One of the recurring concerns I see from affiliates (and have myself) is that tracking isn’t working properly when I am sending traffic through affiliate links.

Sometimes technology breaks, and there isn’t anything an affiliate manager can do about that. But the way they react tells me whether they run a top flight affiliate program.

So it was refreshing to get emails from the Charming Shoppes Affiliate Team about some tracking issues yesterday.

They informed affiliates that they performed a system upgrade, which temporarily affected their ability to track return days.

And the Charming Shoppes Affiliate Team explained…

In our experience, about 34% of affiliate sales happen within 30 days of the customer’s initial referral and by visiting our site directly. In order to prevent any negative impact on your commission and to compensate you for any inconvenience, we will be making an adjustment to your May commissions.

The way they are making good is by looking at the click traffic for each affiliate in the 30 days prior to the issue, combined with the average conversion rate per affiliate, and then estimating the sales that should/could have gone to the affiliate.

Bravo to Stacy, Gina and Herschel over at Charming Shoppes.

I think they deserve kudos for being upfront about the problem and doing right by affiliates.

So to Stacy, Gina and Herschel - I’d like to offer each of you a free, full conference pass to Affiliate Summit 2008 East, taking place August 10-12 in Boston.

You can apply to their Fashion Bug, Lane Bryant, Catherines and Petite Sophisticate affiliate programs on LinkShare.