I've been an Amazon Affiliate for awhile now, just haven't done much sales to date. So a few weeks ago I was at a friends house and he needed a bark collar for his dog. We found one on Amazon for a decent price, so I had him goto my "dog niche" site and use my affiliate link to purchase it. So a few days go by and Amazon shows the click, shows it shipped, then vanishes completely.

My friend got his product over a week ago and I still I see nothing listed in any report of it ever happening. I know my friend had my link because it showed up in the affiliate report after a few days and I also had him delete his cookies before visiting my site just in case. If I had not checked my account, I would have never known it happened at all.

Anyone had any similar experiences with Amazon?

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"I find your argument strewn with gaping defects in logic."

Does your friend use IE for a browser?

what do u mean ? does browser make difference ... if yes that could be a tragedy

He used FireFox, I even checked to make sure he had my cookie. Like I said, it showed up on my report a day or two after he purchased the product. Then, it vanished.

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"I find your argument strewn with gaping defects in logic."

Hmm, thats pretty messed up. You should really get the order information from your friend and then contact amazon and see whats up.

Yah, I probably will do just that. Luckly for me it was only a $50 purchase.

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"I find your argument strewn with gaping defects in logic."

Besides confronting Amazon, you may want to try to replicate the situation, documenting it with screenshots. Maybe your friend can purchase a cheap product through one of your links just to try?

I've done something similar once with Clickbank, and found (and got confirmed by Clickbank!) that, at that time, European affiliate cookies were NOT set.

IE7 Has been dropping 3rd party cookies lately...

In this case, any browser would store cookies unless the user has set the security levels insanely high. Also, Pofecker seems to have seen the update which later vanished ...

Maybe Amazon is letting EPN do their tracking then... lol

I was wondering whether IE7 rejects the cookie outright, or if it only preserves certain info on it.

Still trying to figure out the EPN custom campaign thing.. thats all

Indeed, the click registered, later it showed "Total items shipped 1" and "Ordered items 1", then gone completely. It's like it never happened. No clicks, no nothing at all.

Before ordering... I had my friend clear his cookies, hit my link, then made sure that he had the cookie stored (In FireFox under options/Show Cookies). I literally sat over his shoulder while he did it. I just can't explain it.

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"I find your argument strewn with gaping defects in logic."

I still wonder if it's replicatable. If it is, it's definitely a problem. If it's not, it may have been a hiccup.

Usually an application is programmed with application controls and such, so that it will detect if it saves a file while it's being written to by another app. But sometimes things like these are NOT detected due to network hiccups and such. It only needs one damaged datapackage to foul things up.

Cookies have nothing to do with this, it showed up in stats, its his sale. End of that part of story.

Now..
only options left.

1. Amazon just likes to cheat people
2. Amazon had reason to believe you were trying to defraud them with cookie stuffing, or any other way
3. Your friend returned the item, or did a chargeback.

only way to know is to ask and find out, dont mention your friend, mention the sale you noticed in stats that disappared. if Amazon says it was refunded order, etc get your friends info to back you up and sue Amazon. Find a lawyer who does class action lawsuits and bring his "proof" to him. Dont pay him, get him to pay you a % of the badass class action this could be suing affiliate programs for fraud.