[Red Liner]

Originally Posted by techspark

Seller: HSAtlastradeFashion

The delivery guy wasn't very surprised , he took a video and took the package back.

The real nightmare is now getting a refund from flipkart - all they are doing is asking for time when it was an open box delivery, their person verified everything, I don't understand why are they taking so long.

If you have paid by credit card and by god I hope you did, simply call your relationship managers, rope in the credit card team and raise a dispute on the payment with all this proof. Do it immediately irrespective of what Flipkart says.

[Sidban85]

Sorry about your experience and I hope you get your refund soon.

This seller is notorious about fake goods. You will see them selling New Balance models which are not otherwise available in India and I being a sneakers connoisseur had ordered 990s and 992s from same seller and got fake items all 3 times. They were visibly fake with spelling errors in the sole and tongue and disaligned logos. Thankfully, I got the refunds. There were shoes costing Rs 10000 approx each after discount, so not like Meesho prices where you know they are copies.

Funniest thing is I had raised it with New Balance India Country Manager and Walmart global execs on email. I got contacted by respective teams, who kept on saying they are investigating for over 1 month with vague email updates, then I saw those models suddenly vanishing but being back in another few weeks. So, it is a known scam by Flipkart with blind eye by Walmart and some brands themselves.

The seller never got pulled down from Flipkart.

Nowadays it is better to buy from sites which have their own inventory or better QC e.g. Tata Neu, Ajio or surprisingly Myntra. Price may be not very low but that may also be because they are genuine goods.

Flipkart Assured cannot be trusted as I found from my experience. Amazon CocoBleu /Clicktech are still comparatively dependable.

[rajaramgna]

Originally Posted by itwasntme

Anyone else suddenly receiving such threatening emails from Amazon? While I admit we do have returns, we are very early customers of Amazon and our GMV is impressively high.

They can go take a hike if they actually 'block' our account.

While I did not receive any such email, I noticed many products as having "7 days replacement" instead of "7/10 days returns". I received WD40 but the package was opened. I should have returned it during delivery, instead of receiving the order, but somehow I missed it.

Regarding the flipkart issue, hope the buyer gets the refund soon. For the same reasons, I am reluctant to order on Flipkart. Amazon seems to be better, but still people need to live with fear/caution of being scammed in all possible avenues. Prevention is better than cure.

When ordering products online, please choose the seller, who has years of better positive ratings. I have heard even this can be rigged, but hope not with years of ratings and online platforms have ways of preventing this rigging, to some extent.

[MDED]

Why one earth one would buy a costly TV of Sony online? I never buy costly stuff online. Phones included. Online shopping is reserved only for grocery and books and some sundry stuff costing hundreds only.

Please spare some time and visit offline stores to get the touch and feel of the product before you sign on the dotted line!

[Janus]

To buy in Flipkart or Amazon, a bit of research is required on the sellers.

There are three kinds of sellers, one being your local shop, listing the products on Flipkart/Amazon and ship it directly using a generic parcel service.

Second being sellers of similar kind but they stock their products in Flipkart/Amazon warehouses and it is fulfilled by eKart or Amazon delivery services. The boxes will have Amazon or Flipkart branding including the packing tapes.

Third type is the best for consumers, these sellers get a lot of flak from government for bypassing FDI laws, but they are the best. The sellers are basically an investment from Walmart or Amazon directly with a local Indian partner like Narayan Murthy’s Catamaran ventures. They have lots of heft and money and procure products directly from manufacturers and also fulfilled by them so the entire supply chain is genuine.

1. Do not buy unless the value of the item is less then 500 rupees or if you trust them from previous purchases.
2. Good for medium value purchases.
3. Buy your big ticket items including that big Sony 65 inches TV.

How to differentiate the type of sellers depends on your ability to investigate and effectively use google search

[SS338]

Originally Posted by MDED

Why one earth one would buy a costly TV of Sony online? I never buy costly stuff online. Phones included. Online shopping is reserved only for grocery and books and some sundry stuff costing hundreds only.

Please spare some time and visit offline stores to get the touch and feel of the product before you sign on the dotted line!

Well, not every item is available offline. There are many brands that are Flipkart exclusive and compared to Amazon, Flipkart also has a very high share of such partnerships, making high value online purchases necessary.

[Matrix_Maya]

Sooner or later Flipkart will have same fate as Snapdeal. The number of frauds done by them post covid is astonishing. It's just that consumer law in india are shitty else they would be paying millions of dollars in fine alone.

[sid18]

Originally Posted by itwasntme

Anyone else suddenly receiving such threatening emails from Amazon?

While I haven't received any such email, but it did appear a few times while initiating a return. I have also noticed that these are mostly with the items shipped via third party and not via Amazon directly. This is certainly not expected as most of us have paid for a Prime membership with the assurance of free deliveries and no questions asked returns wherever applicable. I did call up the support agent once and told her about the awful nature of this message while I was trying to return an item that was different from the one ordered.

[anilsurya1985]

I did not received any such messages but my brother received it few months back and I noticed a point related to returns in the amazon site and it says that you are eligble only for 75 returns for lifetime and after that there are chances of account getting blocked.

[maverick029]

Appalling to see such scams, but as a thumb rule we should check the seller before purchasing any product. Trusted sellers on Flipkart like WS Retail and Dawntech, RK infotech on amazon are some names which i look for when purchasing Online.

I have ordered 2 Automatic Washing Machines, 2 TVs (Luxury and Cheap), 1 Refrigerator, iPhones and what not from these sellers and never had a bad experience on either flipkart and amazon. While such scams are unacceptable, its our responsibility to be aware.

[subraiyr]

Originally Posted by SS338

Well, not every item is available offline. There are many brands that are Flipkart exclusive and compared to Amazon, Flipkart also has a very high share of such partnerships, making high value online purchases necessary.

I still feel that brick and mortar stores provide best value esp for electronic goods and high value goods. For e.g. I bought a new TV recently (Samsung). The offer I got from the local retailer was about 5k lesser than what I saw in Amazon. Further I had not ventured into TV buying and therefore did not have a clue on what was good/bad. The instore experience was a revelation into the world of OLED, QLED, nanoLED and other acronyms.

All the Apple products have been purchased in physical stores and the discounts/offers I got was either on par of better than ecommerce stores.

I feel the quality of etailers like Amazon and Flipkart have gone down drastically. Product pictures are significantly different from actual ones. The biggest issue I see is "Country of Origin". In 2020, Government of India had mandated that all products sold need to have Country of Origin detail called out and etailers have to specify this clearly on their webpage. Yesterday, I checked on about 20 products across categories and none of them had this detail. Now isn't that a violation of Government order. Who do you reach out to file a complaint for this ?

Lot more to be said about other etailers who are on instagram and advertise like mad. Products look amazing, but when you see it physically and feel it, you realise why they are priced low.