be. Subject to change and all that.

Part of me sometimes wonders if Netflix gets a discount or something, because it's certain content that seems arbitrarily capped in stream quality, while other movies or shows stream in perfect quality in the same time frame.

But, I'm not that much of a stickler for quality in the sense that, as long as I can see it and it's not buffering, I'm pretty happy.

Amazon makes me a bit nutty by not clearly differentiating between "free with Prime" and "not free with Prime" once an item is in the watchlist, because I watch on my Roku and I can't see that info until I drill down to the item. I'd be thrilled if it would automatically split between free and not free. I do watch paid content as well, but there's a lot of stuff I would not pay the asking price to watch.

I'd be hard pressed to give up either, really, but if I had to choose only one, it would be Netflix, purely for the selection.

[SteveEisenberg]

I'm patient, and all this will do is to make me order a little more rarely.

In my experience, if I order two items, they generally arrive in two boxes. So I don't think this will save them much in shipping costs. Perhaps they are hoping people buy more to meet the minimum.

Paper book shipping is still free worldwide, with no minimum, from their www.BookDepository.com subsidiary. Prices are several US dollars over that on the US Amazon web site, but it's a great bargain for international gift-giving.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Ravensknight

For those of you who do have Prime, how's the streaming service? I have netflix and really enjoy it. Wondering how Prime stacks up against netflix.

It all depends on how you view it. On my Roku (hardwired ethernet), Netflix and Hulu stream almost flawlessly, but the Amazon Instant Video channel is quite troublesome at times. It often causes my Roku to reboot randomly. But on my computer or FireHD (on the same home network), the streaming works just fine for me. A friend of mine says he has no issues at all watching on his Xbox.

The Roku Amazon Instant Video channel seems to have trouble determining how much bandwidth is actually available, where the other services downscale the quality of the stream appropriately and efficiently with no trouble. Maybe it wouldn't be an issue if you had scads of bandwidth available, but I'm on that cusp where I don't quite have the bandwidth for HD content, but the Amazon channel seems to think I do (even though Netflix and Hulu are able to quickly determine that standard definition is appropriate for my internet speed).

I'm able to use some hidden features of the Roku to manually trick the Amazon channel into thinking I have less bandwidth; which makes the channel behave fairly well. But it's still, quite frankly, a bit of a pain in the ass, as the setting doesn't survive a Roku reboot.

[recycledelectron]

Originally Posted by afv011

You always had to pay state sales tax. I guess the IRS will be very happy about your public confession of tax evasion.

1. The IRS collects income tax. Your state's Comptroller (of Public Accounts) collects sales tax...if Your state has a sales tax.

2. Many states have recently forced Amazon to pay sales tax. So it is likely this person did not have to pay sales tax until recently.

3. Amazon collects the sales tax. It is very unusual for any individual to file a tax return saying "I bought ____ from ___ and was not charged sales tax, so here's the tax." (Though I do exactly that.) So any claims of tax evasion seem silly.

Ohh..wait...were You trying to be funny? Never mind.

[CWatkinsNash]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I'm able to use some hidden features of the Roku to manually trick the Amazon channel into thinking I have less bandwidth; which makes the channel behave fairly well. But it's still, quite frankly, a bit of a pain in the ass, as the setting doesn't survive a Roku reboot.

Oh, I used to hate this. Before I switched my internet from standard DSL to Uverse, I had the Roku keypresses for the debug menu memorized. I didn't realize the problem still existed. That stinks.

[ApK]

I don't seem to have that issue. I only watch SD streaming video, but my old model Roku and relatively slow 3Mbps DSL seems to handle both Netflix and Amazon equally well (or equally poorly, depending on the day.)
Amazon Prime has a few nice selections that NF doesn't have but I'd not have subscribed just for the current video selection.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by CWatkinsNash

Oh, I used to hate this. Before I switched my internet from standard DSL to Uverse, I had the Roku keypresses for the debug menu memorized. I didn't realize the problem still existed. That stinks.

Yeah. It only seems necessary for the Amazon channel, though. It's weird. Of course I've never seen an update for the Amazon channel in the time I've had it either. Seems obvious there's a memory-management problem as well as the bandwidth detection issue. Surely if the other streaming services' channels can manage the Roku's memory/bandwidth efficiently, Amazon (with their resources) should be able to modify their channel to do the same. Oh well, maybe some day. Or maybe someday, affordable higher-speed internet technology will actually come to Podunk.

But I'm pretty used to it by now, though. Being a three-Roku household, it's in my best interest to set all three to a lower manual bandwidth threshold so we're not fighting each other for network resources. 'Course my traffic shaping rules ensure that the Roku hooked up to the biggest TV in the house will always get all the bandwidth it wants and all other connected devices will just have to make do with the leftovers.

[Historiann]

Originally Posted by Catlady

I had a free trial of Prime a couple of years back and lately Amazon's been offering me another free trial--I will wait till holiday time to sign up so I can have Christmas gifts shipped direct to a number of people. I don't think Prime is worth it for me otherwise, though--I wouldn't take advantage of anything but the shipping.

For a long time, my thinking was exactly the same as yours. I took advantage of Prime when Amazon offered me free trials (which seemed to happen quite frequently) but I didn't think it would be worth it to subscribe. However, last year I finally succumbed and have been surprised at how often I use it and how much I like it. I find that I can frequently find ordinary things usually bought elsewhere on amazon for the same or less--and voila!--2 days later they are at my door without my having to drive around town looking for them. It's also a terrific for those of us who tend to forget birthdays and other celebratory occasions until the last minute. That gift can still get there on time even if you don't think of Aunt Ophelia's birthday until a day or two before. In sum, the convenience is great, and in the end I probably don't spend any more than I did when I shopped around for some item I didn't really need just so I would qualify for "free" shipping.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by recycledelectron

1. The IRS collects income tax. Your state's Comptroller (of Public Accounts) collects sales tax...if Your state has a sales tax.

2. Many states have recently forced Amazon to pay sales tax. So it is likely this person did not have to pay sales tax until recently.

3. Amazon collects the sales tax. It is very unusual for any individual to file a tax return saying "I bought ____ from ___ and was not charged sales tax, so here's the tax." (Though I do exactly that.) So any claims of tax evasion seem silly.

Ohh..wait...were You trying to be funny? Never mind.

My state income tax form includes a table for additional sales tax to be paid, based on income. Amazon does collect sales tax in my state, but many other Internet retailers do not.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by recycledelectron

Ohh..wait...were You trying to be funny? Never mind.

It was funny

[Blossom]

I plan to sign up for Prime after hubby graduates which should be this semester or the next. We have Student Prime so I order on his account alot.

The funny thing about Prime is how they choose your shipping carrier. I order a Kindle wall charger and it's coming today UPS why not ship it Smartpost like you do everything else to me. It's baffling!

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by Ravensknight

For those of you who do have Prime, how's the streaming service? I have netflix and really enjoy it. Wondering how Prime stacks up against netflix.

We have it and it works beautifully on our Roku and Kindle Fires. Hubby uses it alot. We also have Netflix and Hulu and now trying Redbox.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by Blossom

We also have Netflix and Hulu and now trying Redbox.

I had a free two-month trial for Hulu Plus and ditched it. I refuse to pay $7.99 a month to watch commercials. Netflix doesn't do that, so why does Hulu?

[JoeD]

Originally Posted by library addict

Well, bummer. While the prime membership may "pay for itself" for many I have managed this long without it. Guess I'll just have to wait and combine more orders.

That's what I'll be doing. My orders are not regular enough to make prime worth it. Amazon is often cheaper than local stores, but if I've to pay extra for shipping the price may be closer to each other, in which case nipping to the shop becomes worth while. No waiting on delivery and easier to return if there's a problem.

Can't see it making any difference for the gift shopping I do though. I'd likely always be over the limit on that anyway. Only time it might is when I've already bought things and then see one more item and would likely decide against buying it if shipping isn't free.