Staff Writer
Amazon Prime, a paid convenience that Amazon extends to its customers, will soon be raising its prices. Within the US, the $79 subscription service, ensuring 2-day delivery of any eligible products, could increase anywhere between $20 and $40.
According to The Huffington Post, CFO of Amazon, Tom Szkutak, reveals that the online giant has been “considering” raising its prices for quite some time. This will be their first increase of Prime fees since launching the service nine years ago.
But the service doesn’t only extend to free 2-day shipping. Kindle owners have access to the Lending Library, while regular Prime customers have access to Amazon Prime Instant Video. Since Prime automatically renews annually, “those [services] are rather costly.”
While Amazon will not release any definitive numbers on its Prime memberships—though a December report claims they’re in the “tens of millions”—it will say that these fee increases were tied to the increase in shipping and fuel costs. These have been steadily rising over the recent decade, no doubt accounting for the website’s sudden fees.
It is unclear whether current Prime members will be grandfathered in to the $79 annual fee, similar to Verizon’s unlimited data plan.
Going with the grandfather plan might help Amazon keep its current Prime member numbers, as they are likely to spend “approximately twice as much” as a standard customer.
Stay tuned as we uncover more.
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