4 ms·

> 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 c

> 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.

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.