Redirecting to an Amazon link does not work

Question

I use redirects for all of my outbound links, which work fine with the exception of Amazon.

BUT, if I have the actual Amazon link in the HREF it works fine.

Here is an example:

When I redirect the link in the HREF looks something like this:

http://domain.com/buy-web/1425

which goes via an internal PHP script that gets the actual Amazon link, which looks like:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/search?ie=UTF8&tag=AFF_ID&index=aps&linkCode=ur2&camp=CAMP&creative=CREATIVE&keywords=tory-burch-amanda-crossbody-bag

and does:

header('Location: ' . $outURL);

when I redirect I am sent to this page on Amazon instead of the right one:

http://www.amazon.com/ref=nb_sb_noss_null

I have double checked that $outURL has the right link in it.

Anybody got any ideas why?

Thanks everyone.

PS: Here are the raw headers:

http://andynew/buy-web/1026

GET /buy-web/1026 HTTP/1.1
Host: andynew
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.8; rv:30.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/30.0
Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*/*;q=0.8
Accept-Language: en-US,en;q=0.5
Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate
DNT: 1
Cookie: __atuvc=1%7C28; andynew=a%3A10%3A%7Bs%3A10%3A%22session_id%22%3Bs%3A32%3A%227cb2ce95595fdf811ba5e2163b5f1d24%22%3Bs%3A10%3A%22ip_address%22%3Bs%3A9%3A%22127.0.0.1%22%3Bs%3A10%3A%22user_agent%22%3Bs%3A81%3A%22Mozilla%2F5.0+%28Macintosh%3B+Intel+Mac+OS+X+10.8%3B+rv%3A30.0%29+Gecko%2F20100101+Firefox%2F30.0%22%3Bs%3A13%3A%22last_activity%22%3Bi%3A1406480767%3Bs%3A9%3A%22user_data%22%3Bs%3A0%3A%22%22%3Bs%3A8%3A%22discount%22%3Bs%3A1%3A%220%22%3Bs%3A10%3A%22gridOrList%22%3Bs%3A4%3A%22grid%22%3Bs%3A11%3A%22displayData%22%3Bs%3A3%3A%22rel%22%3Bs%3A8%3A%22currency%22%3Bs%3A1%3A%22%24%22%3Bs%3A9%3A%22productId%22%3Bs%3A0%3A%22%22%3B%7D81d96834d2c29c51fc5169a3b4a3b489
Connection: keep-alive

HTTP/1.1 302 Found
Date: Sun, 27 Jul 2014 18:00:10 GMT
Server: Apache/2.2.25 (Unix) mod_ssl/2.2.25 OpenSSL/0.9.8y DAV/2 PHP/5.4.4
X-Powered-By: PHP/5.4.4
Set-Cookie: andynew=a%3A10%3A%7Bs%3A10%3A%22session_id%22%3Bs%3A32%3A%227de1b339301f44415c2d6e9b6bb4123a%22%3Bs%3A10%3A%22ip_address%22%3Bs%3A9%3A%22127.0.0.1%22%3Bs%3A10%3A%22user_agent%22%3Bs%3A81%3A%22Mozilla%2F5.0+%28Macintosh%3B+Intel+Mac+OS+X+10.8%3B+rv%3A30.0%29+Gecko%2F20100101+Firefox%2F30.0%22%3Bs%3A13%3A%22last_activity%22%3Bi%3A1406484010%3Bs%3A9%3A%22user_data%22%3Bs%3A0%3A%22%22%3Bs%3A8%3A%22discount%22%3Bs%3A1%3A%220%22%3Bs%3A10%3A%22gridOrList%22%3Bs%3A4%3A%22grid%22%3Bs%3A11%3A%22displayData%22%3Bs%3A3%3A%22rel%22%3Bs%3A8%3A%22currency%22%3Bs%3A1%3A%22%24%22%3Bs%3A9%3A%22productId%22%3Bs%3A0%3A%22%22%3B%7D576acce0b2310f850aea22ec8c28ae79; expires=Sun, 27-Jul-2014 20:00:10 GMT; path=/
Location: http://www.amazon.com/gp/search?ie=UTF8&tag=AFF-ID&index=aps&linkCode=ur2&camp=CAMP&creative=CREATIVE&keywords=ugg-classic-bow-shorty-womens-sized-accessory-grey
Content-Length: 0
Keep-Alive: timeout=5, max=100
Connection: Keep-Alive
Content-Type: text/html
----------------------------------------------------------
http://www.amazon.com/gp/search?ie=UTF8&tag=AFF-ID&index=aps&linkCode=ur2&camp=CAMP&creative=CREATIVE&keywords=ugg-classic-bow-shorty-womens-sized-accessory-grey

GET /gp/search?ie=UTF8&tag=AFF-ID&index=aps&linkCode=ur2&camp=CAMP&creative=CREATIVE&keywords=ugg-classic-bow-shorty-womens-sized-accessory-grey HTTP/1.1
Host: www.amazon.com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.8; rv:30.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/30.0
Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*/*;q=0.8
Accept-Language: en-US,en;q=0.5
Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate
DNT: 1
Cookie: session-id-time=2082787201l; session-id=185-3040520-0718910; ubid-main=184-2208389-3838529; session-token="Q34hrPBvyfBn/m8gsaJOC185MUqzRj+6pViKhkOotL7DNO+KI3+yGaNFG65xvuN79/agGpPsGKWGN5fDBbt+KAnyq++5PFQSpAkNQnMAsJwMqR+hNzNXYZYr/pwBLe5RbsEF3mjVsACMNNMuzeVKw1OXUhkSO4XNxp+Z6LtlmyWy62KX0x5Qnz2AWy+pgKVFjLfDmHQAe1RMt82gDA0hMbgBZB3dHrko1dKm9o8BZ6I="; x-main="4g66HOBViU1sjppUYDkyRt5qEx7xXo?2"; __utma=125759317.321611390.1405706148.1406480645.1406480704.15; __utmz=125759317.1406478568.13.11.utmccn=(referral)|utmcsr=amazon.com|utmcct=/ap/signin|utmcmd=referral; __utmv=125759317.AFF-ID; x-wl-uid=1eBl7bcTv1V/h74WHTIZP+Hvnsr/oVfw2gl4r2f4jsJRBO2JdOf8BaddaGBLw/itrjEKvX1dbb0YAZxGDfP8eBA==; s_pers=%20s_vnum%3D1408288972388%2526vn%253D1%7C1408288972388%3B%20s_invisit%3Dtrue%7C1405698772388%3B%20s_nr%3D1405696972390-Repeat%7C1413472972390%3B; s_fid=12639358825850B3-1B157A0114E15FF1; s_dslv=1396942038784; s_vn=1418980489687%26vn%3D4; aws-ubid-main=182-0303093-2027858; aws-x-main="?6@eyI2zA2v9U3hUThKr9ptYKZDEnL1u"; regStatus=registered; csm-hit=s-10PZ2HKQV6RQT3SNRG82|1406478566454; __utmc=125759317
Connection: keep-alive

HTTP/1.1 302 Found
Date: Sun, 27 Jul 2014 18:00:10 GMT
Server: Server
x-amz-id-1: 1ENW70JDY98QP5G7R23W
x-amz-id-2: Cgjt+l8Pxxwl5A0t0tAla6b7y5Yobfh45Yq+kRDS4BPgrqyzZMzUmI5YVe3zF4lQej9X7ieHSTw=
X-Frame-Options: SAMEORIGIN
Location: /ref=nb_sb_noss_null
Content-Type: text/html;charset=UTF-8
Content-Length: 0
Set-Cookie: ubid-main=184-2208389-3838529; Domain=.amazon.com; Expires=Sat, 22-Jul-2034 18:00:11 GMT; Path=/
Vary: User-Agent

Answer 1

You aren't sending the URL you claim to be sending. All of your ampersands are being encoded as &, as if this were HTML. Stop doing that, and your problem will go away.

We couldn't tell you what part of your code is doing this unnecessary encoding, since the code you show in your question will not have this problem.