TuneCore

I submitted 9 albums worth of music I wrote many years ago, and getting it through their rules was a disaster. Things get rejected and you aren't told why, so you ask and wait 2-3 days to get a vague/generic answer, then try to guess what they meant, resubmit, rinse and repeat... But WORST OF ALL: they will change your content WITHOUT YOUR CONSENT, and it will go live on Spotify and iTunes like that! They changed my titles without getting my OK, and now what? Can this even be fixed? What a joke! I should have gone with CD Baby!

OMG, how this organization makes you pay, and after filling the forms and submitting all the requirements, they come with some flimsy excuses as to why your song distribution got rejected. Stay away from Tunecore, they could ruin your chances to be out there to live your dream as a musician.

I've been trying to register my first track on Tunecore's website. After entering the song title, I noticed the website had inexplicably changed one of the letters in the title from upper case to lower case. Since this happened prior to me publishing the song (or even uploading a wav file or artwork), I hit the edit button to fix the error. Tunecore's website, however, would not update the song title. After many attempts to update this info, I sent multiple help emails to Tunecore (over several days) with no response. With some internet sleuthing, I eventually found Tunecore's customer service phone number. They don't list their number on their own website, strangely. I called, hoping to speak with a representative. No luck. Tunecore claimed (via recorded message) that they are unable to offer full time phone support and then disconnected me. Completely ridiculous. I'm seriously considering canceling my subscription before even releasing a song.

my email is [email protected]

I have received no response despite waiting 5 days.

Please refund my money back or I will call the bank for fraud.

We are Australian and tried to renew our membership. No phone number, no reply to requests. Email states response will be given. Can't change password which is right in the first place. Going round in circles and no assistance. Email threatens to delete all music. Why will someone not answer us? Instead of assistance we now have been sent how to cancel our renewal. We don't want to cancel we want to renew and we also want to know what is happening to the money we are supposed to receive?

As of 10/08/2021 it has been two months and I have not received the product I paid for and continue to get billed. Tunecore has the worst customer support I've ever experienced. They do not have a phone line It's done all through email. The people helping you will reach out after a week. They will ask you what your UPC code is. When you reply, they have already closed the ticket early and ask if you to review their performance. You go open a new ticket, same things happens. When you ask for a manager, you will not get one. When you ask to make a formal complaint, you will not be allowed to make one. No one explains what is going on. This is really horrible. I requested my money back and had no response. This company lacks integrity.

They took my money, but would not release my work. When I reached out, they asked me what my UPC code was. I sent them the UPC code and they closed the ticket early and asked how they did. I reached out again and same thing. So I requested a manager and got someone who did the same thing. I requested to make a formal complaint three times at that point they would not answer. They kept sending me someone new who asked for a UPC code, would close the ticket early and would no longer receive emails. When you call they tell you they have no customer service on the phones. They lead me on this way for two months. Now my music that I was hoping to release has been held up and my commitments are suffering. They have no interest in giving you the product they take your credit card and you'll never hear from them again.

Upon looking at [redacted] 's TuneCore account he does in fact have a positive Balance It appears that his particular complaint is specifically about the Publishing Administration service he signed up for through us.We notified [redacted] via email on March ***, that we had received a notice of infringement against a release in his account, which he did not respond toWe notified [redacted] again of a second notice of infringement on May ***, 2014, which he also did not respond toAs per our Terms of Service (http://www.tunecore.com/index/terms#copyright_policy), whenever we receive a notice of infringement, we may hold the lifetime earnings of the disputed content until we are notified of a resolutionThis effects both Distribution revenue and Publishing revenue.Since [redacted] still has not asserted rights to these particular sound recordings, we were not able to pay out any earnings he may have earned through our Publishing service With that said, we are currently administering the underlying compositions of these two sound recordings at 100% We made an attempt to contact [redacted] about this Revdex.com claim and to remind him of the current rights issue on his content on both February **, and February **, but have received no response.At this point we have exhausted all efforts in trying to reach this customer but he is more than welcome to respond to either our Copyright department or Publishing department to assert rights to the content he distirbuted and gain access to any potential funds associated with those releases.Sincerely [redacted] ***TuneCore

I can confirm that all of [redacted] ' issues have been resolved.We processed complete refunds for his renewals in both November and December The first refund was processed on November*, and the second was processed on December*, Both of these refunds were processed within the 3-business day time-frame we provided in our correspondences If for any reason the customer still hasn't received these refunds they need to follow up with the Credit Card company (or bank if they were debit card purchases) directly.I also confirmed that all content in this customer's account has been marked for takedown in our system The automatic renewal feature has also been disabled for this account so if they decide to distibrute any more matieral with TuneCore in the future they will have to opt into auto-renewal manually.Finally, I checked and all e-mails from this customer have been closed and resolved so there are no open issues with this customer at this time[redacted] ***TuneCore

Revdex.com: I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID# [redacted] , and have determined that my complaint has NOT been resolved because: Due to the fact that TuneCore cannot even manage music that was supposed to be removed years ago I cannot trust them to handle any royalty or personal informationOnce you become a customer they no longer care about you as long and your credit card isn't declinedHere is a link to content that was supposed to be removed over a year ago that I just now found: [redacted] The above link was on the first page of google results for my name - " [redacted] ***" The response provided by TuneCore has once again been simple lip serviceWhy even have a customer service department - just forward all inquiries to an FAQ page and save some moneyThis is my last resort prior to legal actionIf TuneCore wants to advertise my fastidious musical name to promote their unethical business they can pay me for it - starting with a complete refund for any/all "services" and a written statement declaring they have no rights to any of my music or the publishing therein In order for the Revdex.com to appropriately process your response, you MUST answer the question above Sincerely, [redacted] ***

Revdex.com: I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted] , and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me and the matter has been resolved Sincerely, [redacted]

To Whom It May Concern: As a company, once an account has had a transaction, TuneCore does not "close" an account Our Finance department needs to maintain records and be able to track down accounts associated with all invoices In addition, all stores report distirbution sales on a two-month delay so accounts need to remain open so that customers can log in to access any possible future funds that are posted to an account Not only is there a two-month delay in accounting, but in a rare instance some stores may have even further delays Some stores process accounting quarterly and with iTunes Match ( [redacted] ), funds may be posted into accounts indefinitely TuneCore also keeps accounts open so that customers can come back to view all historical sales information.As referenced in his complaint, [redacted] was also a TuneCore Publishing Administration customer We did receive a request from him to terminate his publishing administration agreement with us, effective 10/*/ I can confirm that his agreement with us terminated effective October *, I’ve attached his termination letter in case this may be helpful (it also includes information from our Terms & Conditions about post-term collection) Also, while it is usually the client’s responsibility to notify the PRO that we are no longer the administrator, we reached out to BMI on August **, and asked them to remove TuneCore as the administrator since the client has not done so.I'm sorry [redacted] is not satisfied with the responses he received from our Customer Care team but all e-mails were addressed within our advertised one-business day response time and all information that was provided to him was accurateWe apologized to [redacted] regarding his content still being available in certain stores and immediately reached out to the stores in question to ask them to remove the content as soon as possible We have records of requesting the initial take downs at the customer's request but unfortunately the stores did not comply Keep in mind that any and all sales of [redacted] ***'s content would still all go to his TuneCore account and TuneCore never keeps any percentage of distribution salesIn terms of piracy, we unfortunately have no way to control music piracy on the internet other than securing our own website and ensuring no musical content is leaked by our systemRegarding [redacted] ***'s desired settlement, as stated above, we are unable to permanently delete or close [redacted] ***'s account for financial reasons and for our records At any point however, the customer can log into his account and change all contact information and personal information if they'd like and they never have to log in again Also, TuneCore never took the customer's rights to their music or content for distirbution ( [redacted] ) and we have attached written proof/documentation of the termination of their Publishing agreementSincerely, Sean Sean D***Manager of OperationsTuneCore

Revdex.com: I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID# [redacted] , and have determined that my complaint has NOT been resolved because: Thank youI look forward to hearing from you In order for the Revdex.com to appropriately process your response, you MUST answer the question above Sincerely, [redacted]

Revdex.com: I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted] , and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me and the matter has not been resolved however I have spoken with a TuneCore Rep/Customer Service "***" about this matter and it is under investigation working toward resolutionThank you for such quick response Sincerely, [redacted]

To Whom It May ConcernFirst off, I'm sorry to hear about your negative experience with TuneCore You also mention having a negative experience with [redacted] , [redacted] , and [redacted] and although our Publishing Administration service works with [redacted] to help collect money on your behalf all of those companies are completely separate from TuneCore so unfortunately we won't be able to help with any issues you've had with them.With regards to signing up for ***, there is no fee for registering with [redacted] as a writer, so I am not sure if he means that he registered with [redacted] as a publisher instead where there would be a fee associated with this sort of sign up If that was the case, he would need to contact/deal with [redacted] directly to rectify this [redacted] did do the correct thing in not terminating the agreement with the client because since TuneCore is his administrator of record, only we can end the agreement so long as his anniversary date of has elapsed The [redacted] and TuneCore Publishing connection is necessary so we can collect worldwide on behalf of our clients Adding TuneCore Publishing Administration as his administrator allows us to be the payee on record for his publishing share which essentially is granting us exclusive rights that is required from the global rights societies to collect on his behalf.Regarding this customer's Publishing royalties, his earnings are accurate considering that we received work registration numbers from all applicable sources that we register his compositions with – [redacted] being one of them In reviewing his distribution earnings, 70% of his sales came from within the US This means that he was receiving the majority of the mechanicals automatically through his distribution sales and there would not be much residual publishing royalties.The client did write to our Publishing Administration in November asking us to terminate the agreement immediately and we explained to him that per the terms (http://www.tunecore.com/index/terms#publishing_administration_terms) we are unable to until his anniversary date and we even sent him a screen shot of the terms and conditions that states as such (also attached to this response) Even though we were following what's stated in our Terms & Conditions and his termination date is months away we are issuing an immediate termination for him The client will receive a letter confirming this within 1-business days We will also inform [redacted] that we are no longer the administrator of record.In terms of adding additional stores to a release, this is completely optional As a company we're always looking to add more stores to our Distribution service and again it's up to the customer if they want to take advantage of these new stores or not (and there is a fee if they do wish to add more stores AFTER their initial distribution).Regarding TuneCore's Distribution prices we are a subscription service so you pay yearly for distirbution and this is clearly explained on our pricing page here: http://www.tunecore.com/index/pricing Again, we have no affiliation with [redacted] and the pricing models they offer.Yes, if a renewal is not paid the content is removed from all stores However, all stores report sales on a 2-month delay so it is possible for a customer to recevie money from sales up to months after content is removed from stores (or possibly longer is a store is delayed in reporting On April [redacted] this customer contacted our Support Department stating they could still see one of their releases in some stores We responded the same day (Incident [redacted] ) asking the customer to let us know where they're still seeing content available for sale but they never responded If the customer lets us know where they're still seeing their music available for sale we will absolutely look into the issue and get it removed ASAP But regardless, and sales made from the music being available will still be placed in the customers account and TuneCore never takes a percentage of music sales.As previously mentioned, [redacted] is a separate company from TuneCore so we cannot speak on any issues this customer had with them.At this point we have responded to all open incidents the customer has had with us We are making an exception and terminating his Publishing agreement with us months early and all of his content has been removed from our Distribution service.SincerelySean D***Manager of Operations

I have sent messages for over a week with no response! You call the contact number and never get a person.

To Whom it May Concern:
*** *** was a client of TuneCore Publishing Administration from until July During that time, we advised every foreign PRO of our rights to the works *** *** submitted to us, as was our contractual obligationIn August of
TuneCore was contacted by *** *** concerning certain compositions that were erroneously registered to TuneCore within the territory of AustraliaIt should be noted that we did not submit these registrationsIn an effort to correct this registration - though the error was no fault of ours- we contacted Native Tongue, our sub-publishing partner in Australia, who then worked in tandem with *** to amend the registration and recover the fundsThis error was expeditiously corrected to properly reflect *** *** Publishing as the sole administrator of the compositions listed belowIn addition, *** *** was provided with the dollar amounts for each composition that was erroneously sent to Native Tongue, our sub-publisherAn adjustment was processed by Madeleine R***, Copyright & Royalties Assistant of Native Tongue through *** and she confirms that the earnings will be accounted to the client in Quarter of due to the adjustment being part of the Quarter process

Additionally, the client inquired about earnings for the compositions we previously administered and he has been explained that until his new administrator updates his records with the global rights societies, TuneCore will still be displayed as the administratorHe has been instructed to have his new administrator assert their claim which would then cause the source to contact TuneCore for confirmation of his termination that took place on 07/**/This is standard industry practiceAny royalties sent to TuneCore will still be accounted to our former client through our quarterly accountings.Sincerely
TuneCore Publishing

To whom it may concern
The link we provided in this customer's account is accurate.   However, there are 2 links; one is for [redacted] and the other is for the iTunes download store.  We label these very clearly in TuneCore accounts.  Unfortunately if a customer does not...

have iTunes or [redacted] downloaded on their computer the links will prompt them to download the App.  This is an [redacted] feature and is something TuneCore has no control over.  Again, the links are 100% accurate and working properly ([redacted]). A screenshot is also attached showing the link clearly labeled in the account.We did receive an e-mail from this customer on December [redacted] and unfortunately we were unable to respond to them in our advertised time-frame of 1 business day and then when the customer followed up so unfortunately that pushed the e-mail farther down in our inbox. He is receiving responses to all of his e-mails today.  I am truly sorry we were not able to answer their e-mail within 1 business day.In terms of providing a link, we give customers their iTunes link as soon as we can so they can make sure all promotional material is ready to go once it's available. As stated, iTunes does have an internal review process and this release is now live and available well within the time-frame stated on our site (It was created on December [redacted]): [redacted]
I apologize if the communication around the links is misleading and I will certainly bring that to our tech and product team to investigate and fix as soon as possible.
 
Sincerely
Sean D[redacted]
Manager of Operations
TuneCore

Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID# [redacted], and have determined that my complaint has NOT been resolved because:

[Your Answer Here]
Yes I made payment of additional stores with the balance in
my account; they say I made only 25 dollars from all the songs I have published
in the internet which is a lie. Please ask [redacted] to track those
songs.  I said that I have not received a
cent from tunecore because I have not withdrawn any money from that I account
from the very first day I created to date. Please just ask [redacted] to track
those song then you will see that they are all working together to make sure that
I don’t get a cent from my songs. Thanks for your time and effort. God bless
you.
 
 
 
 
In order for the Revdex.com to appropriately process your response, you MUST answer the question above.
Sincerely,
[redacted]

To Whom It May Concern,This customer purchased ou[redacted] Sound Recording Revenue Collection Service on April **, 2015.  As he mentions in his claim he "agreed to be charged" for this service.  As the screenshot attached shows, we make it extremely clear on our website prior to...

paying for this service the customer has "agreed to", to the best of their knowledge, that all the tracks they are requesting for monetization "are not part of a compilation/various artists' album".This customer only has one album in our system and it is in fact a Various Artist album.  Therefore, when he purchased this service he agreed to the Terms and Conditions and knew that the one album in his account would not be accepted.  The service is good for any future releases he might upload and distribute however, so if he ever distributed more content that was eligible he would be able to take advantage of this product.I have been in communication with this customer and we are making a one-time exception for him and are fully refunding the $25 he paid and completely removing this service from his account.  On April **, 2015 he e-mailed us stating he understands by refunding and turning off this feature in his account he'll never be able to activate it again (this is from Incident number [redacted]n our system).Again, this customer agreed to the Terms and Conditions of this service and we stated very clearly prior to payment what content was eligible and nowhere in our company's Terms and Conditions do we offer refunds for products.  However, we've made an exception for this customer since they have no intention of distributing new content and all of their catalog is ineligible.Sincerely,[redacted]TuneCore