Amazon Prime more expensive in Italy: hot reactions

The morning did not open in the best way for many Amazon Prime users who saw the communication relating to theincrease in the price of the annual and monthly rate (including those of Prime Student) starting next September 15th: it goes to 49.90 euros per year and 4.99 euros per month (24.95 euros / year and 2.49 euros / month for Prime Student).

A few hours after the news on the web, a heated debate between those who, understandably, poorly digest yet another increase in a service in an objectively very delicate phase for the world economy and those who, despite everything, continue to consider Amazon Prime still convenient. It is basically these two fronts that are now confronting our readers and more generally in social networks – on Twitter inevitably the hashtag #AmazonPrime immediately became a trend in Italy

The Codacons well represents the most critical voice towards Amazon’s decisions which – it is useful to remember – not only affect Italy but were also adopted at the same time in other countries (France, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom). In the official note, the association touches on a couple of hot points of the story:

• Amazon cites rising inflation as justification for the increase, but Codacons highlights how, in the face of an inflation of 8%, Amazon has unilaterally decided to increase the costs of the annual subscription by as much as + 38.6%, more than 4 times the growth rate of retail prices, while the cost of the monthly rate rises by 25 %
• The price rises came at a time when consumers are already being hit by other major increases such as bills and retail prices.

Specifically, the Codacons has decided to present Amazon in which:

an urgent meeting is requested to review its tariff policy and collaborate with consumers to prevent excessive increases in subscription costs at a time when users are already affected by increases in bills and retail prices – concludes the association.

In summary, we do not enter into the merits of the convenience of the service rates in relation to what it offers but we criticize theextent of the increase and the moment in which it was chosen to introduce it.

The more than 1,000 comments collected so far from the news we published in the morning confirm how much this is a hot and debated topic. Among the most representative comments of the different souls of the public we report that of ale676 which underlines:

For an absolutely non-essential service they can do whatever they like, the market will agree with them or not, the abundant doubling of bills, that bothers me much more

Our reader touches on an important point in our opinion: there is no mention of an essential service – perhaps it was for some and for the purchase of certain basic necessities at the beginning of the pandemic, but it is not now – and this price increase certainly cannot be compared to that of other increases that affect goods much more important. Simply, those who do not accept the increase in rates can simply cancel the subscription.

Another reader of ours, Prof.expresses well the position of those who continue to consider the price of Prime appropriate for what it offers:

I don’t feel like criticizing them between pc games, books, music, films, TV series and expeditions, it’s still convenient for me.

It is not an isolated rumor, in various comments it is noted how the Amazon Prime service has been considered as proposed until now at a low price in relation to what it offers. Sharing this opinion probably depends on how much of the Prime benefits you actually use. To have a starting point from which to reflect, however, you can compare the annual and monthly rates of Prime in Italy with those of any other video streaming service to conclude that Prime is also a streaming service but offers much more, all for a lower price (which then this “other” is considered useful and less varies from user to user).

Among the criticisms of the readers, however, there is that on motivation of the increase – inflation – which does not seem convincing. The exchange of words between 570C4550 And comatrix. It is in fact the same argument put forward by Codacons in support of the request addressed to Amazon.

570C4550: The rise is more than four times the increase in the inflation rate which in June exceeded 8% in Italy. The differential is therefore infinitely higher. comatrix: In fact, they talk about inflation but then if you go to see the rate of increase of the same it has no response

And then, inevitably, both among our readers and elsewhere, there are the confirmations on the non-renewal of the subscription caused by the expected price increases. In the interesting Adnkronos survey, almost 70% of the participants said they were not willing to pay for the new subscription.

#AmazonPrime: the cost of the subscription in Italy increases due to “a general and substantial increase in the overall costs due to#inflation“.
Are users willing to pay for the new subscription?

– Adnkronos (@Adnkronos) July 26, 2022

You can continue to use the comment space to tell if you are willing to renew your subscription with the new rates or if, on the contrary, you will decide to cancel it.