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Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

theverge.com

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Re: Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

#131

Post by codersfocus »

barbazoo wrote: post #105
Analemma_ wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's an interesting point, and it got me thinking: why _do_ I continue buying from Amazon over AliExpress etc.? I asked myself the same question back in January and also couldn't come up with an answer beyond shipping speed, so I cancelled Prime and now just use AliExpress for most things that would've been an Amazon purchase before. Even the slower speed isn't that bad: if I genuinely need it right away I'll tra…

And it's kinda exciting when you get a delivery you totally forgot about.

That means you shouldn't have ordered it in the first place? I gave up on needless consumerism when I got an amazon package, didn't bother opening it, forgot what it was, and it just sat in my closet.

Re: Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

#132

Post by adrianmonk »

sofixa wrote: post #22
srmarm wrote: post #9

I don't get they don't crack down on the product switcheroo scam [0] - it seems like a trivial problem to solve. I've reported items to them before and they don't care. [0] this product for example, loads of the reviews are for something totally different - https://www.amazon.co.uk/WERPOWER-Windscreen-Invisible-Winds...

How is it trivial to solve? They either need to prevent sellers from modifying product pages (which would be a disaster because any mistakes could no longer be fixed without losing all reviews) or gate it behind human intervention(slow) /algorithm (complex). There's nothing trivial about the issue.

It's not trivial, but it's very, very feasible.

Consider that Amazon already does a lot of manual review. They do manual review of individual transactions if a customer is unhappy. The scale of that is enormous compared to this.

They also already do some manual review of product listings. (Every product listing page has a "Report incorrect product information" link.)

Adding this kind of manual review is surely a drop in the bucket if labor costs are the issue.

Re: Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

#133

Post by version_five »

One one hand this seems like a good thing, though it's really just a band-aid for what a low-quality bargain bin amazon has become. I see other comments about being able to dig into reviews by seller and whatnot. I don't want to have to do research like that to buy normal consumer crap. Some might, and that's cool, but I'm sad that any semblance of a curated experience is gone and it's basically just a street corner bazaar where you can't trust anything.

It's interesting to me that amazon, facebook and google, (netflix I'm on the fence about and apple no) have practiced a kind of scorched earth capitalism where they made a lot of money and presumably continue to, but effectively destroyed the environment they operate in. I think most agree that google has hollowed out search into an SEO optimized ad-filled content farm wasteland. Amazon is doing exactly the same thing with retail, they're the biggest name and they've basically created this layer of garbage as the base layer of e-commerce.

Re: Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

#134

Post by SkyPuncher »

captainkrtek wrote: post #56

I’ve given up on Amazon shopping years ago. I much prefer to buy things directly from specific retailers, eg: outdoor gear from an outdoor retailer, clothes directly from the brand, etc. This has resulted in never having to return anything, not rolling the dice on product legitimacy, and pretty great customer service who is knowledgable of the products.

I've gone back to ebay for commodities/non-name brand. So far, prices are better, shipping is faster, returns are easier, and fakes aren't an issue.

Re: Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

#135

Post by rybosworld »

haunter wrote: post #51

The craziest scam I saw on Amazon was ordering an expensive GPU > people change the card's backplate and return a cheaper/broken one. Unsuspecting regular Joe will order the returned GPU ("open box deal!") and they get a fake one. And now you have to fight against the Amazon customer service too. It's incredible. Amazon is basically a "premium" Wish/Aliexpress nowadays. Might as well I order from China becuase I at l…

This is a classic scam that also exists for brick and mortar stores.

For example: customer buys Brita filter from Walmart. Takes it home, puts their old used-up filter in the box. Returns the filter. Walmart employees aren't paid enough to care to check the contents, and even if they did, would they be able to tell the filter had been used?

Re: Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

#136

Post by SkyPuncher »

mbreese wrote: post #91
criddell wrote: post #47

I bought a $50 item and a couple of weeks later I received a letter in the mail offering me a $35 Amazon gift card if I leave a 5-star review with a video or picture attached. I'm surprised Amazon allows these kinds of bribes.

They don't, but it's hard to crack down on. The only way for Amazon to know is if the people who get the gift card notify Amazon, which isn't likely to happen. Here's a story about how Amazon banned a popular battery/charger maker because of the same thing you're talking about. (I have one of their batteries... it was pretty good too). https://www.theverge.com/2021/6/16/22536976/amazon-ravpower-...

It'd be far easier if Amazon didn't provide my contact information to sellers (unless they're large enough to be "trustworthy")

Re: Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

#137

Post by jwally »

While the idea of anonymizing product reviews might seem a tad idealistic, it could potentially reduce the prevalence of paid reviews. By concealing the identities of verified purchasers, it becomes more challenging for manufacturers to verify if their paid reviewers have indeed submitted their reviews. This approach may serve as a deterrent for unethical marketing practices, promoting a more honest review ecosystem.

Re: Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

#138

Post by tylerrobinson »

mabbo wrote: post #106

There is a famous story about Customer Obsession and returns that I used to tell during training sessions for new Amazon employees- Customer Obsession 101, which I was a teacher for. Jeff is in a call center for a day shadowing a customer support agent. A customer calls about a specific item and the CS agent is like "They're going to say it's broken in this particular manner" before the call even starts. Jeff later i…

> So Amazon introduced an 'Andon button'

Maybe my brain is just having trouble parsing it, but what does “Andon” mean?

Re: Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

#139

Post by hedora »

vlovich123 wrote: post #31
heavyset_go wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Requiring new listings for new product titles/SKUs, or approval for significant changes to titles/SKUs, seems like it would stop a good portion of these scams.

Yeah, with permanent delisting of the entire company as the penalty. Of course, these people don’t care. They’ll just spin up a new seller and thus the only people you end up hurting are legitimate partners updating their product line.

Add a filter by “companies that have been selling on amazon for at least 12 months and 10,000 fulfillments“ button.

(Or just call it “rank by seller reputation”)

Re: Amazon starts flagging frequently returned products that you maybe shouldn’t buy

#140

Post by marcosdumay »

generj wrote: post #61
lwhi wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ChatGPT can definitely work this out.

Even a simple Levenshtein distance would do the trick for most of these product switches.

A neural network classifier would surely get less of both false positives, false negatived, ans exploitable vulnerabilities.

But at the end of the say, the question is just if Amazon has any interest at all in stop being accessory to large scale fraud. And the answer is pretty obvious; any of the things people are discussing here is viable, they could pick any or even spend more than 3 seconds thinking about the problem.

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