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Fake Goods Sold by AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Wish

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Re: Fake Goods Sold by AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Wish

#31

Post by meritt »

Spivak wrote: post #14
MichaelApproved wrote: post #6

> What's more, the product was found to contain 751 times the amount of lead Health Canada considers acceptable in cosmetics. How long are we going to let companies hide behind their "platform" bullshit? They know this happens but, because they're not the actual seller, they get to offload the liabilities to some fly-by-night company that'll close down and reopen under a different name. Lead in products is dangerous…

This frustration seems like it's just being directed at the closest entity you can shake your fist at rather than the actual cause. Suppose all those fly-by-night companies set up merchant accounts on Shopify or just bought cheap Wordpress template and hosted it themselves and did the exact same thing. The world of boutique men's watches is absolutely rampant with this. Would you be demanding that Shopify or Tim Bern…

Amazon ships products from their warehouses, in their packaging, charges credit cards as "Amazon.com", provides customer support, and accepts product returns. This makes it generally indistinguishable to the consumer if they're purchasing from Amazon or a sketchy third party vendor, as simply the "best" deal gets populated into the buy box. Unless a consumer drills down into the full offer list, the specific 3rd party merchant and the corresponding ratings are completely hidden.

That's significantly different from someone running their own ecommerce site where they are very clearly the merchant of record.

Re: Fake Goods Sold by AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Wish

#32

Post by gilrain »

shadowgovt wrote: post #24
MichaelApproved wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We shouldn't have to be investigative reporters in order to buy products that won't harm us. Even the merchant name is bullshit on Amazon. Try finding Apple headphones and see how many are sold by merchants named "Apple". Amazon has to know that product is not actually being sold by Apple, yet they allow the counterfeiting to continue.

> We shouldn't have to be investigative reporters in order to buy products that won't harm us. There are other marketplaces that offer a much higher quality guarantee than Amazon. Shop there instead.

The nearest Target to me is 130 miles away. Non-coastal states exist.

Re: Fake Goods Sold by AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Wish

#34

Post by jonathanstrange »

shadowgovt wrote: post #22
MichaelApproved wrote: post #6

> What's more, the product was found to contain 751 times the amount of lead Health Canada considers acceptable in cosmetics. How long are we going to let companies hide behind their "platform" bullshit? They know this happens but, because they're not the actual seller, they get to offload the liabilities to some fly-by-night company that'll close down and reopen under a different name. Lead in products is dangerous…

Ideally, this sort of market abuse would be translated into mistrust by the consumer. But I think a case can be made that it already is. Most consumers understand buyer-beware on online merchant websites (especially since eBay was rampant with this issue at its inception and has gotten better over the years). Perhaps it is the responsibility of the consumer to self-educate, not the responsibility of the market broker…

Without easy access to the relevant information? I mean how would the average customer know from the Amazon page or from even using the product that there is 751 times more lead than allowed in it?

If the distributor was required to test the product and put a large red banner "might induce lead poisoning" on the product page, then of course the consumer could choose. Alas, that's not the case.

Re: Fake Goods Sold by AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Wish

#35

Post by MichaelApproved »

shadowgovt wrote: post #24
MichaelApproved wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We shouldn't have to be investigative reporters in order to buy products that won't harm us. Even the merchant name is bullshit on Amazon. Try finding Apple headphones and see how many are sold by merchants named "Apple". Amazon has to know that product is not actually being sold by Apple, yet they allow the counterfeiting to continue.

> We shouldn't have to be investigative reporters in order to buy products that won't harm us. There are other marketplaces that offer a much higher quality guarantee than Amazon. Shop there instead.

Why do you accept that it’s ok to sell harmful products?

Amazon is a $1 trillion dollar company. It’s not some guy selling things out of the trunk of his car. It should be reasonable for me to assume buying something there is safe.

Re: Fake Goods Sold by AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Wish

#36

Post by ilikeatari »

karl11 wrote: post #5

I have basically stopped buying anything from Amazon that I can just buy direct from the manufacturer. Especially clothes, kids toys, etc. Most online stores now have shipping that is almost as fast, and 9 times out of 10 an extra couple of days shipping is not a big deal.

I am not sure why you are getting down voted but I did want to expand on this. I have a somewhat similar philosophy, though I still buy low value items from Amazon. What I discovered that online stores that have a truly seamless experience (for example well implemented apple pay etc) remove so much friction that the amazon option becomes less appealing. The issue is still with items that you would not know where to source from directly (like replacement part for a dishwasher) but these are usually low cost items anyway.

Re: Fake Goods Sold by AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Wish

#37

Post by preommr »

I get that people are outraged about this. And that's one side of it.

But I also feel like people need to know how to use these platforms. If you're getting a heavy discount, from a sketchy source, then maybe there's a reason for it. Idk about Wish, but platforms like ebay, aliexpress, etc. are great even for things like electronics if you know what you're buying like leds, microchips, etc. Makeup, perfume, power related applications, audio, etc. are the types of products that I would be very wary of. I think it still might be possible to find good sources for those things, but it's more of a gamble.

Before we crucify these platforms, and call for more regulations, etc, let's also remember that they do provide a valuable, cheap service for some.

Re: Fake Goods Sold by AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Wish

#38

Post by friendly_fren »

jsjddbbwj wrote: post #17
MichaelApproved wrote: post #6

> What's more, the product was found to contain 751 times the amount of lead Health Canada considers acceptable in cosmetics. How long are we going to let companies hide behind their "platform" bullshit? They know this happens but, because they're not the actual seller, they get to offload the liabilities to some fly-by-night company that'll close down and reopen under a different name. Lead in products is dangerous…

If you buy any health product, makeup, etc from AliExpress we should call this natural selection. Only half joking. I don't want to see AliExpress closed down just because some girl decided it was a good idea to buy lipstick there at an unbelievably low price.

People are downvoting this but it is true. Consumers have the responsibility to pay attention to where their goods come from. If you are buying something directly from China for an extremely cheap price, you shouldn't expect it to be genuine (not fake) or safe for bodily contact.

Re: Fake Goods Sold by AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Wish

#39

Post by Geeek »

This is all by design, I remember reading this WSJ article last year.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/amazons-heavy-recruitment-of-ch... "A new product listing is uploaded to Amazon from Chaine every 1/50th of a second"

Amazon is heavily invested in getting as much Chinese trash on their US site and it does not seem to care much about the counterfeit problem.

Re: Fake Goods Sold by AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Wish

#40

Post by dsfyu404ed »

freeone3000 wrote: post #20
Spivak wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This frustration seems like it's just being directed at the closest entity you can shake your fist at rather than the actual cause. Suppose all those fly-by-night companies set up merchant accounts on Shopify or just bought cheap Wordpress template and hosted it themselves and did the exact same thing. The world of boutique men's watches is absolutely rampant with this. Would you be demanding that Shopify or Tim Bern…

If you're buying off of a Shopify site, the only endorsement is from the seller. And you know who you're buying from. Amazon is allowing these companies to sell in Amazon's name. I'm not charged by YouCantBelieveItsNotNike, my CC bill says Amazon. I return these products to Amazon. Amazon is the seller.

>If you're buying off of a Shopify site, the only endorsement is from the seller.

Isn't that basically the same as on eBay and Alibaba?

Ebay has a curated front page but it never shows stuff sold from a jurisdiction distant enough to not be accountable for shady practices. It seems like amazon is the odd one out here since they hold inventory, ship it and sell a lot of things themselves.

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