gambling on a to good to be true deal

[Way2slow]

Net store "Sale Fishing Rods" has prices that are unreal (from China I assume).  Came across them looking for some cheap spinning rods to replace a couple of bream rods that are too far gone or broken. Eagle rods that are $60+, plus shipping were over half price with free shipping.

I ordered three last month, they said up front at least three weeks before shipping.  Got an email today saying they shipped, sorta surprised me.  Gonna surprise me even more if they show up at my door.

The deal was through paypal, so I felt a little better about it, but still have my doubts.  I figured I would use this purchase to test the waters because they have remarkable prices.  Also, they may be shipping this cheap order as sucker bait for a larger order.

I will let ya'll know if they actually show up.  Reviews from the past seem to indicate they probably won't, but I'm thinking paypal will cover it if not.  That might also be wishful thinking based on past experience with paypal.

It would take several more cheap orders before I would even consider trying a more expensive one.

 

 

 

 

 

i

[gunsinger]

I hope you get your rods.  If you don't, don't count on Paypal to make you whole.  My brother used Paypal on a "too good to be true" 15x12 plastic shed...."installed."  Suffice to say, once they got his Paypal payment, he never heard from them again.  

 

I urged him to contact Paypal and get his payment revoked.  Either he did something wrong, or they don't protect you like I thought.  They kept telling him, "Send a copy of the return receipt showing you've returned the merchandise and we'll refund your money."  Of course, he had no return receipt because he never got anything to return. 

 

Maybe he just didn't do a good job of explaining that he had been scammed.

[Jigfishn10]

Good luck way2. Hope they show up.

 

I don’t have a PayPal acct, but I like the option of being able to use optional payment methods on PayPal. I use American Express.
 

I’ve been an American Express member since ‘87 and once I got scammed. I called Amex to put in a claim. They investigated it and refunded my money in the following statement. 

[Way2slow]

AmEx is my backup plan.  Paypal is billed through my AmEx card.  I have had two occasions where paypal tried to stick it to me and AmEx made it good and went back against paypal.  The first one was some serious money that paypal tried to say I authorized that someone using their guest sign-in sent themselves.  It took a month of battling with them, finally AmEx told them where to go and credited it back to my account.  I closed out my account with paypal for several years, but it's tough buying on line without them.

To be honest, I'm fully expecting this to be a scam, but it's not a lot of money and it will be like getting three rods for  the price of ones if it pans out.

When the reward is good enough, I'll take risk.  I just received some stuff I got through backing a Kick- Start startup, I invested $300.  Received $800 worth of electronics items if I had waited to see if their startup was going to make a go of it.

[jimmyjoe]

18 hours ago, Way2slow said:

Reviews from the past seem to indicate they probably won't

 

10 hours ago, Way2slow said:

To be honest, I'm fully expecting this to be a scam

 

   I apologize, but I'm not quite sure I understand. You're subsidizing a sales site that reviews have indicated is a scam, and you expect it to be a scam, and you still go ahead and deal with them???

   Why do you even CONSIDER dealing with these people? It's like going to bed a girl who you already know has venereal disease and thinking you won't get it.

   And then you play PayPal for the fool, using them to subsidize your behavior?

   And you teach your brother to bilk PayPal, too, on an advertised offer that's obviously crooked?   And brag about it here?

 

   Have I got that right, or did I not understand something?      jj

 

  

  

 

[Way2slow]

Depends on how much research you do.  Yes, they are fairly new. Yes they are dirt cheap. No they don't claim fast service, and yes they very much have the potential to be a scam.  However, you also have to look at the fact, on the internet, one person can post a bad experience, and a 1,000 more will pick up on that and repeat it like it was theirs, but one person can post a good experience and that's it, no one says anything about that.  That gives a bad experience a 1,000:1 odds of being read on the net.

Then you also have those that are going to complain about any and everything and no matter what you do, they are still going to complain. 

You read five post about them being a scam, but one would think if they were a total scam, paypal would not allow them to use their service.

I agree, they could very well be, but at the same time, I've been around long enough to know how this internet stuff works, and I was willing to risk a few bucks to see.  They could very well be a new company that's suffering from the growing pains of getting started on the international market.

As for bilking paypal, if they are doing business with a company that is known to be a scam, then they need to be bilked for allowing it to continue.

I've posted this on here so others that might have seen that sight and wondered will be able to read a first hand experience from someone willing to risk it.  If I loose a few bucks in this adventure, it's my money, not yours, and it might save some others a whole lot more.

 

Oh, and the VD, that's what condoms are for, when taking risk you try to have some protection.

 

Now, lets get back to keeping things clean so this doesn't get locked so I will be able to post the final results of this deal.  I would like for others to know the final outcome

[gunsinger]

1 hour ago, jimmyjoe said:

And you teach your brother to bilk PayPal, too, on an advertised offer that's obviously crooked?   And brag about it here?

 

   Have I got that right, or did I not understand something?      jj

 

  

  

 

I do think are not understanding one part of this.  The OP didn't say anything about his brother, I did.  And I didn't teach him anything.  He bought the shed using PayPal.  Had he consulted me first, I would have attempted to dissuade him from making the purchase because I could clearly see that the site he bought from was a scam. 

 

I simply urged him to see if Paypal had any protection in place when the buyer was obviously scammed, fully expecting that Paypal could get their money back from the buyer.  

 

No bragging or bilking going on here.

[bulldog1935]

gambling is a euphemism.  

Tying up your money and getting yourself into a long-term refund dispute is more accurate.  

 

Recently ordered some IXA spool bearings though my Japan broker (can't get them any other way).  

At the same time, asked him to order some MTCW (metal, not plastic) drag plate-knobs from a half price "closeout" listing (they increase direct drag contact by 20% and double click-adjustment detentes).    

He replied the site was bogus.  I thanked Masamichi for the information, and lived without the parts.  

 

I didn't buy a surf rod I badly wanted from a website that had a really good presentation of their "brick and mortar" tackle store in Singapore.  However, found a sister site in China with the same inventory list, prices and nothing to support they were real (alpha and beta versions).  When the "brick" site didn't reply to my shipping query e-mails, I knew they were both bogus.  

 

Similar bogus seller examples always come up on Ali Express discussions on the rods and lines page.  However, in the case of Ali Express, they don't apply.  This is because Ali works like Amazon and will automatically refund you if they either don't get to Ali warehouse on time, or you don't receive them on time.  

[jimmyjoe]

2 hours ago, gunsinger said:

I do think are not understanding one part of this.  The OP didn't say anything about his brother, I did.  And I didn't teach him anything.  He bought the shed using PayPal.  Had he consulted me first, I would have attempted to dissuade him from making the purchase because I could clearly see that the site he bought from was a scam. 

 

I simply urged him to see if Paypal had any protection in place when the buyer was obviously scammed, fully expecting that Paypal could get their money back from the buyer.  

 

No bragging or bilking going on here.

 

Wrong person. I apologize.           jj

[deaknh03]

When you google it, scam comes up as a search result, at the top. I would start the refund process Pronto thru PayPal. 

[gunsinger]

6 hours ago, jimmyjoe said:

 

Wrong person. I apologize.           jj

No harm, no foul. @jimmyjoe

[Way2slow]

Final outcome!

after about 10 days, I received an email saying my order had shipped but no kind of tracking number.

I checked my AmEx and it has not been billed.  I checked my paypal accoun and it's still in pending status.A few days later I sent them an email requesting a tracking number. 

That email was returned not deliverable, box was full and over the limit.

I sent a copy of this to paypal plus several links saying site was a scam.  Paypal could care less, there was nothing they would do, but in 30 days it would automatically be deleted if it was still pending where the company had not requested the funds. 

Today was the 30th day, there is no record of the transaction on my paypal account, so it looks like their computer deleted it.

 

So be it a scam, or a defunct company, I don't know.  I can say it's not a company one would want to order from.

 

[Jigfishn10]

18 hours ago, Way2slow said:

I can say it's not a company one would want to order from.

That may be a wise decision. ?

[TnRiver46]

I don’t buy anything that isn’t rang up by a cashier or straight from the workbench of @Bluebasser86 haha

[Way2slow]

It's hard to get a great deal at a cash register.  I recently bought a new Dell XPS-13 2in1 tablet/laptop.  I needed a new MS Office.  I found a downloadable full version of MS-Office 2019 Pro for $49, over 1/4th of what a cash register version would have cost.

[MN Fisher]

58 minutes ago, Way2slow said:

It's hard to get a great deal at a cash register.  I recently bought a new Dell XPS-13 2in1 tablet/laptop.  I needed a new MS Office.  I found a downloadable full version of MS-Office 2019 Pro for $49, over 1/4th of what a cash register version would have cost.

I pay nothing for my Office - Libre Office is fully MS compatible, and is a freebie.

[Way2slow]

First time I've heard of that one.  I've used MS-Office since it first came out, and comfortable using it.  This is the first time I've ever bought it, always got it free in the military.  I still have some 2010 Pro's I could have used, but figured at the price I got the 2019 I would upgrade to it.

[bulldog1935]

I found some stuff I really wanted at a nice-looking website in India.  

Other than OOS listing at Hedgehog Studio, the India website was the highest hit on google.  

Searching for information on the India website and their domain, determined it was less than 15 days old.  

Their website claims a decade of great service.  

If I decide I really want the part, found a Japan website that my trusty Japan broker can determine its authenticity, and order with a 10% brokerage fee.  

 

[Bankbeater]

I learned a long time ago that if it's to good to be true, it usually isn't.

[Way2slow]

Yep, normally that's the case, but, as I mentioned before, with the right research it can pay to take a chance.  Like I said, there was not a lot of money involved, and if the sight had paned out, it would have been a good deal.  I've done a lot of deals that sounded too good to be true that made or saved me a lot of money, and have been burned a few times.  Would I risk a large sum of money on a possible sucker deal, no way.  However, when I feel it's worth the risk, I will chance it. Like getting the down load version of MS Office Pro 2019 for less than $50.  I did some research and it was about  50/50 being legit, but I couldn't find anything bad about the company I got it through.  During the whole process of down loading, installing and registering it with MS, I was anticipating some red flag would pop up, but it ended up being totally legit.  Yet, that same deal through another company I looked at would have probably been a scam.  

I've bought a lot of cars, boats, motors and tons of other things on deals that sounded too good to be true.  Like a 2004 VW Beetle Convertible for my wife for $200, that looks and runs great and other than the tires I put on it, I have less than $500 in the car.