Do sales reports always align with the timing of a retail order?

Our Dashboard records sales only when retailers purchase from Gatekeeper Press, not when the retailers sell to their customers. eBook sales always get reported by Gatekeeper Press in the same month in which a customer purchases from a retailer, but paperback and hardcover sales reported by Gatekeeper Press may not always align with the timing of a customer's purchase from a retailer. Amazon does not list print book sales until they have shipped. If an order is placed at the end of the month, your sales report will not reflect the sale of that book until the following month when the book has shipped and the sale officially processed from their end.

 

In order to keep up with anticipated demand, a retailer like Amazon may sometimes order a surplus of paperback or hardcover books from Gatekeeper Press and build a small inventory from which they ship to their end customers. If Amazon orders copies from Gatekeeper Press in Month A, those sales are reported in your Dashboard in Month A, even if no customers order your book from Amazon in Month A. If Amazon then sells copies from its inventory in Month B from, those sales will not display in your Dashboard for Month B because they have already been accounted for in Month A.