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I wish that Amazon could split the market place off. I disliked it from the first day they introduced it. I want to buy from Amazon not some company I've never

I wish that Amazon could split the market place off. I disliked it from the first day they introduced it. I want to buy from Amazon not some company I've never heard of. It's if course never gonna happen. It's too convenient for Amazon and most users probably don't even understand that they aren't buying from Amazon.

jlarocco 9y ago
> It's if course never gonna happen. It's too convenient for Amazon and most users probably don't even understand that they aren't buying from Amazon. Out of curiosity, why do you assume people don't realize they aren't buying from Amazon?
- vladus2000 9y ago
  I have had to explain this to my dad multiple times before he fully understood and I consider him to be a smart person. I have no idea how this applies to the general population, but they do not make it that obvious if you are not paying attention. Especially the other sellers that participate in prime shipping.
  - eric_h 9y ago
    I try reasonably hard to only by ships from and sold by amazon, but even I occasionally mess up and end up getting a 3rd party seller. Fortunately I've not been burned, yet.
    - fencepost 9y ago
      The problem with "ships from and sold by" is that it doesn't address one of Amazon's other big problems, counterfeit items commingled in their inventory. Have a shipping container full of good quality counterfeit XYZ? Ship it to Amazon to sell, it'll get mixed in with the same UPC from everyone else including Amazon itself and the counterfeits will never be traced back to you.
      - jessaustin 9y ago
        One would think Amazon could trace it back if they tried hard enough, but we can't assume they would do that. After all their margins on commingled items are probably better than when they buy the items themselves.
- pjc50 9y ago
  Why would people think they're not buying from Amazon when they're on the Amazon web site and their credit card gets billed to Amazon? (Can't remember, but do the parcels come in Amazon packaging too?)
  - maxxxxx 9y ago
    Mostly yes
  - jlarocco 9y ago
    > Why would people think they're not buying from Amazon when they're on the Amazon web site and their credit card gets billed to Amazon? Because Amazon tells them when they're looking at the item that it's sold by a third party? And then again when they're checking out. And the items sold by third parties include an invoice and receipt from the third party? It's not a difficult technical issue - it only requires basic reading comprehension, which I'd expect most people using Amazon to posses. Obviously everybody commenting here has figured out what's going on, and most people I've talked to about it (technical and non-technical) have also figured it out, so I just can't see it as Amazon tricking everybody. My assumption is that most people buying from Amazon do know about and understand third party sellers, but aren't bothered by them enough to do anything.
    - maxxxxx 9y ago
      I think most people assume that there is some level of quality control of third party suppliers.
    - andrewflnr 9y ago
      > it only requires basic reading comprehension, which I'd expect most people using Amazon to posses. This is your problem. Most people don't have basic reading comprehension when they're using computers, even less so when they're not expecting to be scammed. This is well known in UI and IT support circles. They don't notice details, they don't read the error messages, they don't read the fine print. On Amazon, they just want to get their thing and move on.
- luckydata 9y ago
  Mostly because it happened to me multiple times to buy something off Amazon, and later realize it was a different vendor when I tried to return stuff and the conditions are different.
- brazzledazzle 9y ago
  I've had to explain this to several non-technical people. Amazon is trading their hard earned trust away.
- astura 9y ago
  Whenever I tell anyone "I sell on Amazon," they are really confused and say "what? How can you, Joe Random, sell on Amazon?" When I try to explain it's a marketplace "like eBay," where anyone can sell things on, they get confused and can't understand. Even if some people understood "some inventory comes from different places," the vast majority of retail operations vet their sources and have quality control. So it's easy to understand why people would assume it's not different from Target selling inventory provided by multiple distributors.
delecti 9y ago
If nothing else, they at least allow you to filter out non-amazon (or even non-prime fulfilled) items.
- Someone1234 9y ago
  They do. - Search - Pick a category - Select "Amazon.com" as the seller
  - minedwiz 9y ago
    Does that also filter out stuff sold by vendors, but fulfilled by Amazon?
    - Someone1234 9y ago
      It is only items sold by Amazon.com, so yes.
      - x0x0 9y ago
        Still doesn't matter. For FBA stuff, they mix items in their warehouses. So even if you buy from Amazon, you can receive an item out of the FBA program. Thus you have no idea if it's the real deal or a knockoff sent from who-knows. edit: That wasn't clear. Try two: Inventory submitted by FBA vendors is commingled with Amazon inventory in Amazon's warehouses. When you, a sucker, buys it, you have zero control over whether the widget you get was purchased by Amazon from the manufacturer or sent to Amazon by Billy Bob's Sellin' Totally Not Fake Shit Shack, which definitely got it from the manufacturer, not the bottom price on Alibaba. This is true even if you buy from Amazon and not an FBA vendor.
  - JonathonW 9y ago
    Sometimes. IME it seems kind of random as to when you can filter by seller and when you can't. You can fairly consistently filter by Prime/non-Prime, but that's not the same (that filters down to things fulfilled by Amazon, but not just sold by Amazon).
nasredin 9y ago
>I wish that Amazon could split the market place off. Recently Amazon made it much harder to select sellers. Now on some products, the page is so confusing that you don't know is it "Fullfilled by Amazon" or you are buying from someone in China. Race to the bottom and all...
- kordlessagain 9y ago
  The "fulfilled by amazon" part is pretty obvious on the page, so I wouldn't say it's hard to figure out. If they have it in one of their warehouses, they'll ship it to you and will refund you directly without getting the seller involved if they did and there is a problem with it - sometimes without even verifying you returned it (this has not happened to me but I've seen it happen to another person). If you chose to buy something that isn't in one of your warehouses, your mileage will vary. Recently I got them to refund me after showing I returned the defective item (tracking number + signed by an employee) the SAME day it was returned to the seller's location. Granted, the seller and I had a dispute (which was that the seller refused to acknowledge the device spit out a fair amount of magic smoke when powering a small charger). Again, it's effort in and effort out. If you buy something off Amazon, make sure it's being shipped to you by Amazon!
- ryanSrich 9y ago
  Does filtering by prime only help? I've started only buying prime eligible items and I've seen quality increase slightly. Also, oddly enough I've found jet.com to be far superior to Amazon in both price and quality when they actually have the item I need.

jlarocco 9y ago

> It's if course never gonna happen. It's too convenient for Amazon and most users probably don't even understand that they aren't buying from Amazon. Out of curiosity, why do you assume people don't realize they aren't buying from Amazon?

vladus2000 9y ago
I have had to explain this to my dad multiple times before he fully understood and I consider him to be a smart person. I have no idea how this applies to the general population, but they do not make it that obvious if you are not paying attention. Especially the other sellers that participate in prime shipping.
- eric_h 9y ago
  I try reasonably hard to only by ships from and sold by amazon, but even I occasionally mess up and end up getting a 3rd party seller. Fortunately I've not been burned, yet.
  - fencepost 9y ago
    The problem with "ships from and sold by" is that it doesn't address one of Amazon's other big problems, counterfeit items commingled in their inventory. Have a shipping container full of good quality counterfeit XYZ? Ship it to Amazon to sell, it'll get mixed in with the same UPC from everyone else including Amazon itself and the counterfeits will never be traced back to you.
    - jessaustin 9y ago
      One would think Amazon could trace it back if they tried hard enough, but we can't assume they would do that. After all their margins on commingled items are probably better than when they buy the items themselves.
pjc50 9y ago
Why would people think they're not buying from Amazon when they're on the Amazon web site and their credit card gets billed to Amazon? (Can't remember, but do the parcels come in Amazon packaging too?)
- maxxxxx 9y ago
  Mostly yes
- jlarocco 9y ago
  > Why would people think they're not buying from Amazon when they're on the Amazon web site and their credit card gets billed to Amazon? Because Amazon tells them when they're looking at the item that it's sold by a third party? And then again when they're checking out. And the items sold by third parties include an invoice and receipt from the third party? It's not a difficult technical issue - it only requires basic reading comprehension, which I'd expect most people using Amazon to posses. Obviously everybody commenting here has figured out what's going on, and most people I've talked to about it (technical and non-technical) have also figured it out, so I just can't see it as Amazon tricking everybody. My assumption is that most people buying from Amazon do know about and understand third party sellers, but aren't bothered by them enough to do anything.
  - maxxxxx 9y ago
    I think most people assume that there is some level of quality control of third party suppliers.
  - andrewflnr 9y ago
    > it only requires basic reading comprehension, which I'd expect most people using Amazon to posses. This is your problem. Most people don't have basic reading comprehension when they're using computers, even less so when they're not expecting to be scammed. This is well known in UI and IT support circles. They don't notice details, they don't read the error messages, they don't read the fine print. On Amazon, they just want to get their thing and move on.
luckydata 9y ago
Mostly because it happened to me multiple times to buy something off Amazon, and later realize it was a different vendor when I tried to return stuff and the conditions are different.
brazzledazzle 9y ago
I've had to explain this to several non-technical people. Amazon is trading their hard earned trust away.
astura 9y ago
Whenever I tell anyone "I sell on Amazon," they are really confused and say "what? How can you, Joe Random, sell on Amazon?" When I try to explain it's a marketplace "like eBay," where anyone can sell things on, they get confused and can't understand. Even if some people understood "some inventory comes from different places," the vast majority of retail operations vet their sources and have quality control. So it's easy to understand why people would assume it's not different from Target selling inventory provided by multiple distributors.

delecti 9y ago

If nothing else, they at least allow you to filter out non-amazon (or even non-prime fulfilled) items.

Someone1234 9y ago
They do. - Search - Pick a category - Select "Amazon.com" as the seller
- minedwiz 9y ago
  Does that also filter out stuff sold by vendors, but fulfilled by Amazon?
  - Someone1234 9y ago
    It is only items sold by Amazon.com, so yes.
    - x0x0 9y ago
      Still doesn't matter. For FBA stuff, they mix items in their warehouses. So even if you buy from Amazon, you can receive an item out of the FBA program. Thus you have no idea if it's the real deal or a knockoff sent from who-knows. edit: That wasn't clear. Try two: Inventory submitted by FBA vendors is commingled with Amazon inventory in Amazon's warehouses. When you, a sucker, buys it, you have zero control over whether the widget you get was purchased by Amazon from the manufacturer or sent to Amazon by Billy Bob's Sellin' Totally Not Fake Shit Shack, which definitely got it from the manufacturer, not the bottom price on Alibaba. This is true even if you buy from Amazon and not an FBA vendor.
- JonathonW 9y ago
  Sometimes. IME it seems kind of random as to when you can filter by seller and when you can't. You can fairly consistently filter by Prime/non-Prime, but that's not the same (that filters down to things fulfilled by Amazon, but not just sold by Amazon).

nasredin 9y ago

>I wish that Amazon could split the market place off. Recently Amazon made it much harder to select sellers. Now on some products, the page is so confusing that you don't know is it "Fullfilled by Amazon" or you are buying from someone in China. Race to the bottom and all...

kordlessagain 9y ago
The "fulfilled by amazon" part is pretty obvious on the page, so I wouldn't say it's hard to figure out. If they have it in one of their warehouses, they'll ship it to you and will refund you directly without getting the seller involved if they did and there is a problem with it - sometimes without even verifying you returned it (this has not happened to me but I've seen it happen to another person). If you chose to buy something that isn't in one of your warehouses, your mileage will vary. Recently I got them to refund me after showing I returned the defective item (tracking number + signed by an employee) the SAME day it was returned to the seller's location. Granted, the seller and I had a dispute (which was that the seller refused to acknowledge the device spit out a fair amount of magic smoke when powering a small charger). Again, it's effort in and effort out. If you buy something off Amazon, make sure it's being shipped to you by Amazon!
ryanSrich 9y ago
Does filtering by prime only help? I've started only buying prime eligible items and I've seen quality increase slightly. Also, oddly enough I've found jet.com to be far superior to Amazon in both price and quality when they actually have the item I need.