Very disappointed in their sales representative. He seemed disengaged and uncaring when we were on the phone. His "I don't care" attitude was a complete disservice and because of that - I'm not going to pursue any contract with them. Very sad if he was all the company had as the "face of the organization ". read more

IUniverse makes money on your books and doesn't pay you your royalties. Even when you know personally about sales or find there is a suspicious drop off in historical sales, they ask you to "prove it." Do not use this company, it is a scam. read more

SCAM / FRAUD iUniverse is the worst publisher ever.I couldn't be more unhappy with them. The people you have to interact with sound like they have no education whatsoever. It takes an eternity to get royalty information. I have 2 more books out this year and couldn't sign with another publisher fast enough to get away from this mess and embarrassment of a company.Horrible. Fooled me into some expensive marketing package that cost $1500 per month. Royalties were only $0 per month. Impossible to cancel.STAY AWAY, SCAM read more

I purchased an eBook from this company but they didn't provide the format that I could use. The customer service was the worst and rudest that I have even encountered. The woman had no intention to listen to me, let alone solving the problem for me. Still, to be polite, at the end of the conversation, I said "Thank you" but she was gone without saying anything like "You are welcome" or "Bye." read more

Totally agree with all previous reviews. They harass you and try and try and sell you more and more packages. They should be ashamed of how they take advantage of people. read more

This was a nightmare experience that never led to my book being published. Instead, I was stalled over the 90 days during which you can get a refund for your 100% prepayment. Stalling included: constant staff turnover, not answering calls or emails, "liability issues" that were not valid (I checked with a lawyer), and no clear process for producing the book. I switched to Archway and they did a fantastic job in the best time possible. You can check out my book, "Circle of Love," to see the quality of what you get from Archway. I suggest you contact your credit card company and you might be able to get your prepayment back, even after 90 days. Good luck! read more

i am an author and I use them to publish my book. The worst service ever, quality is terrible, persnally can not recommned them.

I published through iUniverse ca. 2004. I am writing to warn anyone thinking of publishing through this company or its affiliate Author House not to. First, you have no way of knowing if the sales they report are accurate, totally at their mercy. Second, they pay royalties 60 days after a business quarter ends. Why? Then they even miss that late date, twice with the excuse of having software problems. Third, they recommended an email advertising campaign, supposedly targeted to readers of my type of book, for about $1000, which I tried. No sales. Never saw the email, I suspect they sent spam, if anything. Fourth, I refused their offer to join their STAR program once, then did join a few years later. I decided to try advertising through them again ($1200) provided that they would target blogs for my type of novel, which they agreed to. They advertised on general blogs, not targeted at all, and, worse, advertised a form of the book that was not even available. I had to argue to get the refund, but I did. Also, the person who re-wrote the back cover description for my book could not have had English as his first language and was not very good at it. I had to argue to have that changed, too. I have no faith in this company and pity anyone doing business with them. I have also published through amazon's independent publisher program, basically free, royalties paid every month, no BS. read more

Since 2007, I have published 6 novels with iUniverse.com, for all of which I had to pay a great deal of money to get them published. In 2014, someone called me from iUniverse and asked if I would like to purchase a publicity package -- a service, not merchandise -- to market one of those books for me. I did go for that package, and paid for it with a credit-card on my bank. Later in the year, they called me up again and asked if I would like to purchase a second publicity package, a different service, and at first it sounded good. But I am on SSI, Housing Authority covers most of my rent, and I'm on Food Stamps, and obviously very poor. So I called them back and asked them to cancel that package. The young man I talked with finally agreed to cancel it. He did not give me a cancellation number at the time, and I did not realize I should have asked for one. Apparently he didn't tell their financial department that I wanted to cancel, because they billed me for that second package in three installments on that credit-card, the first for $463, the second for $433, and the third for $433. I finally discovered those on that card account around January of this year, and was horrified. I called my bank's Card Services and filed a dispute with them. They have now said that as I have no cancellation number, I therefore have no proof this happened, and if I can't get that number or get iUniverse to charge back the card, crediting it for those amounts, there is no remedy. So I got lied to by iUniverse, and they have taken $1,329 from me by false pretenses. I called and left one of their representatives a message to have somebody at iUniverse call me back and see if I can get some justice, but that will have to wait for morning. In the meantime, my credit-card interest and payments are now so large that I'm going to be starving -- my rent got raised, what little income beyond SSI and so on has dried up, and I don't have the resources to survive now. And, to add insult to injury, I've gotten two calls from them since this started trying to sell me still a third and fourth publicity package that I can't afford, that I told them I can't afford, that I don't want and can't pay for. I told them I literally CANNOT pay for those nor for the one they billed me for in those three installments for a total of $1,329, and I really don't think they get the message. If I have to, I will get a court-appointed attorney and do whatever I can to get that money taken off my account. I've never seen any results from that first publicity package, which I did willingly pay for, nor this second, unwanted one, nor any merchandise from them in either case. I have been rooked by these people, and as they are a big, established company, they know they can get away with it, or, at least, assume they can. iUniverse is de facto guilty of identity theft from me, using my card number to bill me for something I did not want and tried to cancel, whether or not they are guilty of it de jure. DON'T publish with iUniverse until you have thoroughly checked them out, including checking via a search engine to see whether there are other complaints against them (there are). read more

This company has devolved to the level of strategic fraud. They set up layers to exploit clients. In my case I paid my initial money half of the total amount in the beginning. They agreed to produce my book but wanted me to change the cover. They did not say they wanted me to change the title in fact they provided another cover photo including the proposed title. This took place in September. They continued to send things within the text for me to change leading me to believe they would produce the book with a few changes. After I paid my second amount and after they asked for more corrections a little at a time I started to become suspicious. I found out they had been bought out in 2007 and now had numerous complaints and several lawsuits against them. Two months after my initial query and submission they told me they could not produce my book and I used for a refund because they were supposed to tell me that in the beginning before I had wasted time and money but they were interested in stringing me aklong trying to get more money. When I told them I did not need extra editing services they finally told me they could not do my book. I had used this company years ago however they have evoled into fraudulents and exploititive crooks. read more

I signed up with this company back in 2010 and from the moment we sent our documents to them it hasn't been a great experience. I realize that the people who are working for them have NO clue about publishing a book. They have employees who probably just need a job so they give them a book filled with rebuttals so they "sound" like they know what they are doing. I rarely see a royalty check even though it indicates on my dashboard that books are selling. I wrote a letter to the Vice-President of sales because I ordered my books for a RUSH order and it was sent to Georgia instead of California and I haven't heard anything since November 2012. This company just wants your money and do NOT care about your success for your book. IF I were to do it all over again, I would find a company to print up the books and sell it myself. I no longer refer to this company as iUniverse instead I call it iUni-WORSE read more