Ebay and Fakes?

Vixen

Vixen

Vixen

Soldato
Joined
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I know that eBay "doesn't allow" counterfeit goods, but obviously a huge amount slip through the net. Does anyone know their policy for returns/refunds if something you've won does turn out to be fake?

I want a spare pair of hair straighteners and I've found a lot of auctions for purple GHDs. I can tell by photos that some are definitely fake, however others have taken photos directly from the GHD website rather than showing what they are selling. I decided to put a relatively low bid on a set which has a stock photo but good feedback, but now I'm worried that I'll end up winning and they turn out to be fakes. Am I right to be so concerned?

Thanks
 
It's not always easy, some fakes are hard to tell apart....

I bought some capacitors a while back that were fake from China, the seller gave me a refund however.
 
GHD purple are easy though. Go to their website and put the serial number in and they will tell you whether its fake or not.

Downside if it is fake, as I discovered when I bought a fake nokia charger is you only get the buying price back, not the postage which I think stinks. In my case the postage was as much as the item and since it worked I kept it as it would have cost me a few quid to post back (yes you have to post the fake item back to get a refund :confused:). I just left him negative feedback.

I also reported the seller to ebay for selling fake items 5 times since he regulary listed the same items again and was a powerseller and Ebay did nothing about them. He stated to Ebay that he was buying them in as genuine and had no reason to beleive they weren't (all the instructions were in Russian including the English section so fairly obvious it was a fake)

So as long as your are prepared to loose the postage cost, you are fine buying what might be a fake.

And since GHD purple are worth more the £100 I would think the postage is a snall percentage of the cost.

EDIT the GHD purple straigtners are the most faked item on Ebat at the moment and also the favourite item to sell when you get hold of somebody;s ebay account. My gf ebay account was hacked and they listed 20 GHD purple straightners for £100 each buy it now straight away.
 
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Do they still have the serial number check online? I've looked and can only find product registration and information about trusted sellers.

I should be able to identify a fake if I got one in my hands, it's just trying to decide if bidding is worth the hassle. I have noticed a huge number of definite fakes though, the hairdryer looks very different so it's easy to tell if they put a picture of what they're actually selling. The set I have bid on are on an account that hasn't had any feedback since 2007, although they started at 99p and don't have a buy it now option.

It's really scary when you consider how desperate some scammers are to rip people off on ebay!
 
Crazy how all the fakes are purple. :D

The Chinese dude didn't ask me to send the capacitors back to China, thank god, he refunded me straight away which was nice of him. :)

EDIT: Ask the seller for a serial number so you can check, if they refuse then that is dodgy in itself... :)
 
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Theres loads of fakes on ebay.when i was searching badminton raquets almost all of them were obviously fake. but you should be able to get your money back if they are advertised as genuine products
 
Vixen said:
Do they still have the serial number check online? I've looked and can only find product registration and information about trusted sellers.
Click to expand...

Yeah you have to input the serial number into the product registration to verify it.

Unfortunately you will only be able to do that once you have it but at least it will tell you if it's fake.
 
I picked up some Sennheiser CX300s on ebay a while back - it's wall to wall with fake ones of those. The only way I could be confident of getting real ones was finding some in limited edition plastic free cardboard only packaging that was exclusive to Amazon. Got a good price on them as it happened, but if not for that obvious way of finding a real pair I'd have given up and had to buy them new.
 
wohoo said:
Theres loads of Razor blades on ebay, most of which are fake.
Click to expand...

Yeah I bought some for Australia and they all turned out to be fakes, felt like shaving with a rusty knife. Luckily I managed to get the seller to refund me without having to send them back (the return post was about 80% of the item's cost).

I have bought Sony MemorySticks off eBay and been fine though, you just have to be careful, most of the time the sellers get good feedback because the bhuyers don't know that they are fakes which makes it harder to tell. The chances are if the seller has several GHD's for sale that they are going to be fake.
 
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Raist said:
Vixen, what kind of price are you getting on this? The real deal from Sephora is around $240 (£170). If there's a "new" deal that's significantly less, it is probably a counterfeit. I can pick up the real thing locally and ship it if you're willing.

http://www.ghdhair.com/customer-care/counterfeit
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Quite dear. The cheapest you can buy from a genuine certified outlet in the uk is £130.

ANything cheaper than that I suspect a fake.
 
I've been bidding low because I do suspect they are fakes and don't really want to pay full price. My old GHDs stopped working this morning though, I guess they weren't too happy about me looking for new ones :p. Looks like I'll have to get a new pair from ghdhair!
 
Its all fakes on the bay :)
Looked around a few eBay forums before and all you see is people asking for fake goods to sell.

SO apart from eBay and PayPal being dodgy themselves, the punters can now sell fakes without much of a comeback.
 
i got some mach3 blades a few years ago, so fake was like shaving with a rusty nail, never got money back though, now i get screwed for £18 for 8 in boots
 
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