Amazon halts $7.99 monthly Prime plan after under 2 weeks of testing
Amazon Prime is a great way to save money if you are well-invested in Amazon’s services. You get free 2-day shipping, Amazon Instant Video streaming and free book rentals – not a bad deal for $79 a year, right? Except seeing that $79 charge to our bank account is much harder than the pricing plan Amazon recently decided to test. Sadly, after less than 2 weeks of testing, Amazon has changed its mind and halted this new plan, which would give you all the benefits of Amazon Prime for only $7.99 a month.
“We regularly test new options for our customers. At this time, we’ve completed our test and are no longer signing up new customers for Amazon Prime monthly memberships.” -Amazon
You may have managed to sign up, but you are out of luck if you decided to wait a bit. This came as a great deal for those that don’t like to see that $79 fee for buying the service outright, but it is actually $17 more per year to go for the monthly plan. This is why we recommended that you get the annual plan, if you know you will be using Amazon’s services.
Users would be able to simply go on a shopping spree and get everything with free shipping, only to cancel the service the next month. An idea that seems great for the consumer, but not so much for Amazon. Still, testing this pricing structure for only 2 weeks seems a bit unreasonable. Amazon should have at least waited a month and see if this service could be profitable.
Who knows, maybe it will come back after the holidays, when all the Christmas shopping is done. Were you able to sign up for Amazon Prime at $7.99 per month? Do you prefer it over paying $79 for a whole year?
[via AllThingsD]