3 ms·

This person as far as we are aware is NOT a designated person that sanctions are impacting and they are NOT located in Russia. If the author's statements are t

This person as far as we are aware is NOT a designated person that sanctions are impacting and they are NOT located in Russia. If the author's statements are true then Packt Publishing is acting terribly here - There's a good chance it's not legal. They only should have two options from a legal standpoint - honour the contract if the author isn't a designated person or cancel the contract if they are a designated person. Either way that shouldn't mean they continue to sell the book without paying royalties or keep existing earnings. I hope the author keeps publicly updating us on their case - it's of interest to anyone who wants to publish and are considering Packt as an option.

_p8yz 3y ago
Thank you for this reply. I am happy to see a supportive comment here. Yes, I am updating on this just for others to be aware of this possibility. I was trying to solve this for a year already, and now Packt Team just stopped communicating with me whatsoever. I did not publish a book for money, and the amount of royalties is not life-changing for me, like with any other authors. But still, I don’t yet see this way of operations correct. The company is getting profits from my work, and I am devoid of my share until further notice. I am still getting quarterly notifications with outstanding amounts, but I can not do anything with them. I share this to see if anyone ever experienced such situations, and to warn any upcoming authors with Russian nationality of potential issues. Packt team were very supportive in the process of writing and releasing the book, and I had a good overall experience with them. And they always been on the line with me for any questions, till the last few weeks.
rewmie 3y ago
> This person as far as we are aware is NOT a designated person that sanctions are impacting and they are NOT located in Russia. Irrelevant. If you read up on the Russia sanctions[1] you'll learn that violating sanctions is a criminal offense, and they are set up so that the responsibility to ensure not only that "your Russian agents, partners or suppliers are subject to current financial sanctions" but also "if individuals or organisations are ‘owned’ or ‘controlled’ either directly or indirectly by designated persons". This means that in order to ensure that a company will not be committing a crime by doing a payment, they need to do an extensive background check on the payment recipient, and even then they would be taking a major risk. In the very least, this would require extensive cooperation from the payment recipient to go through the necessary lengths to demonstrate satisfactorily that paying them wouldn't violate sanctions. However, in this case the person in question seems to already have a propensity to be deceitful and disingenuous in the way they chose to present the problem. [1] https://www.gov.uk/guidance/trading-under-sanctions-with-russia https://www.gov.uk/guidance/trading-under-sanctions-with-rus...

_p8yz 3y ago

Thank you for this reply. I am happy to see a supportive comment here. Yes, I am updating on this just for others to be aware of this possibility. I was trying to solve this for a year already, and now Packt Team just stopped communicating with me whatsoever. I did not publish a book for money, and the amount of royalties is not life-changing for me, like with any other authors. But still, I don’t yet see this way of operations correct. The company is getting profits from my work, and I am devoid of my share until further notice. I am still getting quarterly notifications with outstanding amounts, but I can not do anything with them. I share this to see if anyone ever experienced such situations, and to warn any upcoming authors with Russian nationality of potential issues. Packt team were very supportive in the process of writing and releasing the book, and I had a good overall experience with them. And they always been on the line with me for any questions, till the last few weeks.

rewmie 3y ago

> This person as far as we are aware is NOT a designated person that sanctions are impacting and they are NOT located in Russia. Irrelevant. If you read up on the Russia sanctions[1] you'll learn that violating sanctions is a criminal offense, and they are set up so that the responsibility to ensure not only that "your Russian agents, partners or suppliers are subject to current financial sanctions" but also "if individuals or organisations are ‘owned’ or ‘controlled’ either directly or indirectly by designated persons". This means that in order to ensure that a company will not be committing a crime by doing a payment, they need to do an extensive background check on the payment recipient, and even then they would be taking a major risk. In the very least, this would require extensive cooperation from the payment recipient to go through the necessary lengths to demonstrate satisfactorily that paying them wouldn't violate sanctions. However, in this case the person in question seems to already have a propensity to be deceitful and disingenuous in the way they chose to present the problem. [1] https://www.gov.uk/guidance/trading-under-sanctions-with-russia https://www.gov.uk/guidance/trading-under-sanctions-with-rus...