Avoid Amazon.in 3rd party sellers!!!

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pauldmps

Skilled
I had earlier ordered two items from Amazon.in- both of which were fulfilled by Amazon. No issues, really.

But this time, I ordered a SoundMagic ES18 headphone from a 3rd party seller ITSHOP from Amazon.in. I am shocked to see how a company like Amazon handles its services in India.

The item was ordered on 20th Jan & was to be shipped on or before 22nd & was to reach on or before 27th. On the evening of 22nd, after getting no confirmation on the shipping, I sent a message to the seller telling him that the deadline is about to end & if he doesn't ship the item today, I would cancel the order as I need the item urgently. After 2-3 hours, an e-mail from Amazon confirmed the shipping. However there is no mention of any shipping info in the mail or on the website. Amazon does not enforce the seller to provide any tracking info unlike ebay. Shocking!!! The seller, sent a mail with a tracking number soon after:

Dear Sir,
Your order item is dispatched. Find the docket no for your reference mention below.
Courier = AJW Express
Docket NO = 50000075131
Mode= By air.
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The tracking number when input on their website, it showed that there is no such consignment. I waited for the next day in hope that the courier may have not uploaded the details. However, when there was no info for the next three days, I sent one message to the seller every single day. The seller ignored all the three.

I called the Amazon customer care on 25th & let them know about the issue. The CC rep apologized & file a claim on my behalf. he assured that I will be refunded by 7th Feb. Amazon requires more than 14 days to process a claim. How fast!!!

After this assurance, I ordered the item from Snapdeal on 25th. After ordering the item, I get an e-mail from Amazon that looked like this:

Hello from Amazon.in.
Thank you for writing back to us regarding order XXX-XXXXX-XXXXXX. We apologize for the delay in receiving your order, however we see that the package is in transit with AJW couriers 50000075139.
If you have not received your package, please reply to this email and we will investigate this further. Thank you for your patience and understanding.
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Notice the different tracking numbers in the mail sent by the seller & the mail sent by Amazon ??
Now this tracking number shows the item being booked on 23rd evening - beyond the shipping deadline set by Amazon. I sent a mail to Amazon regarding the issue.

Now both the items - from Amazon as well as Snapdeal reaches me on the same day 29th. The Aamzon one is 2 days behind its scheduled delivery. As I had already filed a claim, I send the courier back without receiving. I sent a mail to Amazon notifying the return. Amazon let me know that I will be refunded within five working days.

However, when five days were over, there was no reply, I contacted Amazon again. This is how Amazon replies to its customers:

Hello from Amazon.in.
We are writing to follow up with the Amazon.com A-to-z Guarantee claim filed for order XXX-XXXXX-XXXXX.
The seller who fulfilled this order has confirmed that they have not received a return. Unfortunately, the refusal of a shipment does not prove that the item(s) were delivered back to the seller.
Amazon.in strives to maintain a marketplace that is fair to both buyers and sellers. While we understand your concerns regarding this transaction, we cannot hold the seller responsible for a refund without receiving the item back.
Thank you for your understanding.
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I am yet to get any refund after more than 15 days of the item being ordered.

This raises few questions :
1. There is no mechanism like PaisaPay in Amazon which holds the payment until the item has been delivered to the buyer. Isn't this an invitation to fraud ??
2. Ebay has strict policy regarding negative feedback .This seller had a single transaction with negative feedback on the same item (which I missed before ordering, unfortunately). http://www.thinkdigit.com/forum/amazon-india-junglee/180804-stay-away-amazon.html .Shouldn't be there such system in Amazon ??
3. Amazon does not enforce any shipping details to be provided by the seller. Is this a right policy ??
4. Shouldn't Amazon resolve issues faster ??
5. Should the customer be responsible for the seller's choice of courier (which BTW is not mentioned in the item's description page, unlike Ebay) & if it misses all its deadlines during both shipping & return shipping ??
 
I agree on all the points except #5. Had shopped from Amazon last month and had to do rma of memory I bought.
Amazon washes its hands off for items bought from third party sellers. Even the refund policy is pretty stupid. You send item back, Amazon waits for seller to confirm item receipt & after passing a few days, they will refund you the amount after taking it from seller. Pretty roundabout method. Also I didn't like their return policy of giving only 10 days for item to be returned.
 
Amazoin.in only has 3rd party sellers and Seeing the above experience...looks like we can opt for the below 2:
  • don't order from amazon.in and incase you do (for those great deals)
  • Don't return their packages:)

By any chance does anyone have amazon.in's facebook id? i wasn't able to find it
 
I order from Amazon.in quite regularly. Never had a problem even with expensive items.

The reason is, I stick to orders that are "Amazon Fulfilled". If you follow that, you won't face problems buying stuff from Amazon.in.

My advice is - if the item you want cannot be "Amazon Fulfilled" don't buy it from Amazon.in - look elsewhere....
 
It is true that Amazon fulfilled items are safe to be bought. But not everything is available that is Amazon fulfilled. Most sellers except WS retail at Flipkart does not ship to Odisha. Therefore, I had no choice but Amazon. However, their policies are pathetic. It is unfortunate that a brand like Amazon cannot keep its goodwill in India.
 
pauldmps said:
3. Amazon does not enforce any shipping details to be provided by the seller. Is this a right policy ??
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Afaik you can get those details by selecting 'shipping details' as subject in "contact seller" section. It gets displayed just by selecting 'shipping details' without any need to send any message to the seller
 
so far i have ordered items only from the amazon fulfilled sellers.

the items have reached much quicker than ebay, snapdeal and flipkart for me atleast.
 
hgps said:
Afaik you can get those details by selecting 'shipping details' as subject in "contact seller" section. It gets displayed just by selecting 'shipping details' without any need to send any message to the seller
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Yes but still it is dependent on seller. Plus I don't understand why the site is designed such that on the main orders page it shows that there is no tracking info & we need to jump hoops to find the tracking info.

Update: I'm yet to hear anything from Amazon regarding the refund. What should I do now ??
 
manu1991 said:
^^ The seller is croma, so you should be okay.
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I had one horrible experience with Croma (not buying off Amazon.in though) so wont be that sure. It took an email directly to the CEO to get it resolved. Even then their own employee admitted that they sell chinese pieces of known brands - hence the issue.
 
sharktale1212 said:
I had one horrible experience with Croma (not buying off Amazon.in though) so wont be that sure. It took an email directly to the CEO to get it resolved. Even then their own employee admitted that they sell chinese pieces of known brands - hence the issue.
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What does that mean? By Chinese do you mean fake? Or just lower quality? Many known brands do manufacture a lot of their phones in China.
 
blkrb0t said:
What does that mean? By Chinese do you mean fake? Or just lower quality? Many known brands do manufacture a lot of their phones in China.
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It wasn't a phone. It was an induction cooker from Prestige.
Though later the employee and his manager said, he was a misunderstood. What the employee meant because companies sell lower quality products, such issues arise.
 
I don't think that Amazon is the problem here but the seller. And it was your mistake to not have checked the feedback. ALWAYS check feedbacks.
My thought on the sale. Not the policies.
An item which i ordered reached me in 36 hours (against 24 hours as claimed). I had placed the order in one afternoon and got it it around 7:30pm of the following day. Do you think that i should give them a negative feedback for that? I dont think so.
 
iPwnz said:
I don't think that Amazon is the problem here but the seller. And it was your mistake to not have checked the feedback. ALWAYS check feedbacks.
My thought on the sale. Not the policies.
An item which i ordered reached me in 36 hours (against 24 hours as claimed). I had placed the order in one afternoon and got it it around 7:30pm of the following day. Do you think that i should give them a negative feedback for that? I dont think so.
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That is such a bullshit excuse. Blaming the victim to be more careful is a trope that is found in almost all wrongdoings and crimes. It shifts the discussion from the perpetartor to the victim.
 
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