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Cameras Online? How The Shysters Work
earlylate writes "How do certain photo and electronics dealers thrive despite widely-circulated warnings by unhappy customers? According to a new investigative website "many apparently separate and competing dealers are actually jointly owned and run" and "go to great lengths to conceal their locations and management." Further, some comparison-shopping sites "are in effect marketing partners with their affiliates," the very dealers they rate. There's a contest based on the suspicious "flood of similar, glowing reviews some dealers receive," as well as links to several sources of information and advice for the careful online shopper."
A lot of people don't realise the the big "price deal search engines" such as Kelkoo and Dealtime also return results based on the amount the retailers they link to have paid for a higher position. You'll often find you can dig up better deals just using Google. However, I know that at least one of the biggest UK online electronics retailers derives the highest percentage of paying click-throughs from Dealtime (that is, people referred by Dealtime, who then go on to actually buy a product). The Dealtime referrals actually result in more sales than people browsing their site to find stuff. So the idea/scam works well...
Code, Hardware, stuff like that.
Don't mess with them... I tried once, it wasn't pretty. I still have to move every couple months so they don't find my location...
This post alone will give me away, I need to move again... but I needed to warn you all!
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Once bought a VCR some years ago. I went into one store and asked for a specific model of a VCR. I was quoted a price, then I went to another store. The clerk for the second store, after receiving my request, spoke into a walkie-talkie in his native language and then quoted me the same price. Now, perhaps it was coincidental, but both clerks appeared to be Indian. I didn't buy the VCR from either store.
A NYC lawyer blogs. http://www.chuangblog.com/
I'd rather pay a little more and know that I'm buying from someone I can trust. So what if I can save a few bucks if I'm not sure I'm going to get exactly what I paid for? Sure I look for deals but it's a matter of balancing that against buying from someone reputable.
Bradley Holt
They made it so I couldn't order online anymore! Don't make them mad!!!
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If you'd like to volunteer, let me know, I have a great camera I can give you for a low-low price, that would be perfect for the job.
Don't anthropomorphize computers: they hate that.
You mean to say that I shouldn't spend $100s based on the opinions of anonymous and untrusted (to me) sources.
I tell you, I'm shocked.
You'll be telling me next that the editorial in trade newspapers is somehow related to the advertising.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
only because of the fact that there is a sucker born every minute.
I don't think that the number of scams has really increased or anything...the information deluge from the internet makes it seem like there are more scammers now than before. The fact appears to be that in place of one sucker being swindled, now you have 10 suckers being swindled simultaneously.
A fool and his money...yada yada yada.
Here are some interesting pictures of the storefronts
Front doors
When it comes to expensive, and frequently fragile electronics, always buy local. This should be a no brainer. The on-line prices are too good to be true simply because the on-line retailers know they won't have to deal with the customer service part.
Just because you can, does not mean you should.
The unfortunate side effect is that shoppers will be less likely to go to mom and pop online retailers and will stick to the conglomerates. This makes is clear that it is in the best interest of honest online retailers and all those who sell services to them that they need to make a concerted effort to combat online fraud.
http://stockmarketgarden.com/
Henchman, "I say, that scoundrel has surfaced in the United States. Shall we whack him?"
Don Worcestershire, "Quite."
"I'm just here to regulate funkiness."
I tend to pick a reputable retailer I've already done trade with, and if the price is more than say 10% different I just assume it's a scam and ignore it unless I know someone else personally who's traded with them. Even if the difference is less than 10% I still prefer to buy from companies I or my friends have dealt with. I may miss some good bargains that way, but I've never been scammed...
Game dev and music blog
I heard the voicemail one of these scumbags left for someone not too long ago. I don't know about others, but I would have had the police online to file charges... These people are scary.
Luckily, they're not the most intelligent people, as the voicemail seems to show. Calling someone a "bitch" repeatedly and threatening to kill them via an easily traced means is just asking for legal trouble. They don't know how to deal with the actual bad publicity they're starting to get. (Ratings sites are not actual bad publicity, since hardly anyone uses them, and there are many different ones).
I have a feeling this sort of scam will disappear in due time. It's getting harder and harder to hide from geeks with net connections and blogs, and bad word of mouth, unlike bad "reviews," is killer for a business. Just think of how many techies you know who refuse to buy a particular brand of hard drive simply for hearing about a friend's bad experience once.
Oh, the rest is a total shameless plug, but we did a bit about this on GeekNights last Thursday.
GeekNights!
Late Night Radio for Geeks!
Use common sense. here's what I tell everyone that asks.
1) only buy from reputable sites. this has been going on since computer shopper days. its even more true today.
2) I only use my American Express (AMEX). I can't tell you how many times AMEX has helped with fraudulent charges, merchants that don't deliver etc. AMEX is expensive and a pain in the ass for mechants to sign up. If they are not willing to do that, than I won't buy. I will pay a slight premium for sights that take AMEX. It's worth it.
If I'd done both these when I first got online in the 90s I would have saved myself a lot of grief.
"It's technical in a psychometric kind a way" -- C. Parish
The two I trust:
PriceWatch.com
ResellerRatings.com
Most of those have been around for a long time. and the places with the glowing reviews always feel a bit suspicious when you dig deeper on them.
The fun part is that it highlights something that most people ignore. They will not think twice buying from someon on ebay with a 1000+ rating yet it is really simple to BUY rating points. (hint: search ebay for cupons) If you spend lots of money on something online and the price is too good to be true, be ready to lose your cash.
BTW: if it's less than $1000.00 you are pretty much hosed. I lost $500.00 to a scammer auto parts dealer on the east coast (read my blog for the name and location) and after getting my lawyer poised and finding out how much to bring the small claims suit against them It was much cheaper to simply drop it as it would have cost me $1500.00 to sue him... These scammers know this and that is why they rarely venture over that $1000.00 line.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Digital cameras currently have a very competitive market. Every site has the same models for within a few bucks of each other, pretty close to at-cost, and make it up on supplies (batteries, chargers, SD/XD/sticks/whatever storage medium, docks, printers, straps, cases, and of course the holy grail of ripoffs, the "extended warranty").
When you see a site advertising a given model for $100 to $250 less than everyone else, well, do you really think they plan to take a loss on the camera itself? And even if they did take a small loss (such as at-cost with free shipping), they sure as hell won't sell for less than they can ever dream of making back even if you bought every overpriced accessory they offer.
Just save yourself the trouble and use a reputable dealer like Amazon or NewEgg for any electronics. They usually have close to the lowest price, and factoring in the BS as part of the cost, they almost always win without even a second thought.
To think that in light of this, BestBuy stores seem like a nice place to shop!
I'd never trust a store who couldn't spell "right" correctly anyway. All you Grammar Nazis were right.
They all researched the cameras they wanted, and they thought they had adequately investigated the dealers. They saw the full-page ads in major photo magazines, the professionally-designed websites, the high dealer ratings on prominent search-sites. They saw all the trappings of the modern online secure shopping site. They trusted that their credit card companies, the respected magazines, and even the states which are home to the merchants, would help ensure a good transaction. And, of course, the prices were hard to resist. Why were our friends ultimately disappointed?
We took a look at some of the factors and some of the businesses involved, and we offer the information we've found to all who are considering purchasing cameras, video equipment and electronics from the comfort of their living rooms and offices.
This website is a partial scorecard. We hope it will help readers understand who some of the better-known dealers are, what's behind the ads and websites, and how to find further information.
We believe that open information benefits both consumers and dealers. We think the whole photographic industry -- hobbyists, professionals, dealers and manufacturers -- is healthier when consumers have clear idea of how to research a transaction and whom they will be dealing with.
We've tried to make these pages accurate. All the information included is from public sources. If you know of any errors, please inform us and we will correct them at once. If you have further information you think we should be aware of, contact us. (Please -- no rumors or speculation; only confirmable facts.)
Our contact details are here.
WELL KNOWN DEALERS
We have examined some of the online dealers who specialize in cameras and electronics, looking behind the ads and websites to find out who they are and how they do business. We chose some of the most visible companies -- the ones with heavy national advertising and prominent ranking on internet search engines. Many of them have sprung up in the last few years, while some have been around online and in traditional stores for decades.
Judging from customer surveys, newsgroup discussions and published articles, some of them are held in high regard while others are despised.
There were some surprises. The biggest one is that many apparently separate and competing dealers are actually jointly owned and run. This is no secret to followers of the many online photography and video forums, but we believe the intertwining is unsuspected by most consumers. On this site we've grouped many of the dealers into "families" to clarify their identities. They form a truly tangled web, with many overlapping corporate connections, addresses and telephones.
Another surprise was that some dealers act mainly as brokers, with little or no inventory of their own and no "real stores." In our opinion this should not disqualify a business from consideration, but it does contribute to frequent misunderstandings about what is "in stock".
The biggest obstacle to any research is that some dealers go to great lengths to conceal their locations and management. Sadly, this disguising seems to be the norm for many newer, web-only merchants.
We believe that open information benefits both consumers and dealers.
We have included the names of individuals where we could find them, so that consumers know whom to contact with compliments or questions or complaints about a specific transaction.
We believe that a businessperson who is proud of the way his or her business is conducted will be proud to be publicly associated with it.
Some of our information may be out of date, as some companies may change location, telephone numbers or personnel. We welcome updates or corrections via email here.
Sources Cited Much of the information on these pages is attributed to these sources:
Don't anthropomorphize computers: they hate that.
Two years ago I had to replace the headlight in my sedan. I eventually bought it from an Internet-based vendor but not before I realized that most of the sites I investigated were being run by a much smaller number of actual businesses.
I have no idea how many companies are doing business selling car parts on the Internet but I'm sure that it's a small fraction of the "front-ends" that appear to be doing business.
--Richard
I paid $100 for a headlight for
which the dealer quoted me $240.
Being pro-market, I see the scammers as the worst aspect of any market. In the past, it can be argued that regulations and restrictions through government was needed -- scammers were able to swindle thousands to millions of dollars before people were able to get the word out and warn each other.
As the percentage of technically-savvy individuals grows, information about a dealer or retailer can be distributed in seconds. Thousands of individuals can moderate (or rate) a seller, and sellers can moderate (or rate) buyers instantly. eBay handles these transactions with very little government involvement or force.
Scammers (such as the photo retailers) have been suckering people for DECADES. This is WITH government "protection" that many citizens believe they can rely on, yet we still see thousands of people getting swindled.
As the old generation moves out of the buying phase and the new generation becomes the big power in buying, we will see less swindling and scamming. It is already very hard to scam someone in my age range (low 30s) as most of us check online before buying a large item. Google is adapting much of their search ability to cellphones (WAP, SMS and other means). I already check items out through my wireless PDA phone when I am on the go. I've saved myself a few hundred dollars by not purchasing items with bad reviews. I found these reviews through my phone in mere moments.
The old ways of the retail industry are dying. As a retailer myself (who lost one of our stores because of a scamming employee and manager base), I know that the customer has more power than I do. When all you had was a local shop to buy from, you weren't able to negotiate for better quality, service or pricing. With next day service from thousands of online shops, the retailers are put on notice that they better offer more than just a product, or they'll go out of business.
These photo scams will end without much government involvement. If they broke a contract or agreement, I can understand calling a lawyer. Hopefully in the short run enough people will comment about their bad experiences that the companies will be punished before more people are scammed -- and I see the strength of scammers quickly weakening as information is globally available, instantly.
I've been using Citibank/ATT Universal Card for online purchase. You can download an application that will let you generate a unique card number for each purchase. You can also limit the amount and set the expiration date.
After the purchase you can modify the amount or date and even cancel the number.
It won't stop you from making a dumb purchase but it will prevent excessive charges and unauthorized addtional charges to your credit card.
I, and my company, buy plenty from B&H and Adorama. Also had good experiences with K&M.
It's like any other major purchase... do your homework. Look for stores with established brick & mortar business and reputation. Don't be lured by too-good-to-be-true deals (they really are). Ask around with people who are in the know (there are plenty of photography enthusiast websites out there).
Yes, there are a lot of shady people running shady ops in shady neighborhoods in the NY area. But that doesn't mean there aren't reputable shops as well.
Caveat emptor.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
There are a few fine NY stores: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/ http://www.adorama.com/ http://www.jandr.com/ In particular, B&H tends to carry everything photo related. Adorama carries almost as much as B&H. I've seen people happy with J&R, and I think 17th Street Photo (but I'm not sure of the last one), but they don't tend to have the depth B&H and Adorama has. So if you need say an Olympus 35-100mm f/2 lens, they will carry it, but you will get the glazed eye look if you ask for it at Best Buy. My one beef with B&H is they don't want to ship to maildrop places like The UPS store (I've had problems with delivery to the house, and prefer to get things delivered to the UPS store where somebody will sign for it, and I can pick it up at my leisure). So I tend to order from Adorama more often. Note that the price on these stores tends to be a fair price, but it isn't a 'deal' that the scam sites pretend to have.
Review sites for electronics and the like are chock full of super-cheesy, almost non-sensical reviews. If you look at reviews, and most of them consist of one or two lines of things that don't really matter, then it's a bogus review. There are so many of them, it becomes what I call "Surround and drown" fake reviews. Firefighters know that if you surround a fire with enough hoses, you can drown it sooner or later. These review sites have the same process, where all negative real reviews are drowned out by the fake ones.
"Timely shipping!" That one is my favorite fake review. Um, you ship via UPS or FedEx Ground. It's 3 days, no matter how you slice it. How can it not be timely?
"Great Customer Service!" Another of my favorites. The person hasn't done anything but buy something, in all likely hood. There hasn't been any customer service up to that point.
"Easy to use website ordering!" Um, yeah, that's the first thing I look for when buying electronics over the web.
If the review doesn't bring up any points, or doesn't provoke any honest thoughts, it is probably fake. Read the actual negative reviews.
Besides, why does this surprise anyone? The same thing can be said for almost every PC/XBox, PS/PS2 magazine or website. They all get such pats on the back from the companies they review, that they don't have an honest review in them. It's the equivelent of letting a lifelong, die-hard Rolling Stones fan review one of their concerts. The review is going to read "Dude, they Rawked!", even if Keith Richards was so stoned he forgot to play his guitar.
...the same rules apply now that applied 35 years ago when I started buying photo equipment. Most are places that will screw you one way or another. Some are downright crooks. And there are a few gems that stay in business year after year, garnering more and more loyal customers even though their prices aren't rock bottom.
Personally, I use BHPhotoVideo.com for darn near everything photographic. Some things, like flash brackets, are personal taste problems. You just gotta touch and feel before buying. But for everything else, B&H is either the best or so close I can't tell the difference. They're businesslike (even brusque, sometimes) on the phone but they're also professional and reliable. The number of similarly high-quality online dealers in this market segment can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Actually, you only need two - B&H and Adorama. There are a few specialty dealers who are good for other things and if you need what they sell, they're wonderful. But for the full line of general photo gear available online, it's B&H and Adorama.
The best guidance I know of for buying a camera or related equipment in the U.S. is at photo.net.
unscrupulous lawyer 1843, U.S. slang, probably altered from Ger. Scheisser "incompetent worthless person," from Scheisse "shit," from O.H.G. skizzan "to defecate" (see shit).
shyster--'shIs-t Etymology: probably from German Scheisser, literally, defecator
: one who is professionally unscrupulous especially in the practice of law or politics : PETTIFOGGER
You're not helping anyone. You make people with a legitimate beef look petty and you present people with no bad intentions at all as anti-semitic (or specifically anti-Jewish, as there are a lot more semitic people than just Jews).
Now, go into a closet and say "niggardly" a hundred times.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
resellerratings.com is generally quite good and the results can be trusted. Of course, one should browse to be certain a particular store wasn't recently flooded with fake positive reviews.
In Soviet Russia...michael would be rotting in Siberia!
There is one at least that is a reputable dealer, B&H Photo. They are a massive store and sell still and video cameras from consumer up to extremely high end pro. They do audio gear, consumer and pro too. Of course because their are reputable their prices are good, but nothing special. However they are worth checking. I got my Yamaha reciever from them. Yamaha requires their recievers be purchased from a license dealer to honour warantee. All the local ones wanted full MSRP, however Yamaha lists B&H as a licensed dealer. Checked with them and it was much cheaper, even with $50 shipping.
So there ARE reputable dealers in New York, you just need to be careful. One thing to check is to see if they are authorized dealers. You can't fake something like that (Yamaha does the listing on their own site) and that's not something that a scammy, fly-by-night is going to do since the company wouldn't license them anyhow. If they are an authorized dealer for the companies that do that kind of thing, they are probably on the up and up.
I just buy from B&H Photo or Adorama. They've been around for years and their prices are as low as you'll usually find. I've never had any problems ordering or returning merchandise and they don't pressure you.
http://www.bhphoto.com/
http://www.adorama.com/
The markups on electronics are very slim. If someone is selling you an electronic product for hundreds below everyone else you're being ripped off.
But we were talking about electronics here, something Consumer Reports is astonishingly bad at. Their Mac coverage borders on the daftly ignorant. They famously reviewed the PowerPCs as "slow" but accidentally only ran interpreted 68000 programs on them, not the new ones. And they published a survey of virus trends which was so flawed that 17% of OS X users "reported" having a virus on their machines. They reported this as cause for concern, rather than realizing it was a signal that their methodology is flawed. And don't get me started on how little they know about PDAs. I trust CR's car data. But for electronics I look elsewhere. They're incompetent.
The problem with Consumer reports is that the reports and reviews are not written by experts. They are written by consumers, who have no idea what the hell they're dealing with.
Consumer Reports "best buy" computer every year ends up being a Compaq or a Dell or an HP machine. Anyone who knows anything about computers will get a good chuckle out of their rationale for that rating.
I know a guy who has said much the same thing about their ratings of HVAC equipment.
I'd rather have the opinion of an expert than a purposefully ignorant "consumer".
-- I wanna decide who lives and who dies - Crow T. Robot, MST3K
In all likelihood it got dragged into the U.S. via Yiddish, hence the Semitic connection. Calling a Jewish lawyer a shyster is probably rather tasteless.
This is not my sandwich.
I stopped trusting Consumer Reports when they dinged some really nice mountain bikes for having front brakes that are "too powerful".
If you can't lock up both wheels on dry pavement, your brakes are set up wrong. It's wise to not do that, but on a bicycle you are the ABS.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
This is _exactly_ my mentality lately.
Those are the only two stores I have ordered off of in the past year... and I've ordered thousands of dollars worth of things for my house (just got married)...
Trying to get the extra $5 off of something by using some shady site just isn't worth it anymore. Newegg and Amazon are always within 1% of the bottom of the barrel sites and I don't even have to think twice about ordering from them (actually... my credit card is just saved at both.... so I can order at will).
A little piece of mind is worth a lot!
Friedmud
While I don't know specifically what CR was doing at the time, I can tell you that frequently different standards of quality control are applied rebadged merchandise. For example, when Sears puts their name ('Kenmore') on appliacnes, they want a certain level of quality -- which may be more or less than the manufacturer would normally turn out, depending on the amount of money they want to spend.
Also, reliability reports in CR are and always have been based on quality surveys sent out to (all) subscribers of the magazine.
I think CR gets a bad rap just because they're relatively incompetent at rating computers and electronics.Their automotive coverage has vastly improved in recent years, and they nail the reliability of cars and trucks. And they are the standard benchmark for home appliance reviews. Ultimately, though, CR is just one tool, and can cover only so many products even within one class of appliances. If you're making a major purchase, you should use many tools to find information about it. And you definitely shouldn't discount CR as one of those tools (unless you're buying electronics...).
They are written by consumers, who have no idea what the hell they're dealing with.
You have a beef with CR, fine. That's no reason to go making shit up.
CR has experts do the testing, which is plainly and comprehensively explained along with their testing methodology.
1. I submitted this site because thousands of camera buyers are victimized every year. Slashdot members, being more web-savvy than average, may be more aware and thus less susceptible. And less surprised at the site's information.
2. The word "shyster" was nowhere in my submission.
3. Many members send in links to promote commercial sites. The site I submitted is more or less a public service.
4. DANGEROUS GROUND alert! Perhaps slashdot should examine whether the shopping comparison site it is allied with is one of those that allows itself to be used by the villains we've been discussing. (Look up your favorite digital camera, and see what dealers show up near the top of the list with clusters of rave reviews.)