Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers • Hacker News Board

Re: Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers

#31

Post by mkl » Fri, Aug 23, 2019, 1:57 PM UTC

thechao wrote: post #23

itp wrote: post #14

I appreciate why the title was modified from the original, but the mistaken use of "it's" rather than "its" was introduced in the process and should be corrected.

There’s a trivial way for native English speakers to learn this rule: replace ‘it’ with ‘his’, appropriately, adjust comma to suit. > Amazon has ceded control of hi’s site to a 3rd party... Obviously incorrect.

It's an apostrophe, not a comma, and unfortunately that won't work in the case where it should be "it's", like at the start of this sentence, but yes. "It's" only ever means "it is" or "it has".

Re: Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers

#32

Post by dsfyu404ed » Fri, Aug 23, 2019, 1:57 PM UTC

Klathmon wrote: post #21

sergiotapia wrote: post #3

We used to buy from Amazon since it was a stamp of quality. I tried buying a usb-c cable for my mac mini, and it was terrible. So many brands and no way of knowing what to get. Today you might as well buy from Ebay. What online store exists today, where I can be guaranteed to buy quality things? Do they no longer exist?

This is the same issue I've had with walmart. For a long time now it's been obvious they have brands make "special versions" of many products for walmart which are lower quality and cheaper. Now they are offering free one and 2 day delivery on their site, but I just don't want to go there for fear that I'll end up getting what looks like a "good deal" but what I'll actually get is a worse more cheaply made product. A…

At least with Walmart you know their value engineered products are actually made by who they say they are and actually work enough of the time to pass whatever QC standards were set. With Amazon you have no idea whether you're getting a counterfeit.

Re: Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers

#33

Post by castlecrasher2 » Fri, Aug 23, 2019, 1:57 PM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #9

athenot wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The odd thing is eBay's quality is now easier to assess than Amazon's.

And eBay is often way cheaper to boot.

definitely so for <$10 items, sometimes higher. Anything I've bought on eBay for <$10 is nearly always $10 or higher on Amazon

Re: Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers

#34

Post by cmrdporcupine » Fri, Aug 23, 2019, 1:57 PM UTC

This among many reasons is is why I cancelled my prime membership. The quality control is abysmal. It's become an eBay, but without a proper dispute system, and crazy prices. Many goods get listed at multiples of the price available elsewhere and if you're not paying attention you can get screwed. It's totally buyer beware. The trust that Amazon established over the years has been lost.

I ordered something on Amazon Canada, it was listed as sold by Amazon.com.ca. It qualified for prime. I ordered expecting it to arrive in 2 days. It took over a week and it became clear after the fact that it had been sourced from a US supplier and because it happened over the 4th of July it sat in a warehouse for a few days over the holiday.

Amazon hid that it was a third party supplier. Amazon hid that it was coming from across the border. Amazon refused to cancel and refund the order once this became clear.

They've really gone down hill.

Re: Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers

#35

Post by jtbayly » Fri, Aug 23, 2019, 1:57 PM UTC

thechao wrote: post #23

itp wrote: post #14

I appreciate why the title was modified from the original, but the mistaken use of "it's" rather than "its" was introduced in the process and should be corrected.

There’s a trivial way for native English speakers to learn this rule: replace ‘it’ with ‘his’, appropriately, adjust comma to suit. > Amazon has ceded control of hi’s site to a 3rd party... Obviously incorrect.

When does "hi's" ever look correct though?

Re: Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers

#36

Post by sergiotapia » Fri, Aug 23, 2019, 1:58 PM UTC

stanski wrote: post #24

They were sued for the recklessly mislabeled helmet and still didn't take the posting down? Even if they could've argued that they themselves were fooled by the seller initially, not following up after the guy was killed points to a much bigger issue. Basically they just don't give a shit. Side note: I'm filled with dread just thinking about buying a motorcycle helmet from amazon.

Take the number of helmets in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one.

Re: Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers

#37

Post by rootusrootus » Fri, Aug 23, 2019, 1:59 PM UTC

bluedino wrote: post #7

sergiotapia wrote: post #3

We used to buy from Amazon since it was a stamp of quality. I tried buying a usb-c cable for my mac mini, and it was terrible. So many brands and no way of knowing what to get. Today you might as well buy from Ebay. What online store exists today, where I can be guaranteed to buy quality things? Do they no longer exist?

When was Amazon ever a 'stamp of quality'? You can still buy a brand-name cable from Best Buy or other retailers that people used to use before everyone was trying to save a few pennies.

> When was Amazon ever a 'stamp of quality'?

Up until the moment they started intermixing stock from third-party sellers in with the stuff "Ships from and sold by Amazon." It is this change all by itself that pushes me away from using Amazon. If I could just opt-out of the third party sellers I would, but I can buy a product ostensibly from Amazon and still end up with a fake.

Re: Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers

#38

Post by toomuchtodo » Fri, Aug 23, 2019, 1:59 PM UTC

martythemaniak wrote: post #30

I wonder if Amazon won't somehow kill itself with poor quality. I needed a bunch of LED bulbs recently and I knew exactly what I was looking for - about a dozen 40W eq, two 60w eq and two 100w eq, all in 2700K and two 100w in 3000K. Amazon was a mess - prices were all over the place, exact products were hard to find, etc. Dollarama had them all for $2.50, $3.50 and $4.00 a piece, usually in all three flavours (2700,…

Digikey has reasonable pricing and shipping costs. Might consider them for future purchases.

Re: Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers

#39

Post by athenot » Fri, Aug 23, 2019, 1:59 PM UTC

isolli wrote: post #19

athenot wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The odd thing is eBay's quality is now easier to assess than Amazon's.

How do you assess quality on eBay, e.g. for cables?

For an active cable (lighning, etc.) look for new and look at the seller's feedback. Look at the other stuff they are selling. Is it junk, is it all off-brand? How long have they been selling?

It's not fool-proof and I still find myself buying only cable brands I trust (I don't mind overpaying for peace of mind when it comes to that). But the likelyhood of fakes (imitations of legitimate brands) is much lower, in my opinion.

Re: Amazon has proven unable or unwilling to effectively police third-party sellers

#40

Post by docker_up » Fri, Aug 23, 2019, 1:59 PM UTC

Already this year the number of purchases I've made is cut in half from last year. I've gotten burned with too many poor 3rd party sellers. They are so greedy for the short term revenues they don't realize that us "idiots" are starting to lost trust in their system, and if that happens at a large scale, their business will collapse.