Lulu.com
Online Self Publishing Book Company
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Lulu.com Reviews
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I ordered one copy of a hardcover book that my parents wrote. It arrived on time but with multiple errors inside. There is one page that is printed 9 times in a row. Yes, you read right. 9 times. There are other pages where two pages of text are on top of each other, and photos that are on top of text. I cannot get through to Lulu with the phone number that appears at the bottom of the shipping page, nor with any other means. I would like a call from Lulu to discuss this but no one will call me.
I tried ordering ONE copy of my own book that I was not using for profit, but merely to have one hard copy of my work. They emailed me saying I violated their terms and were suspending me, effective immediately. I sent an email back asking for clarification and even referenced their terms of agreement, but did not hear back. They cancelled my account so I cannot log in, and now they will not refund me for my purchase I made just to have my story printed and bound. These people are crooks and just stole my money with no delivered product in return.
I wouldn’t even give Lulu a 1/4 Star. They have sent out my books with other people’s stories inside my books. The cover is mine but they inserted pages from two other books. One sent out in the US and one sent out in the Philippines. Absolutely no quality systems in place. Horrible customer service. I called today to report this issue and got a voicemail saying they were all gone for training and to call back at a time when they are there. Again, do not use Lulu. Your work is too important to be ruined by this inept publishing company.
This website is just a false advertisement ploy to get people to let them publish for them, (which is a fortune! ) because they make it nearly impossible to use their self-publishing software! It was nothing but problem after problem. It is way too complicated to do on your own or with their support team. Nothing even works, it's a headache to download the correct file, everything always turns out wrong. This is yet the worst experience I've had trying to do anything on the internet. I canceled my account and am looking for a legit company.
I am a first-time author and have been using Lulu for nearly a year now to publish my work. I have not needed to pay for any of their services (I do my own artwork, and plenty of avid-reader friends for proofing) and bought 15+ copies of each book I have written. The prices are a bit steep for delivery, but if you wait long enough discount coupons pop up allowing free/cheaper delivery plus reductions on printing costs. The revenue amount from Lulu is also very good, with me receiving £1 average per sale, compared to larger companies like Amazon that take a much bigger chunk and leave me with hardly anything. Any issues I have encountered have been dealt with within 48 hours.
The quality of the books and printing is top-notch as well, though the consistency of the colour/black and white printing is odd; on rare occasions I have received my books printed in full colour when I request them in black and white. Both the colour print and black and white print are excellent quality. Lulu have two types of printing distribution; their own, and then retail. I have had no problems ordering books directly from Lulu, both for proofing and generating a stock for my own sales. However, the retail printing side of the service is sloppy at best; my first package from the retail printer was delayed by 3 days, which Lulu was kind enough to notify me about, but then when the package finally arrived it was completely empty. The books could not have fallen out, as the packaging was completely sealed; they had not been put in the box.
Lulu also provide a great service for Ebooks as well, allowing me to distribute my work to the iTunes store with ease. The only issue here is that if you share the same name as another author, Lulu will not notify the retailers about it, and you may find other people's books listed under "more by this author". This is down to the information Lulu provides to the retailer, I brought this up to customer support and they quickly fixed it for me; be sure to check your books listing details on other retailers sites that you have allowed Lulu to distribute to, and get them fixed if they are wrong. A lot of success in writing is down to your publisher, and on Lulu YOU are the publisher; it is up to you to make the book, and then go out there and sell it! Lulu just provide a gateway for readers to view your books online and buy them. Don't waste money on marketing packages either, it is easy enough to market your books on your own and guess what? It is much cheaper.
Lulu is NOT an easy publishing website, and if you are a newbie, like me, you will be in a deep sea of confusion wondering why your choices are being hindered for nothing. So many things are wrong with the navigation of the website and it doesn't make the user experience good at all. CONFUSING AS HELL. FIX YOUR WEBSITE.
This company are an absolute joke! I paid for a premium package and was then told of additional costs that were not mentioned at the beginning of the process. The customer service was the worse I have ever seen, before signing up I was chased by their sales team multiple times a day, once I signed up they never reply to emails and refuse to provide any information. After several complaints I was promised a full refund. I was told this would be done in 7-10 days. That was over one month ago! This company owes me over $2,500 - they have crippled me and my family, refuse to respond to any emails, hang up on me when I call - the amount of distress this has caused me and my family is unreal! Please please please stay away from them - they do not know what they are doing and have zero care for their customers - an absolute disgrace!
I have published many books over the years and I found Lulu to be the most professional and easy company to deal with. Starting from the beginning with the gentleman named Ryan whom I spoke with, to production. Ryan was very knowledgeable, professional and kind. He listened to my needs and the needs of my mother's book. Production staff (Erika) was great as well and respected this family history book. I highly recommend using their services if you are serious about publishing. I have read many of the reviews on here and they are from NON serious authors or ones that wanted their books done for free. I will definitely be using their services again. Keep up the great work LULU!
Lulu is the worst. They suspended my account. I had 57$ in royalties on it... a week before payouts saying I had infringed upon copyright when the said book in question was not even published on my account. They steal money. They are disgusting people.
I was going to try this one since real publishing co.s is not supposed to charge you any fees upfront to publish your book! Yet this is on the free publishing list! On Google search! Yet by reading several reviews and complaints I see that it's not free at all! What a letdown! And a turn off! And proof that Lulu is nothing but another SCAM! So disappointing! Always read the reviews first! Before trying bizs online! Or else you might get scammed! So watch out! - do your research! It could save you a lot of money! And problems you don't need! Avoid this one! It's a shame that they are thieves by some victims and they are liars too! Since they're not free like they say they are in their fake advertising! Shame on them!
The biggest problem is Lulu is distribution particularly Google Book search. Google Book Search will display online for free "20%" of your book which can be 50-60 pages for the average book. Supposedly these pages are not sequential. What author really wants to give away 60 pages of their book? Why would anyone need 60 pages to check out a book? So, to be fair Google is off track here, But the problem is that Lulu Does not inform authors about these details before publication, I set my educational book up to have 40 pages of instructional text followed by over 100 pages of workbook sheets.
So Google displays practically the full text. Google FAQ about previews says there is a "Snippet" version which is not the full text but Lulu says "our agreement with Google does not include the Snippet View." So Lulu will give away a substantial part of your book for free which is counterproductive for them since they are in the business of selling books. So either you give away your book or you are not on Google Book Search. Absurd!
I have been in contact with Lulu Press, Inc. in the past regarding self-publishing, and spoke to a man named Ryan ** on Friday evening. He convinced me to purchase one of the self-publishing packages, but I decided to do a little more online research about the company before I made the first payment via credit card on Saturday morning. I found less than favorable reviews, and many dissatisfied customers, so decided not to proceed. I notified Ryan that I was going with a different company, but he continued to call. I blocked his number and his email address, but he just called from different numbers, and had someone else call from a different number, always before 9 a.m. - and they know I'm on central time. I consider this harassment. My 'no' is final, and this behavior has convinced me that my decision not to publish with Lulu was correct.
I received an email from Lulu saying, "Hey VIP! Your 40% Off is here." Then I started ordering some clothes for my family because I thought Lulu were offering 40% off on all clothing. Then later once in the website, I realised the 40% off is only for only some selected clothing. Then I started browsing the selected clothing spending hours hoping to get 40% off and only to realise when I went to the checkout, it said "The promotion code for 40% off is not valid for your country" (I live in Australia). There was nothing to indicate in the sales promotion email I received to say that certain countries are excluded. I will not be wasting my time anymore trying to get discounts from these dodgy emails.
I published a Book on Lulu in 2014, with only 21 pages. And they printed my images in black and white and the print in the book is so small. But anyway they have told me why I have not gotten any royalty from the book, is I need to raise my price. The price of the book is $21.00, which I see as too expensive but some copies have been sold. And I have not received a penny.
Lulu is total scam. They publish almost for nothing but they make money by making you market your book. After spending $9000 on marketing, you will sell hardly 0-5 copies hardly. LULU IS TOTAL SCAM and so are all the self-publishing companies. You better off publishing on just Amazon...
I have helped writers from many areas of the world produce their books on Lulu for free (well, if they want to be on Amazon, they have to pay for one preview copy, at cost plus shipping). I do this because many authors are unable to self publish in their country, or simply don't have the technical know how. But now, on Consumer Affairs, I see false claims about Lulu. I have to assume these are from people who are supporting self-publishers whose greed for money from authors is unequaled - such as iUniverse, Dorrance, Page Publishing, etc.
Lulu does not require authors to purchase editorial services or art services, although they will supply those if you want. The same for marketing services. But an author can simply publish her or his book for free. Then if the author charges more than the cost (e.g., charging $19.95 for a book that costs $9.95 to print), then the author earns the difference. This is far more generous than a typical royalty situation. The real problem, as with all self-publishing, is that these books are very difficult or sometimes impossible to sell.
I am a first time author and followed everything that was shown for my first book to be published. After paying the upfront fees that were supposed to be the total, since we asked ALL the details, we were then asked to pay other large fees to finish the book. They would have other "scam" artist to call me and explain why we really needed all these other unknown factors for the book. When we decided that this was unprofessional and asked for the money back then the circle went round and round. Months later we were only able to receive half our money back, so they made money for nothing. It was not worth the money or time hiring an attorney to get the rest back. So, I would suggest to research your company better than we did and record and document ALL correspondence and phone calls, they recorded yours.
I always buy my stuff at Lulu coz I'm living nearby from electronics, clothing, groceries and etc. I even bring my colleague to buy their stuff as well. Overall we are very satisfied. But today I went there to buy some stuff and had a very bad experience with the cashier name Jenelyn **. I bought rice cooker and she told me to go to gift wrapping for the handle. I told her this is not for gift. Instead of explaining nicely, she said in rude way "I'm not saying you go there for wrapping, they will put handle." Then I left and forgot the receipt. I went back to get the receipt for the warranty. What shocked me is she was talking to her co cashier about what happened like she is very proud of what she said to me.
I didn't mind what I heard instead asking her for the receipt that I didn't get. She said "I gave it to you with the change" talking in a rude way with angry face. I said, "I don't have it." She said "Because you leave it here." I'm also working in a customer service but we don't treat the customer like that. I came from work with busy day. And we want a smiling people to attend us. Not a rude one. Anyway, I just want to share my experience coz I'm really really disappointed.
I am a first time publisher with a children's book. I contacted Lulu and explained that I needed help creating a book. I needed help with the illustrations and was told that the artists were great to work with. After I submitted my book, I was told that graphic design was included, but not illustrations. $290, per illustration extra. When you look up the meaning of graphic design, it's explained as pictures and text together, not to Lulu. Being that it was my first experience, or inexperience, very frustrating. So they would not work with me. I asked for a refund, still waiting, 7-10 business days. I've invested 1 month's time and the saddest part is that I am not trying to get rich here. I wanted to create this book for charity, St. Jude and Toys for Tots. I hope that this helps some people. Be careful. I felt like I was crystal clear. But in the end, they wanted more money. Very dissatisfied!
My experience with Lulu has been nothing but pleasant and rewarding. They did a fantastic job of laying out my book and creating a beautiful cover. I have had pretty good sales, but then again I put effort into marketing and promoting my book. The reviews complaining about lack of sales obviously think that people are just magically going to know their book is available on Lulu. I have three books on Lulu and will publish there again. I've tried other self-publisher and there is little chance of making a dime on most of them. Lulu is the only one where you can actually make money on your writing.
I’ve published with my first book with a company called CreateSpace and had a horrible experience from the start to finish. So I decided to publish elsewhere. I ended up getting referred from an author who published multiple publications with Lulu’s services. I was a little hesitant because of the some reviews but gave them a shot since they are one of the most renowned self-publishing company. Without a doubt this it was the decision I could have made. Their team was very up front and knowledgeable. I told my Publishing Advisor what kind of investment I had to put into the project and they came up with a plan that suited my needs. I spent around 4k and ended up making my investment back within 18 months. I am currently working on my 3rd publication and I will be working with Lulu!
I am a first time author about my own ideas about my profession, which is conventional medicine and now anti aging/alternative/holistic/ with conventional medicine only for an emergency. I was very excited going through the process of publishing my book which I think is well researched, unique and of interest to the public in general. However I was amazed at how no one can find it on the internet, unless they actually typed in the exact name of the title (how would anyone know?). There are many books in this area (health) that can be found easily, and they either have been around for 10 years and published by private owners of fairly large medical groups and essentially give them away free to their patients, or they are published by major publishers and are written to advertise the drug industry with is a multibillion dollar industry.
So far I sold 2 books this year and made about 13 dollars. I actually need to sell about one hundred thousand books to break even with all my legal and medical fees that this medical story reveals. I see they are starting to come up with some expensive marketing packages for internet sales. I have not tried them yet. I just got set up with about 4,000 dollar basic package to get in up worldwide, but not at all marketed. The world wide press release is actually apparently used for the various international bankers/corporations to market their own agenda and not a individual person like a self published book. So in other words, after I paid for a worldwide press release to about 24,000 news outlets, it resulted in one extra book sale that week.
So now if I spend say 2,400 dollars on Google advertisement, will this generate another 10 or 20 dollars in sales? I do not know. I already had to file for bankruptcy, so it is not like I can just start throwing lots of money marketing for fun. Does anyone have experience hiring professional advertisements for their self published book? Do you need a budget of many thousands or tens of thousands of dollars to actually get it on the market? Is this going to be wasted money or get my book seen by the public? I think many self published authors have this problem... How do you actually get it up so that the public can find it on the internet?
I had a 3 books published with and have only received like $14 in royalties. I KNOW they are not paying me because my friend ordered over 10 for his bookstore AND I NEVER GOT MY ROYALTIES!!! I then searched Amazon and found that 53 BOOKSELLERS ARE SELLING USED COPIES OF MY BOOKS but STILL NO MONEY TO ME!!! I sent emails, tried to call and finally they called me and said "Oh, these are people listing your book and if you buy from them WE will ship it..." Complete BS because my friend listed 5 of them in his possession!!! Thieves. All of them. STAY AWAY FROM LULU!!!
I tried self-publishing my first book and I thought I would try Lulu. They gleefully and happily took my $2,700. I also had to pay to have it separately edited. Thank God I did not use them or else I would have been looking at thousands of more dollars for editing. Now here is the big rub! I cannot get Lulu to get the search terms right for the major sellers like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, etc. If you search the key terms for my book that I gave them, you cannot find my book on the big sellers unless you enter the specific title. I have worked repeatedly with customer service and all I get is excuses. My sales are in the tank 1 1/2 years after the release of my book because no one can find it.
I have had to spend more money to try and market it myself - which then Lulu makes more money because they print the book. Of course, Lulu tried to sell me a huge package of thousands of dollars to market my book that I turned down when I told them no one could find my book on Amazon because the search terms were wrong. Makes me wonder if I was set up to sell me the marketing package. I have more books in the pipeline with one almost done! I will NEVER use this company again!
Mainly dissatisfied with Customer Support. I made an order from Lulu and I found out that I wanted to add a different name on the shipping address so I decided to cancel it. I didn't get any refund so I contacted customer support. First response came to me 4 days later but they didn't mention anything about the refund so I made another ticket. I waited another 4 days for a response to come in. The person in the email said that my bank has made a pre authorization and not a final payment. However by the time the response came to me, the pre authorization was already sent to Lulu. I wrote another ticket now and I am hoping to get my money back. I originally planned on making the order again but after two weeks of still waiting for a solution and the fact that the customer support takes so long to respond, I most likely will not make anymore purchases on lulu.com.
Response to email inquiries is very slow and never provides an adequate answer. Revenue not showing up on my profile even when I provided an order number that shipped 3 months ago.
I have published my own books, plus those for clients, through Lulu and frequently recommend them. I love that they offer hardcover books, which CreateSpace and others do not. I have just published a book of my own in the spiral-bound format. I have not used their paid promotional services because I do that myself--for myself, and for clients. I have called Customer Service and have had remarkably astute and polite assistance, even when I called at 3 minutes before their closing time! I actually heard the CS assistant whisper "Have a good evening," to a co-worker, but not in an unpleasant tone. She was not hurried and very patiently explained the answer. I had read something wrong, and she told me where the answer was on-screen. Duh. I feel for anyone who has had less than stellar experience with Lulu. My experience has been remarkably wonderful!
I am a best selling author that was looking for a wider experience than my last publisher offered. LuLu was recommended by a group of Authors I am friends with, but they had no idea how awful of an experience I was going to have. I paid the $1999.99 fee immediately and with a smile on my face, I thought I was in for a great experience. Since my payment, my first Coordinator quit (supposedly) and it took a week for anyone to contact me about it. My new Coordinator is Barb ** and she is just as worse as my last one. It took 3 phone calls and 5 emails to finally get someone there at LuLu to accept my manuscript. When I finally submitted it, it took three more days for someone to recognize that the email was received.
I received an email yesterday from my Coordinator telling me that my book needed a few changes, but they were unaware I had my book professionally edited by a local company in Tampa. No changes were needed and they are just stalling. They allegedly have a proofing content department and since I just read all of these bad online reviews, I am going to ask for my money back and I have found a more reputable publishing company to help me. Stay away from LuLu because all they want is your money upfront and a 1000 excuses to not publish it.
Not a stellar company. Lulu produces a fairly decent print book, but the ad campaign is sorely lacking. Not having a small fortune to start with, this leaves a person at a handicap. Lulu requires an upfront payment for an ad campaign, and has no particular interest in your product. They made their money whether you do or not, opposed to a company that would generate a campaign and then take out their cut on a per book basis. Overall, I'm a bit underwhelmed. As an "independent" publisher, they certainly live up to the name. You end up feeling VERY independent... and alone in all this.
Using their services to publish a book. It seems as though I should have higher sales rate than I did. I had compared to other authors who had been published elsewhere. They were getting numbers of book sales yet I was not seeing the reviews, the sales or the author revenue. It seemed unusual to say the least. In fact at one point after a few months when I first published there were more "used" books for sale than I had sold in "new" books (how does that happen?).
Testing the system, I purchased a pile of books from various distribution channels. I check on my account 6 months later and only 3.3% of the sales were reported from the publisher. That's a conservative figure because There surely were a few random sales thrown into that mix. Quite disappointing. It could be that the print houses aren't reporting. Does not really matter. I'm done with them. Quite disappointing.
I paid a tremendous amount of money to LULU so they would edit and publish my script, however when it came to the cover, which I provided, they decided to be impossible. I had my own image, but they refused to use it unless I could somehow PROVE that this was my own image. I mailed back and forth for weeks, with absolutely no help from their side whatsoever. Completely unflexible towards individual needs and unwilling to help you.
I've been thinking of writing a review for Lulu. They have created a quality product with my book, yet through one line emails I don't think many of the team members realize that people are putting HUGE INVESTMENTS in their projects. HUGE... Many cases everything they've got. It's business, I get it. They want to keep the money coming and send people on their way. And yes, many of us feel foolish for doing it. The guilt is colossal as well. Because what I very well may end up doing in the end is filling out my Schedule C form for taxes next year claiming this as a COMPLETE LOSS. It's life, yet has serious effects.
People want to know that the team they are pouring TONS of money into consider their project seriously. I know everything is business, but Lulu is EXCELLENT at taking your money and sending one-liners. Everyone says "Feel free to call" and they are very busy and can't take constant calls, but in my experience these last 6 months, I've made 5 phone calls? Two being to the consultant selling me my expensive package, one to Carolyn and one to marketing. The response on the other line is not helpful and not welcomed, it's a bother. Lulu has called me MANY more times to ask me to pay more money every step of the process. The team is quite friendly there until you explain you can't possibly bleed another penny.
I can only hope and pray for the semi-success of the book. It'll surely be a lesson learned if not. I am not trying to be a best seller. But with it being a solid book and ALL this marketing I still hope for a recoup of this money at the very least. Time will tell. Lulu is "so-so". They certainly take your investment for granted. They do not care about bleeding you of everything you've got and sending you one line emails to get you out of their hair. Caution there if you've LOVE being attended to.
I would not recommend the use of LULU for any type of project. Their customer service is very unhelpful and their uploading software is archaic in terms of not being flexible or catching errors in the uploading process.
Overall, I do not recommend Lulu.com for self-publishing. I did the $1000 basic package. There has been very little feedback and creative input. There have been many, many e-mails. Some even automated and wrong. The only thing they really did was format the text, which takes less than half an hour, and create a cover, which I'm sure they took from stock. There are also many hidden fees for late changes. This was not explained at the outset. I have another book that I needed a small change to with Lulu.com and the person who helped me originally said he had no idea who to speak to or how to make the changes even though I was more than willing to pay for it. Very disappointed.
I have used Lulu to publish a number of types of books and am very happy with their printing quality as well as their author support. Once when there was a technical issue, they replaced all of the books at no cost to me or my client. I've noticed that with the different Print On Demand companies, it's usually garbage in - garbage out. Years ago when just becoming accustomed to graphic design programs I made some mistakes and found the folks at Lulu very helpful. Many new authors come into this with the idea that if they publish it will sell. In my experience, most sales happen when an author is there signing. This goes for all self publishing.
I submitted a book manuscript for self-publishing and had a representative/Lisa ** explain the rules, guidelines and procedures. I asked several times for a schedule but they would not provide one. I asked specifically about copyright editing and line editing. Lisa told me that after my manuscript was reviewed the company may have suggestions on content. I agreed and waited for 5 weeks.
Lisa contacted me and said, "We have rejected your manuscript". I asked why. She told me that, "Some of your statements are outlandish". I asked which statements. She provided a list of them. I read them all and said that the bibliography has provided the quotes that other sources have made. I was just quoting other sources. She told me that she was sorry for being the bearer of bad news, but the company's decision was final. I asked, what happen to the discussion about the company recommending retracting some statements. She said the decision is final. So much for the company offering any advice.
Part 2 - Refund. I asked Lisa to refund my money. She told me she would start the process. I asked, "What process?" She told me that her company had a procedure and that she would initiate the procedure. I ask the question of when will I have the money. She could not give me an exact date. I contacted my credit card company and they told me that they have a 10 day period to return the money. I waited and waited. I called Lisa and she obviously didn't want to talk. I asked to speak with her boss Donnovan. He refused to call me.
Then the head of customer satisfaction Eugene ** contacted me. What an **. I asked for an accounting and he forwarded to me immediately. He told me that he didn't want to talk with me again. I told him if there is a problem with their accounting "I will be calling you". He told me to "If you want to talk to someone call your bank". I went to another online publishing company and they reviewed and approved my manuscript within a week. DO NOT DO BUSINESS WITH LULU. THEY DID NOT MAKE GOOD ON ANY OF THEIR PROMISES. Then you as a customer will loan them money on your paid fees.
Terrible first and only experience with this company. Purchased a book for $99. I then downloaded 2 different software readers, per their recommendation, neither opened the book correctly. Uninstalled the software, and reinstalled per their instruction... still didn't work. Followed more of their suggestions, still no solution. After spending over 2 hours on the trying to open I requested a refund. Their response was basically, keep on trying different applications to open the book we sold you which won't open properly... sorry... good luck. Nice. Very nice Lulu.com.
I purchased a package for my book to be published. After Lulu took my money they go and tell me in order for my book to be publish it has to go through a content evaluation which has to meet their standards. Not one time did anyone from Lulu Publishing tell me that upfront, and if they would have I would not have gone with them. I sent my manuscript to them three times and each time they rejected it. I feel they want me to put my books how they wanted to be and I don't think that's right. This is my book and I should have it how I want it. I was told I have two more chances to send it back to them and for them to accept my manuscript and if they don't they're going to terminate my contract and not give me a refund. I think that is ** because I paid to get my book published and they're refusing to publish it.
I bought a book of Guitar chords from Lulu recently (Fourths tuning by Alessandro de Sanctis). But on receipt it was unusable, as it had no instructions on how to use the hundreds of chord diagrams, which strings to miss and which fingers to use to form the shape. I was disappointed, and contacted them thinking I would have the normal internet shopping protection to send it back for a refund as I had bought it blind. They were polite but didn't want to know. I am disappointed on two fronts. It was a shame the book was unusable, but online retailers like this who do not care about customer satisfaction nor the quality of the products they distribute leave consumers with very little choice. They also almost guarantee the domination of the big but easy to deal with businesses such as Amazon.
One year ago I began the process of publishing a 100 page book with Lulu. I paid their fee and submitted the copy in 6 x 9 format and PDF format. Lulu required that I submit in Microsoft Word and remove all images, which must be provided in a separate file. Did this, then several weeks later was told to enter the images back in each page. Weeks would pass before anyone would respond to e-mail correspondence. Lulu notified me that I would have to provide written permission for each image and photo. All but two photos were taken by myself. Two were taken 77 years ago, with no hope of finding anyone to provide permission. Lulu demanded that I replace other images from their list of images, then charged me for them. After countless attempts to correspond with their representative, I asked that they return my money and we would abandon efforts to publish. They did not respond.
Now, one year later I am no closer to publishing or receiving money back. I have maintained a copy of all correspondence between myself and Lulu, and given that to the law firm that represents my business. This is the rudest, most unpleasant and shabbiest excuse for a company I have experienced. I'm sure they must have handled some customers better or they would not still be in business. I would just like to receive my money back and be through with Lulu.com.
UPDATED ON 09/25/2015: After eleven months attempting to publish a book using Lulu, I finally gave up. I uploaded my book to a POD (print on demand) publishing company and within ten days had copies of a beautifully printed book. I asked Lulu for a refund of the $1,244.00 they had received to process my book. After several attempts to get a response, I was finally told I would receive a refund of $250.00. Weeks have gone by, and after several attempts to obtain the check, I have received nothing. Perhaps some have had good luck with this company, but my experience was miserable from every standpoint. Oklahoma City author.
I purchased a package that cost 2 grand, I received back a product that looks like a pamphlet. Nothing I asked for was completed, cover designers not able to produce, all areas of wk very poorly done in an attempt to get the consumer to spend more money. When send back to author for review all changes cost extra. You can tell in areas of service the individuals you deal with are trained to milk you out of cash. They attempt to be rude and try to intimidate you into paying more, in my case of publishing my book, I paid to have my own editor as well as but my photo I gave lulu on the front as my cover, all they needed to do was put book together, this was even done intentionally wrong. When I wanted it corrected I was told I would be charged more. All employee are rude and try to intimidate you as the author.
I looked up an author and book online which brought me to Lulu. I purchased the book, but when I received it, I realized that most of the material was already online. Since I had paid $44, including shipping for a 144 pg paperback, I contacted Lulu and let them know I was not satisfied. After 3 emails, I was informed the book was custom printed for me and there were no returns. Didn't see that policy when purchased.
Avoid. They are available to talk prior to sale and will promise whatever they need to make the sale. Then they are unavailable to help. They only want to communicate by email and virtually never provide a complete answer on concerns. Money spent was more than I had planned and results were much, much less.
Today I called your company to straighten out a billing problem I had with a book purchase I'd made a couple of days ago, when my Paypal account bounced the debit back to me due to a lack of funds. I had already straightened it out with Paypal, and was calling Lulu.com just to make sure that you'd gotten paid OK, and that the order had indeed gone through with no problems on your end.
The gentleman who answered the phone sounded like a back-room pressman, resentful of the fact that, interrupted from his work, he was being made to answer customer service calls against his will. He hung up on me before I could explain my situation to him. Really, Bob? A company that has empowered creators in more than 225 countries and territories to produce nearly two million publications available in six languages (from your own website) hanging up on a paying customer by an obviously disgruntled worker? Is this the kind of image you wish to project to your customers who purchase books from your site? It made me feel like I’d just gone into my favorite restaurant, and the waiter, to demonstrate his resentment of having to wait tables for a living, held out my bowl of soup and poured dog poop into it, right in front of my face. Is this the kind of reputation and word of mouth you are attempting to build a successful business on?
When googling Lulu.com today, searching for an address to write to, I came across forums with many similar complaints. Usually when I encounter a company that is so poorly run as to generate this many complaints, my suspicion is that this neglect of good customer service comes from the top down. My suspicion is that you are too cheap to hire a customer service department. Please, Bob, feel free to correct me here. Tell me it isn’t so.
And if this is the way you treat your paying customers who bring you business, I shudder to think of how you treat people that you don't like. For every person like me who takes the time to actually sit down and write you a letter, there's probably a thousand angry people quietly fuming to themselves about the poor treatment they've received at your hands, who simply won’t bother to write you. They figure what’s the use?
The problem with CEOs is that they never take the trouble to experience their own company the way a customer does, and so they never get to have the lovely experience of being mistreated by their own company. As soon as someone hears that Bob Young is on the phone, the red carpet comes out, and you are given the royal treatment due a CEO. The rest of us aren’t so lucky.
Take the criticism, Bob, and fix your broken company. Otherwise, it’s been nice knowing you. I won’t be doing business with your company anymore because you’ve given me every reason not to. I will be sure to warn all my friends and acquaintances about this experience, and I will be looking forward to finding a competitor who knows the meaning of good customer service.
I've been publishing my book through Lulu for a while and on the whole have been fairly happy, as I've done everything myself and literally just uploaded files and done the distribution. A few weeks ago I realised I needed help with EPUB formatting / conversion to get it into the iBooks store, which is something I need to do quickly as another project depends on it. After looking around some freelancer websites I thought "Why not use Lulu as I already work with them and they can also submit it to Apple for me?"
Unfortunately, Lulu, while quick to take my money for the service and send me the initial instructions, basically disappeared for weeks, ignoring several emails I'd sent. It took an angry post on their forum, 3 weeks later (the advertised lead time for the service on their site is 1-2 weeks) to get someone to look at it, tell me nothing has been done and that there is further action required on my part. Why didn't they tell me this weeks before when I asked? No answer was given and the person in question ignored everything in my email that wasn't directly related to him doing the job. Compensation? I was hardly even offered an apology.
I await to see the results of the conversion now, having done my part, but the whole experience has made me realise Lulu really doesn't care about individual customers. Maybe they have too many customers to be able to give proper attention to everyone unless they pay thousands of dollars, but they also seem to be completely unconcerned about providing poor service. If their lead times are longer because of the holidays, why not let people know? My bet is because then people might go somewhere else. If you care about your business, don't order services from Lulu. Find a freelancer or a small company with good reviews and give your money to someone who cares and doesn't make you feel like you're money's not good enough.
We paid Lulu $999 to format and publish our book, with promises that it would make it very marketable. After some difficulties, it was printed OK. However their website turns out to not have any provision for editorial and media reviews the way Amazon does. This completely wasted the review/endorsements we got from famous NY Times best-selling authors. When we tried to include them as our own multiple customer reviews, they were reformatted by Lulu to all run together with no bold, underlining, or spaces between them.
The book pages look very unprofessional. Lulu simply says their system does not provide for any other formatting. We are now forced to have all the websites promoting our book use the Amazon link instead of Lulu's, which results in much lower royalties for us.
I wrote them a certified letter demanding they respond to this, and 30 days later, no response. In addition, when I want to send copies directly to reviewers, I can't include a note saying who it is from and why. So I have to have books shipped to me and then resend them. Meanwhile, their marketing guy kept calling trying to get us to sign up for their expensive marketing services. Are they kidding? Do these people really want to sell books?
lulu has resolved all problems, turns out to be nothing more then a communication problem, they were sending emails to an old email account that I had closed just prior to the finishing of my formatting and design cover..
I have paid $429.00 for formatting and book design, on 01-18-13. They finished the book design and the final revision of my book which I had confirmed needed no changes to the formatting 8-12 weeks ago. I have made close to a dozen inquiries as to the status of my book over the past 2-3 months and they do not reply with an adequate response. The website does not show a contact number in which I can call to talk with someone. All they do is send me a survey with no information about my book and when it will be ready. My order number is ** and my reference number is ref: **. I would like either my finished book in print or a refund for my paid services. Thank you.
I recently submitted some poems that I selected from my journal that I have been keeping for over 10 years to Lulu Poetry.com, but when I search the site I cannot find my work. I am really upset by this and want to be able to locate the pieces I submitted into the contest. Any help with this is appreciated. As of right now, it does not seem that the people of Lulu are holding up their end of the agreement and if that's the case, then I want my work back.
I had ordered a couple of books via lulu.com in Oct. authored by a potential client. The order was placed on Tuesday and I paid extra for expedited delivery (2-3 days) so I could review the books over the coming weekend. The books didn't arrive until the next Monday--no sooner than if they had been sent via regular mail.
There was no complaint tel. no. to call to seek a refund of the expedited amount. Eventually, I found an email on their site to which I wrote asking for a delivery charge refund. That was 4 weeks ago and I've heard nothing. They will never get my business again.
I recently submitted a poem to their contest. Only to find now it is a scam, baiting people to enter. And now they have my poem and I received nothing. My daughter submitted one also and they claimed she didn't exist.
I started writing poetry at Poetry.com and had a few on there. Now that lulu has taken over, I cannot just do what I use to do on poetry.com. Just type in my name or the authors name and boom the page came up with names and titles for poems. You click on one, the poem pops up and there you go. Now its like a circus. You need to jump through hoops and there is no guarantee you see your poetry. To make matters worse, you cannot contact them. I say pull them off the net!
'Lulu Poetry' bought out the domain name poetry.com, after the organization of Poetry.com had been exposed a fraudulent. I am sorry I cannot give this a precise date, but I think it was about two years ago. The site, where members of the public are invited to contribute poems of their own to compete for a daily or weekly prize, has no adequate 'Contact Us' facility on its website, to make corrections for example to the personal data that one has entered on first registering with them. I rather like the principle, and the site, and the idea that poets worldwide can get together to discuss and improve each others' work.
I have several times in the last few weeks had to ask for a password reset. I always receive something suitably obscure, such as the latest, 'Eg7NDx65', with a recommendation to 'change the password' to something you will remember as soon as you receive it. This does not happen. There is no facility on the site of 'Lulu.com' or 'poetry.com' tenable to this, nor any 'contact us' facility at all.
I ordered a book in January at a cost of almost $100. Despite raising five different cases chasing shipping, it still hasn't arrived. I will be taking the matter up with my credit card company. I am not remotely impressed with this shoddy excuse for an online retailer. I wasted 4 months waiting for this order.
I had written and submitted MY poems on poetry.com for several years. And many of my poems had received Editors Choice Awards. In other words, they made plenty of money off my work and millions of other creative poets. And I did find it unusual for poetry.com in Owings Mills, Maryland to ask us to purchase anthologies with our poetry and turn around and record our work on CD's to be sold supposedly to millions of people throughout the entire world. If we're the writers. Where is our money? What's really going on with these thieves? I'm angry that I'm unable to access any of my work from the criminal site www.poetry.com on their new site lulu.com. It's a joke! I believe it's the same people just different states? Who really knows?
Why are they being allowed to continue using our work and profiting from it quite handsomely? I want my work. I do not want anyone profiting from my poems. I am convinced fraud is being committed by this very corrupted site! I seriously doubt that contacting you will resolve there criminal behavior. Also, I was never informed that www.poetry.com located in Owings Mills, Maryland has become Lulu.com. I'm assuming they are like many criminals, relocate, change names every few years and laughing all the way to the bank. What's the point of laws if they don't have to abide by them?
I have tried to contact them for years and have not been able to contact them. I would like to reclaim my work that is still posted on their website. I had originally signed up with poetry.com.
I also fell victim to Poetry.com and their scam and web of lies. I have 18 poems supposedly copyrighted to me that I know longer have access to. Any and all efforts I have made to find them on Lulu Poetry comes up with no poet found. I have copies of all of poems printed off and wonder where they are now or what kind of action I can or cannot take. I do believe that my poetry isn’t beginner level and I have touched many people with my words. My mother’s passing is what inspired me to first submit a poem, and I, just like so many others, apparently have all been 'semi-finalists' and all have been subjected to letter after letter, trying to get us to purchase things.
I was published as well and that was such a hassle. It took over a year and multiple complaints for them to actually send my book, which at the time my father paid for. I was looking into possibly getting my work published and now I don't even know if it is legally mine anymore. It is shame on us poets for buying into this site, but it is them who are soliciting people of all ages and getting their hopes up with false promises to generate revenue for themselves. I just want my poetry back. Even though I have copies, I don't even know if I can use them for future publication now. The funnier part is I hadn't submitted a poem in years and up until last year I was still receiving letters from poetry.com until they were bought by Lulu. Now I can't even find my poetry. This has caused years of emotional roller coasters and false pre-tenses from this site. I have not written in years since feeling cheated and taken advantage of.
I am a published poet. I had been at the Poetry.com site for years. My poems were published and copyrighted. How can the site be sold and poets were not alerted? Poetry comes from the heart. This is America and I think I have rights to my poetry. Please tell me there is a way of getting my poetry back that was stolen from me, I do believe. I never gave Lulu.com permission to use my poetry or name. I am very upset about all this. Poets were from all over the world with Poetry.com. I even went to conventions. Physical damage is the stress of not knowing if my poetry is lost. I worked a lot of years composing those poems at different times in my life.
I can't get in touch with anyone from Lulu.com to save my life, why is that? I was a member of the old poetry.com site. I cannot remember which e-mail I used to register back in 2001 but I had posted more than 20 poems on the site. I keep trying to find them with Lulu's search engine but I find it impossible to do a search by author. This makes me very sad because I always put the originals in the site and do not have copies of these poems. I tried a google search which gave me this link, but when I try to click it, it says that the page doesn't exist. I'm really sad and I hope that someone can help me find my beloved poems once more. They stole my poems! I want back what is rightfully mine.
I placed an online order with them on December 1st. Since that time, when reviewing the status of my order on their site, it indicates "Fulfilling". It does not mention what this term means, and leaves me wondering where in this process are my books? There is absolutely no phone number anywhere on their site to contact a live person about orders/inquiries etc. One item ordered was a downloadable PDF. The content of the PDF was 'fluff' and not pertinent information. As a result of one item ordered lacking in integrity, as well as a constant order status of "Fulfilling", I made the request to have my order cancelled.
I followed the manner necessary to file my request and received an email stating I hadn't put the reference ID in the subject line, even though I had placed the order number in the subject line. It was evidence this email came from a live person. I sent it back, frustrated, with the reference ID and order number making the same request. An email was sent back saying that I must review their website for shipping times as certain destinations need a certain time for shipping allowance. Again, I ordered Dec. 1st, it is now Dec.21st. At this point, I should have received the order or the order status should be changed from "Fulfilling". I respond to that email saying, “That's all well and good about the shipping, but I want my order cancelled.” They respond in another email saying that the reference ID noted in the subject line had its issue resolved, and therefore could not assist me any further unless I open up a brand new case via their website. But they didn't resolve my issue.
I don't want to know where the parcel is. I asked for it to be cancelled! I responded in a frustrating tone, requesting it be cancelled as per my last email, and no one to this point has responded. Dec. 22nd, I opened a brand new case to try and get a response from them. And again by today, I still have not heard back from them. Furthermore, I found a phone number through a linked site for their PR department and asked for a call back. But right on their voice mail for this department, it advises customers not to leave a message, return to the immediate site and email their requests. Talk about frustrating!
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- Lulu.com
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- www.lulu.com
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