Buying from a Third-Party on Amazon? Skeptical....

kristenrice

NOT just an ambulance driver
Joined
Apr 25, 2006
My daughter is looking for a Voltron-inspired hoodie sweatshirt. She thought she had found one and wanted to purchase it from a website that I had never heard of so we decided to use a Visa gift card registered to my PayPal account and go through PayPal to make the purchase. Good thing we did! The day after we submitted the order, I received an alert from PayPal that someone attempted to access my account from overseas. I secured my account (already had 2-factor authentication in place) and so that was no problem. PayPal was great and their security measures did their job. Nothing was compromised since I had no bank account or credit cards linked to my account, just the Visa gift card. We waited 2 weeks for a shipment confirmation which was supposed to take 3-5 days....nothing. After 30 business days with no response (the hoodie was supposed to ARRIVE in 15-21 business days) or confirmation of shipment, I opened a dispute with PayPal. Within a few HOURS, I received a full refund after the seller replied to PayPal that I had cancelled my order:confused:.

Anyways...I am now very skeptical of overseas sellers and since most of the Voltron items she has found are coming from Hong Kong and China, I don't know what to do:confused3. She decided to look on Amazon since we figured that would be a "safe" vendor. Sure enough...she found one that she wants....but it is not sold by Amazon. It's sold by a third-party so, naturally, I am terrified of buying it for her. I don't want my Amazon account "hacked" again. (I already have a thread about that fiasco!) For those who don't know...the last time my Amazon account was compromised, the thief made fraudulent claims on my behalf that I did not receive my merchandise, hacked my e-mail and tried to forward the refunded gift card codes to their e-mail address. I caught the fraud before the thief could get the gift card codes and so they were "stuck" in my account and I tried for MONTHS to get Amazon to take their money back...they never did. So now, what concerns me is that if I place this order for the hoodie through a third-party vendor, and for some reason I truly do NOT receive it, I am worried about claiming a LEGITIMATE refund because it would be impossible to prove.

Sorry...this got a little long-winded....basically, my question is how safe is it to buy items from a third-party vendor on Amazon? Does Amazon only deal with reliable vendors or are they simply a storefront?
 
Does Amazon only deal with reliable vendors or are they simply a storefront?

No, anyone can sell on Amazon. Now, if there is something wrong (item doesn't ship, wrong item sent), Amazon sides with the buyer and will refund (as of right now, who knows in a few years).
 
i'm willing to bet that the seller on amazon is also from overseas-with some clothing that have 'characters' on them there's no current licensing agreements and foreign companies that don't fear prosecution produce them for sale. i inadvertently fell for one on amazon-the quality of the clothing was TERRIBLE and it took over a month to receive. she probably wants to avoid these sellers.

i just did a search-tell her that hot topic has a voltron hoodie. she might do a google search on jc penny, walmart and target as well (esp. since there's back to school stuff getting stocked now).
 


You can always google "Review Website Name" and see what kind of experience other people have had. Sure, you could encounter a new website who's just starting out, and you're one of their first victims ... but not likely.
 
One thing that has really helped us in terms of reviewer reliability is using Fakespot(.com)

It's mostly for Amazon products, anyways it goes through the reviews for warning signs that the reviews might be suspicious in quality. I find that helps me determine if this is a type of seller I may be comfortable using.

It's really just an additional tool to use to maybe use for the future.
 
I've not had much luck with third party Amazon sellers. In fact I've had to use their dispute resolution service a couple of times for items I received that were clearly counterfeit.
 


I want to clarify a few things...
First, my daughter isn’t really concerned with the quality or authenticity of the hoodie. She is planning to wear it only once or twice around Halloween for cosplay with a friend. It’s $19.99 with $5.99 shipping so it’s not super expensive. Second, I’m not worried so much about returning it as I am about not receiving it. I was also concerned about my payment information being stolen but that concern was addressed.

From all of the responses here, I think that I feel ok going forward with the purchase. My daughter understands that she may not receive it and once it’s ordered, it’s a done deal. I am not going to dispute anything because of the previous (albeit fraudulent) claim of items not received already on my account.
 
The counterfeit items I received were not wearable, the sizing and construction were terrible. Something to keep in mind.

same here-a men's xl t shirt arrived marked as xl but clearly smaller sized medium at best. after a couple of washings-despite hang drying it- it became a petite crop top. there's also the smell factor. with my order there was a nasty plastic/petroleum like smell from the art work which had been poorly ironed(?) on to the shirt that never entirely dissipated prior to it's washing destruction.
 
Just tell her to be prepared to get something that does not meet the description at all.
I do alot of Amazon shopping, and I have purchased a few things from overseas seller and not a single one of them was what I actually ordered. It was an awful attempt, but non usable/wearable.
Amazon CS is great though so you will have no issues getting a refund if you need it.
 
The counterfeit items I received were not wearable, the sizing and construction were terrible. Something to keep in mind.
same here-a men's xl t shirt arrived marked as xl but clearly smaller sized medium at best. after a couple of washings-despite hang drying it- it became a petite crop top. there's also the smell factor. with my order there was a nasty plastic/petroleum like smell from the art work which had been poorly ironed(?) on to the shirt that never entirely dissipated prior to it's washing destruction.
That explains why she put the item in the cart and it’s an XXL..she wears a medium! The sizing descriptions say that they are Asian sizing which is why I am assuming it’s coming from overseas. There is nothing on the listing that indicates where the item originated from and the store is named “Vivibridal” and, of course, there are no reviews.
 
Well, she found one that was “Prime” eligible, sold by Wiesen and fulfilled by Amazon. I have no idea if that’s any “better”, but that’s what she settled on. At least she will have it in 2 days so she won’t have to worry for long.
 
I would not recommend linking to a Master or VIsa gift card or to a debit card. Much easier to resolve problems if you use a credit card.
 
Well, she found one that was “Prime” eligible, sold by Wiesen and fulfilled by Amazon. I have no idea if that’s any “better”, but that’s what she settled on. At least she will have it in 2 days so she won’t have to worry for long.

It should be fine, fulfilled by Amazon means that Amazon actually has the item in one of their warehouses, even though it's a third party seller. Typically, these are a lot better quality sellers than the ones shipping from overseas.
 
I got the shipping confirmation e-mail and it is supposed to arrive today! So far, so good!

I ended up using more of of the remaining "gifted" gift card balance...the money that Amazon refused to take back from me no matter how many times I insisted it wasn't my money. This was my way of giving it back to them:rotfl2:. I figure that if something goes wrong, we won't dispute it. We will just consider the money returned to Amazon like it should have been in the first place:thumbsup2.
 
One thing that has really helped us in terms of reviewer reliability is using Fakespot(.com)

It's mostly for Amazon products, anyways it goes through the reviews for warning signs that the reviews might be suspicious in quality. I find that helps me determine if this is a type of seller I may be comfortable using.

It's really just an additional tool to use to maybe use for the future.

The problem with this is that the flag things like Amazon Vine reviews as fake which they absolutely are not. Those are some of the best, most trustworthy reviews available.
 

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