There’s a new “Draft Unavailable” glitch going around the KDP universe, and this one seems to have to do with the Content Review team. Here’s what we know so far and what we’re doing about it.
Here’s what is happening: in late September, several low-content publishers (including myself) received this message from the Content Review team at KDP:
These books were put into “Draft Unavailable” status, which is a “hidden” status Amazon doesn’t identify on its website as a state a book can even be in, so that’s interesting.
What happened next was even more interesting.
Anyhow, I replied to Amazon right away, citing everything I have just summarized here– in fact I do have rights to include the image on the book’s cover and including the screenshots and full licensing from Creative Fabrica as the evidence they requested. This is the first lesson of this article– always always reply immediately to any message you receive from Amazon KDP. If you do not respond, they can use that lack of response as grounds for terminating your account (and I know that because this actually happened to a person in a low-content Facebook group I belong to). Same message, no response– termination. Yes, this is a ridiculous double standard, because (as you’re about to read), I have now responded to this message three different times over the course of six weeks. The lesson is this: they can ghost you, but if you ghost them, be prepared to lose your account.
But I digress. At the same time, I attempted to re-submit the book, which went into the “In Review” status with which we are all so familiar (especially during Q4, when the review queue can be 7-10 days).
Days passed, then a full week. I never heard one thing back from the Content Review team, and my book returned to “Draft Unavailable” status.
Not great.
I re-submitted the book once again with its original cover, and after four nerve-wracking days back in “In Review” status, the book was once again returned to “Draft Unavailable.”
Bear in mind– at this point I have still not received a reply back from the Content Review team that sent the original message, even to acknowledge that they received my proof of copyright. NOTHING. No answer at all. Now it’s the end of October, so it had been about a month.
Next I decided to see what would happen if I took them up on the # 2 option, which is to change the book, using all new artwork, and re-submit it. Annoyingly, I also had to change the hardcover, which was selling fine with the original image, because of course I wanted the covers to match.
I re-submitted the paperback and the hardcover with the brand-new cover, then replied back to the original (never answered) message that I had chosen option 2 and could they please make the book available for sale.
Result: hardcover cover approved. Paperback cover returned to “Draft Unavailable” status. No reply received. It had now been one month with no progress on this issue.
Just out of curiosity (because I had never done this before), I opened up the customer service chat function and attempted to explain the problem. Interestingly, the totally helpful (if a little clueless) customer service agent said she was able to see on the back-end that none of my messages had ever been replied to by the Content Team. She said she “escalated” the cases, and I received notification of that fact after we finished the chat. I then just left the whole thing alone, since (as we know) if you push Amazon too hard, you get their full attention, which you do not want.
Finally (finally!), ten days later, I received a reply email from the Content Review team, saying that they had approved my proof of copyright and that I should re-submit the titles in question. They switched my book to “Draft Unpublished” status, and I easily re-submitted it. Shockingly, it went from “In Review” directly to “Publishing” status in under an hour (unheard of, considering we’re in Q4, where the average review time is 7-10 days). It has now the first book I’ve ever heard of to actually make it out of the mysterious land known as “Draft Unavailable”!!! If you’re keeping track in your head, that’s about six weeks from the time I got the first message (so far).
Also, I have another post right here on what I did when my books went to “Draft Unavailable” status with no message from the KDP Content Team at all. That solution is even crazier!