3 ms·

It used to be better, not anymore. I used to buy on Amazon first, but these days on Amazon I've had too many fake products, and refurbished products sold as new

It used to be better, not anymore. I used to buy on Amazon first, but these days on Amazon I've had too many fake products, and refurbished products sold as new. True, they refund easily. But I'd rather not have to return half of my purchases.

notyourwork 7y ago
Half sounds like a over dramatization of a minority issue.
- kardos 7y ago
  Even if it was 10% used-products-sold-as-new, that's not acceptable.
  - ericd 7y ago
    I’ve ordered hundreds of items from Amazon, I’ve never gotten any that I thought were used.
wahern 7y ago
So why not only buy products sold by Amazon? I've never had a problem buying third-party products through Amazon, but long before I started reading about fraud stories I always tended to avoid those, anyhow. I like Amazon because of the consistency. For anything expensive, if Amazon doesn't sell it directly I'll go to a local retailer rather than take the risk. Only rarely do I buy, say, German deodorant from some random importer selling through Amazon. Alternatively, I'll buy from an eBay seller as long as they have a solid reputation. The problem with Amazon's review system is that it's not obvious to me from which seller a customer purchased the product, which sort of makes the review system useless in that regard. So, yes, the review system is problematic, but why avoid Amazon entirely when you can simply avoid non-Amazon sellers? This refrain about fraudulent third-party sellers seems like a non sequitur to me, at least the way it's presented. If you're avoiding Amazon out of spite for the way they obfuscate seller reputations, then just say that; that's a fair argument. EDIT: Here's what I look for: "Ships from and sold by Amazon.com." If you see that, then it means Amazon is getting the product through the same channels as, say, Target. As far as I understand, Amazon won't intermingle their inventory in the same bins as third-party inventory, or if they did long ago they no longer do. But feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.
ekianjo 7y ago
> these days on Amazon I've had too many fake products I keep seeing this kind of posts on HN, and even though I shop several times a week on Amazon I have never received a fake product. Is this limited to very specific categories?

notyourwork 7y ago

Half sounds like a over dramatization of a minority issue.

kardos 7y ago
Even if it was 10% used-products-sold-as-new, that's not acceptable.
- ericd 7y ago
  I’ve ordered hundreds of items from Amazon, I’ve never gotten any that I thought were used.

wahern 7y ago

So why not only buy products sold by Amazon? I've never had a problem buying third-party products through Amazon, but long before I started reading about fraud stories I always tended to avoid those, anyhow. I like Amazon because of the consistency. For anything expensive, if Amazon doesn't sell it directly I'll go to a local retailer rather than take the risk. Only rarely do I buy, say, German deodorant from some random importer selling through Amazon. Alternatively, I'll buy from an eBay seller as long as they have a solid reputation. The problem with Amazon's review system is that it's not obvious to me from which seller a customer purchased the product, which sort of makes the review system useless in that regard. So, yes, the review system is problematic, but why avoid Amazon entirely when you can simply avoid non-Amazon sellers? This refrain about fraudulent third-party sellers seems like a non sequitur to me, at least the way it's presented. If you're avoiding Amazon out of spite for the way they obfuscate seller reputations, then just say that; that's a fair argument. EDIT: Here's what I look for: "Ships from and sold by Amazon.com." If you see that, then it means Amazon is getting the product through the same channels as, say, Target. As far as I understand, Amazon won't intermingle their inventory in the same bins as third-party inventory, or if they did long ago they no longer do. But feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

ekianjo 7y ago

> these days on Amazon I've had too many fake products I keep seeing this kind of posts on HN, and even though I shop several times a week on Amazon I have never received a fake product. Is this limited to very specific categories?