Sick of losing your credits before you buy a new audiobook with them? Audible want to get you listening more giving you more time to decide.

As someone who doesn’t use Audible the fact that this is an update that needed to happen came as a shock. But now, the credits used to buy audiobooks on Audible that you purchase, get given, or hit rollover limit will last up to a year before you use them.

Before this update credits would only last 6 months and if you hadn’t purchased an audiobook with them in that time then say goodbye to your credits. The new time-limit follows a class-action lawsuit against Amazon’s audiobook platform, claiming users might not be aware that they’d lose their unspent credits.

It seems that Amazon cleanses credits regularly as part of their monthly memberships which add credits to your account once a month. To prevent “stockpiling” credits expired after 6 months, meaning many users lost credits they’d paid for because they didn’t use them soon enough.

Amazon’s extension of Audible credits’ to 12 months also introduces some other measures to make sure users are aware of what happens with their credits. Members will receive a monthly email statement detailing their credits and when they expire.

Members can use their unused credits to gift a book to friend or family if they haven’t got anything to purchase with their unused credits. Amazon will also now allow memberships to be placed on hold between 1-3 months once a year.

Whilst it still seems ridiculous to me that they would have a time limit on credits people have paid for, it’s good to see Amazon responding productively to criticism (a nice way of saying a criminal lawsuit).