Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

Ok, here's the deal. I bought one of these 2GB Full Metal i-Platinum players with the deluxe 1.8" screen (same as from UXCELL) from this Hong Kong seller, and I dont know if I should go through with it and pay them.

They're selling them at unusually low starting prices ($24.99), and extremely low global shipping of $5 (UXCELL's rate, actually). The seller has a VERY low feedback score of 3 (100% +). Well I contacted his entire feedback record. All 3 buyers appear to be legit (ie. not personal friends), and stated that they had not received their players yet! The seller had asked them to leave a + feedback so he ("she", depending on who you ask...) could build a reputation. But the buyers seemed quite confident they would. I'm not so confident, and I sure as shit wouldn't leave feedback until I received my item and inspected it under an electron microscope.

Besides the unusual feedback, here's a few reasons why I'm hesitating on Paypalling him and completing the transaction:

The seller offers no shipping insurance in his ad, so you cant ask for it. That leaves tracking (for later Paypal claims). In the feedback, one of the buyer's mentions "tracking" (I've asked the seller yesterday if tracking is available and gotten no reply yet, despite the other buyers saying "Fast communication!"). The seller lists the shipping service as "Expedited International Flat Rate". On Hong Kong's Post's site, I can not find any such service listed. Are they actually using a private shipper that charges $5 for international shipping service with tracking??

The seller's ad is fairly well put together and despite the low feedback, currently has about 775 items up. That to me says this is probably not a "new seller" to eBay (possibly a seller that got booted off eBay and is using a new name). If the seller is not legit, here's one possible scenario:

He has 775 items listed, but doesn't have a damn thing in stock and never saw any of these things in his life. He prices the items low enough to get a lot of people interested, with the shipping even lower to seal the deal. He convinces a few to give him feedback. Then when he makes enough money quickly, he splits eBayville. He of course empties his Paypal account every 5 minutes. One seller told me not to worry, Paypal will give me a refund if I dont get the item. But I just read Paypal's policy and they dont guarantee any such thing.

The seller does not have Paypal's Buyer Protection Policy. That means all Paypal will do is "make reasonable efforts to get the seller to reimburse". But that means if the seller has emptied his Paypal balance, even if you win the dispute, you won't get squat. And since Paypal notifies the seller of the dispute, you can bet your booties he's going to have enough time to empty his account.

Now I realize that sellers have to start "somewhere" but... what are my chances of not getting ripped off if I pay this seller for the item? I'm especially wary because in this case, it isn't my money its my girlfriend's money that I'd be spending.... (sorry for the long post!)

I just discovered this seller (tamainc) has another account in the UK (typical behaviour for Hong Kong sellers, isn't it?!). His UK account is "fatboy5354"The ads are almost exactly alike, even if the player's aren't. The M.O. is the same, with low shipping and starting price (but in pounds).
And so is the feedback. Very low 1 + feedback, that is also a "bogus feedback", where the buyer was asked to give a positive feedback (unless the seller truly managed to send an MP4 player from UK or Hong Kong to the US in one day!!). "FATBOY5354" is the seller mentioned in member rakashmiri's recent post in this forum called "2GB 2nd Generation Metal Pod MP3 MP4?".

This is the player I bought:

http://cgi.ebay.com/2GB-2nd-Generation-Metal-Pod-MP3-MP4-Player-i-Platinum_W0QQitemZ250071571786QQihZ015QQcategoryZ7 3839QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

Michiganjfrog, I would recommend you to stay away from the seller. Although he could be genuine, its a very slim chance.

I got an iPlatinum from a HongKong seller too, very stupid communication but it was okay. [Was scared to death when I read about the hack.] But the shipping was much higher and insurance was required. [about $25 for shipping and $14.99 for the 1GB product.]

This one just seems to be a con man attracting people with low prices. I'd be dumb to leave feedback BEFORE I got the product. :) It would be better if you paid a bit higher to get a product from a known and reputed seller instead of firing an arrow in the dark.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

Well, michiganfrog it's a good thing you didn't pay for the item.
His "tamainc" , ebay account has just been deactivated for his profile now bears "no longer a registered user" and all his items have been pulled.

I wish I would have read your post before paying myself.
Now I have escalated a paypal claim and informed paypal that he may be operating under UK ebay account "fatboy5354" as you suspect.

That, "fatboy5354" account is still active.
I suggested they investigate that account and freeze the related paypal account if they can connect the sellers.

Man, I've got to read these forums before I ever buy another chipod.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

Follow-up,
Glad I have been watching this guy, since I payed for item.
I filed paypal dispute immediately after seeing his ebay account
suspended and managed to get a full refund from his paypal account.
I'm sure some people won't be so lucky.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

Thanks for letting me know. I had exactly this scenario in my mind when I bought the player. I would buy it, then the seller would skeedaddle with the loot and never send out a damn thing to anyone, and I'd see "NLARU" on his account. I guess that explains why TAMAINC never pushed that hard to get me to pay for the auction I won.

Glad you were able to get a full refund from Paypal. I wonder if all those people I emailed who bought the same player off this seller and told me they were putting their blind faith in "her", have seen refunds as well, or if they've gotten royally stiffed. I see a bit of a pattern in my Paypal disputes and that of others, where when a seller is definitely tagged as a crook due to many complaints or suspension from eBay, you're more likely to get your money back (providing Paypal froze the account in time). Of course eBay's pretending FAT5434 is not related to TAMAINC, it looks like.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

Yes, I was tempted by the low prices and jumped right in the con.
It would surprize me greatly if "fatboy5354" turns out to be legitimate.
He has almost the exact same MO as "tamainc".
The premature positive feedbacks, the unbelievable low prices, in fact some of his prices are lower than "tamainc" , the 10-16 business day wait after shipping and the thousands of items for sale at any given time.
If it walks like a duck, smells like a duck, quacks like a duck, it's gotta be a duck. It's getting close to the 16 business day + 2 day ship wait for his first big bunch of buyers, so we will find out shortly.
Like I said I'm gonna search these posts before I commit to another chipod seller on ebay. Nice site here!

There is no doubt in my mind that TAMAINC IS FATBOY5354. It's a duck. I did find one buyer in the US who after only several days received a computer gadget from fatboy, and says its fine. Shill bidder? Possibly. I never found one that actually saw any of their mp4's though.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

February 4th, Super Bowl Day!

Ok, it happened today. Fatboy5354 got a run of 60 negative feedbacks
from buyers who didn't receive items and all of his items were pulled from remaining auctions. That liar stole alot of money. What bothers me is that ebay and paypal are making a ton of money off of these theifs and they do very little to stop them.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

DAMN, that's what I was afraid of. The sellers KNOW eBay wont do squat to protect consumers or go after them, which is why its SO easy to do. Not only did this Chinese bastard have the intention of stealing people's money (remeber, were not talking about selling 1GB players as 4GB here, were talking about not having any players to sell and taking peoples money!), but he had the balls to ask all his sellers to leave him feedback before getting product. Any theif could make thousands of dollars like this in a matter of weeks. Steal some photos of desirable items from some other eBay seller, open an eBay account with a false address or stolen cc, make tons of money. On top of that, if he filed an unpaid item strike against me for not wanting to get ripped off, eBay would refuse to remove it!

eBay is becoming eScam while they do nothing to protect consumers. Sorry to say folks, it was a quaint idea when it started, but the world is no longer suitable to do business on the "honour system" and neither eBay nor Paypal will insure your losses, despite what they claim.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

I was so lucky. I filed an "Item not received" dispute through Ebay/Paypal and got all my money back just a few days before Fatboy ended his Ebay membership.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

lol,the first internet item i bought:

, jan.23 , i bought one of him,(he had like 3 bad feedback so why not)Jan 25 , i got an email he say 14 business day, one week later , i checked his feedback , 12 new bad feedback... i started to be scared(remember , first time i bought on internet) and now,(some day ago...) like you say , 60 bad feedback...

now im wondering if ill get mine ... 14 buisness day mean like feb. 14...

i bougth this one: http://cgi.ebay.ca/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?...3245&rd=1&rd=1

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

Sorry to hear about your bad first experience. Hope you were able to get your money back from Paypal. Too bad you did not read this forum before you bought, because my message about FATBOy/TAMAINC predates your purchase. Hopefully, you will learn from the messages on these sites and eBay guides like mine (see sig) how better to tell the scammers from the probably-not scammers. exemple: Je suis sur que tu sais maintenant que (pres que) toute les vendeurs avec des lecteurs mp4 style Nano clone de 4 giga ou plus sont des "scammer"!

i don't think that you should buy it as most hacked players come from china(sorry if i have offended anyone).

Really? China?? Well that's it then, I'm tossing my Nano clone. I have a strict rule about not buying anything made in China. Not even egg rolls. If for nothing else, on account of their hideous treatment of Tibetans and Falun Dafa practitioners.

In fact I'm gonna check all my mp4 players and whichever ones come from CHINA, I'm chucking. I'm just gonna get me a real mp4 player, an Apple or a Meizu. Wait a second... tell me, where do the Apples come from? I heard they were made in "Appleland" by some form of albino elves or something. Can anyone confirm?

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

but ill wait till Feb.14(14 buisness day)im still confiant* ... but after the 14 ill give up ...

sorry for my bad english...
*not sure if its an english word... google translation "entrusting"

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

*confident

If Paypal do not help, try bothering your credit card company for a chargeback.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

i cant,my paypal money come from my bank ...

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

also , this is the email i got from him...

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

Unusual this seller has almost perfect english, for a Chinese seller... Hmmm... Well, its been 14 days, so I guess its time to confirm no receipt. Except there's no one to confirm it to, he's not on eBay under this name.
You'll need to dispute the transaction with Paypal.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

ok, ive opened a dispute ,
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We are temporarily unable to determine the status of your case.

Non-receipt - Case ID: PP-253-617-615
Status: Pending
Transaction ID: 27W92439R89727925
Seller Name & Email: Wong Wai Tak, fatboy5354@yahoo.com
Transaction Amount: -$34.99 USD
eBay Item#: 270082263245
Transaction Date: Jan. 23, 2007
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

but i dont know how its working...

is it correct?


EDIT*

mistake , its called a claim (i saw "whats the difference between a dispute and a claim" lol)

I tried buying from Fatboy and ended up opening a dispute with Paypal. The day after I opened the dispute I went back onto Paypal and finished up the dispute and got my money back.

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

hope it will be like that for me too

now the status is "Waiting For Seller's Response"

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

whats happening if he dont response?

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

You win your claim if Wai Tak doesn't respond. But keep in mind that you can win your claim and still not win bupkus, if the seller has removed the funds from his Paypal account. You might want to ask Paypal about that (if they froze your funds in his account, or if he has a balance of $0)

NOOBISH , if the seller does not respond within 30days from the date you opened the dispute, paypal would take over the dispute and decide on the outcome.

So if the seller never respond in like 1-2weeks after you opened the dispute, i'll suggest you send another message via paypal resolution centre to the seller.
State all the correspondance dates, price paid for player, actual memory capacity, difference between what you paid and players selling for the actual memory capacity, what you want (eg full/partial refund).

At least if he does not respond at all, when paypal takes over the dispute, you have a better chance of getting a refund of some sorts.

He never got the item in the first place.

:cry:

so i just have to wait? (also i will order one from uxcell...)

Yes, assuming you updated your claim to a dispute. Keep checking the status of your claim periodically.
And hope that they froze his funds! Otherwise, you wont see a dime, I'm afraid.

(also i will order one from uxcell...)

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

yay

Great! Sounds like you are on your way to resolving the problem.... but according to the wording, they aren't guaranteeing the funds are there to take, from the seller's account. If they are able to transfer the funds to you, I would remove them immediately so they cant take it back later after the seller complains or something! (ie. do not trust paypal...)

Re: Is this a bad seller or not? You decide!
 

i got my money today :D :D :D