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Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

californiaglobe.com

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Re: Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

#91

Post by Exuma »

tedfernau wrote: post #66
xoxoy wrote: post #60

Shopping on Amazon has become unbearable for like 95% of categories these days. The experience is like rummaging through some shady tourist market with a dozen stall owners trying to scam you. The pricing is all whack with lots of counterfeits that have gamed the ranking and review systems. It’s just not worth trying to filter and find things that are actually competitively priced and sold directly by Amazon. Have no…

I could hardly disagree more. It takes some effort to find the good stuff, but Amazon is the superior way to shop online for most things.

As someone with 2200 purchase on amazon over the last several years, you're definitely wrong. I have to use every trick up my sleeve to not get pure hot alibaba trash. It USED to be that amazon best seller items were good at least, and now those are an absolute trash garbage fest as well too. Go try to buy a strainer, charger, literally any appliance, anything, and tell me you get good results.

Re: Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

#92

Post by ChuckMcM »

Wow, here is the actual decision : https://cases.justia.com/california/court-of-appeal/2020-d07...

It definitely looks like Amazon is going to have to accept strict liability in California. That will make it interesting to see what they do. Do they leave California? (their biggest US market) or do they clean up their FBA act? I'm hoping for the latter, as the justices argue in the decision that is exactly the intent of California's strict liability.

Re: Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

#93

Post by ChuckMcM »

stickfigure wrote: post #61
jarym wrote: post #9

Common sense. Amazon want to ‘own’ the customer relationship and go to great lengths to that end then it follows they will have to ‘own’ any liability too. Imagine you went into a retail store with a faulty product and they were to try fob you off saying you need to go to their supplier/wholesaler/manufacturer. It mostly doesn’t work that way thanks to most consumer protection laws in place.

> Imagine you went into a retail store with a faulty product I understand where you are coming from, but there are lots of consignment stores and flea markets, at least in the middle parts of the US. The person you pay at the front counter simply records the transaction for the merchant. Amazon is a sort of cross between traditional retail and a consignment store, so it's not obvious (or "common sense") where product…

This is laid out in the judgement[1]. In California, if you are an integral part between the manufacturer and the consumer, especially if you are the one that "owns the relationship" you are on the hook for strict liability.

[1] Starting from Page 17 -- https://cases.justia.com/california/court-of-appeal/2020-d07...

Re: Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

#94

Post by crooked-v »

kadoban wrote: post #90
stickfigure wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not correct. There are plenty of subdivided retail marketplaces (with a single cashier) that sell new products. There's one here where I live in Winters (just north of SF), and I found them frequently in the midwest when I lived there. Merchants rent small blocks of space from the establishment; what they put on the shelves is really up to them. Yes, this is commonly secondhand goods. But not always. The shop…

That starts to be somewhat comparable, but still doesn't feel much like Amazon. Amazon isn't separate blocks of space, and merchants don't really rent their own areas. On a website that'd look like amazon.com/mycrapcompanystore/ or something. As a customer I just go to amazon and search for what I want. They choose what specific items I should see, in what order, and I am barely aware of who actually sent the item to…

Ebay is a good contrast here, as while it has the same general search-for-a-thing idea, it makes it very clear that you're buying this one specific item from this one specific merchant.

Re: Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

#95

Post by vkou »

stickfigure wrote: post #78
wtallis wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consignment stores and flea markets are for secondhand goods. Most of what is sold on Amazon is represented by Amazon as new rather than used.

This is not correct. There are plenty of subdivided retail marketplaces (with a single cashier) that sell new products. There's one here where I live in Winters (just north of SF), and I found them frequently in the midwest when I lived there. Merchants rent small blocks of space from the establishment; what they put on the shelves is really up to them. Yes, this is commonly secondhand goods. But not always. The shop…

When I buy a widget from Amazon, I'm not actually getting a widget from some particular merchant on Amazon.

I'm getting a widget that was pulled out of a co-mingled inventory box at some Amazon warehouse.

Amazon owns the entire shopping experience, end-to-end. They run the website. They design the website. They handle payments. They advertise the items ("Customers who bought Foo also bought Bar"). They handle shipping. They handle refunds. They handle warehousing.

But they don't seem to want to own the responsibility. I'm assuming that's because it's not the profitable part of this equation.

Re: Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

#96

Post by pottertheotter »

technofiend wrote: post #86
xoxoy wrote: post #60

Shopping on Amazon has become unbearable for like 95% of categories these days. The experience is like rummaging through some shady tourist market with a dozen stall owners trying to scam you. The pricing is all whack with lots of counterfeits that have gamed the ranking and review systems. It’s just not worth trying to filter and find things that are actually competitively priced and sold directly by Amazon. Have no…

Sadly Walmart is the same. So far Target does not allow third party sellers so they're my go to for anything I need to guarantee is legitimate. That or the manufacturer's website if they happen to sell direct. Amazon's heyday has (IMHO) come and gone as a seller of anything but their own brands.

I am saddened that Walmart continues to chase the 3rd party seller gimmick, but they at least allow you to filter results by seller. I always select Walmart.com, ignoring everything else.

Also, Target does have 3rd party sellers, but it sounds like they are doing it in a more constrained way. The program is called Target Plus. https://digiday.com/marketing/target-third-party-marketplace...

Re: Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

#97

Post by x0x0 »

cscurmudgeon wrote: post #88
an_opabinia wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has Amazon systemically refuses refunds for people who try to return counterfeit goods? It definitely doesn’t care if you don’t even notice. But they do the returns if you ask. The former is what needs to change.

Only within their refund period. I have had so many products break down after their return window. Most recent example: Expensive chargers which stopped work within a few months. The seller’s page was gone. Customer support was of no use. This seems to be a common pattern. Fly by night sellers whose pages disappear within a few days.

"duracell" cr2032s -- those little pancake batteries for your car keyfob -- that die within 4 months. Which is weird, because the duracells at my hardware store last like 5 years.

Re: Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

#98

Post by fxtentacle »

stickfigure wrote: post #61
jarym wrote: post #9

Common sense. Amazon want to ‘own’ the customer relationship and go to great lengths to that end then it follows they will have to ‘own’ any liability too. Imagine you went into a retail store with a faulty product and they were to try fob you off saying you need to go to their supplier/wholesaler/manufacturer. It mostly doesn’t work that way thanks to most consumer protection laws in place.

> Imagine you went into a retail store with a faulty product I understand where you are coming from, but there are lots of consignment stores and flea markets, at least in the middle parts of the US. The person you pay at the front counter simply records the transaction for the merchant. Amazon is a sort of cross between traditional retail and a consignment store, so it's not obvious (or "common sense") where product…

Amazon is sort of like a consignment store where all the products from all the merchants are mixed into one large bin and you need special equipment to figure out the seller of each item, but of course it's fully acceptable for them to just give a fake name and address. Plus nobody checks what you sell for legality.

If a consignment store would allow random people from all over the world to sell illegal and dangerous goods with a fake ID while dodging taxes... would anyone find that tolerable?

Why accept the website equivalent?

Re: Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

#99

Post by duskwuff »

kadoban wrote: post #90
stickfigure wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not correct. There are plenty of subdivided retail marketplaces (with a single cashier) that sell new products. There's one here where I live in Winters (just north of SF), and I found them frequently in the midwest when I lived there. Merchants rent small blocks of space from the establishment; what they put on the shelves is really up to them. Yes, this is commonly secondhand goods. But not always. The shop…

That starts to be somewhat comparable, but still doesn't feel much like Amazon. Amazon isn't separate blocks of space, and merchants don't really rent their own areas. On a website that'd look like amazon.com/mycrapcompanystore/ or something. As a customer I just go to amazon and search for what I want. They choose what specific items I should see, in what order, and I am barely aware of who actually sent the item to…

Technically there is a "storefront" page for each seller on Amazon, but it's not easy to get to and is awkward to navigate. Here's an example of one:

https://www.amazon.com/s?me=A30QSGOJR8LMXA

Overall I'd agree, though -- Amazon has gone out of their way to take focus away from the individual merchants on their site and give customers the impression that they're buying items "from Amazon".

Re: Amazon Liable for Defective Third-Party Products Rules CA Appellate Court

#100

Post by onion2k »

Exuma wrote: post #91
tedfernau wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I could hardly disagree more. It takes some effort to find the good stuff, but Amazon is the superior way to shop online for most things.

As someone with 2200 purchase on amazon over the last several years, you're definitely wrong. I have to use every trick up my sleeve to not get pure hot alibaba trash. It USED to be that amazon best seller items were good at least, and now those are an absolute trash garbage fest as well too. Go try to buy a strainer, charger, literally any appliance, anything, and tell me you get good results.

If you've bought 2200 things despite it being so awful why would Amazon be inclined to fix it? Your orders show them it's working for you.
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