
Amazon Warehouse scam: 16TB HDD swapped for 8TB, returned for full refund - ilamont
https://twitter.com/BlissWallpaper/status/1286419567783432193
======
zaroth
“Amazon Warehouse“, for those not familiar with it, is an option you can
select specifically to buy an item that was previously returned.

Amazon has done a cosmetic inspection of the item and gives it a ranking on
how it appears which you see when you are buying it.

There are certain types of items where you can save a huge amount of money and
get great deals using Amazon Warehouse. Hard drives are obviously not one of
them due to the assumption that everything is returned _for a reason_. An
example of a type of item that I’ve always had good luck with is pots and
pans.

The interesting thing about this is assume that the tracking is in place to
identify who returned the original item. What would you do?

Maybe the actual scam (I don’t mean in this specific case) is buying perfectly
good Amazon Warehouse items but, knowing that they had been previously
returned, _claiming_ the item was swapped out after swapping it out yourself.

So Amazon can’t really know who to blame from a single incident. But certainly
I would expect accounts would accumulate warning flags and at some point be
banned.

~~~
vinhboy
I feel like this needs to be the top comment. Buying warehouse items is risky,
that's why it's cheaper.

Also, you can just return it if you don't like.

I don't think this deserves the scrutiny it's getting here.

~~~
paradoja
I'd think that it's cheaper not because it's risky (specially since Amazon
says it inspects the item), but because it's second hand. Trying to pass the
risk to the user is probably not what most people would expect.

------
Log1x
I semi-recently bought a Samsung 970 EVO from Amazon, except new (and not from
a third-party seller). Instead I received a security blanket:
[https://i.imgur.com/DTPdhAn.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/DTPdhAn.jpg)

The SSD box was seemingly factory sealed.

I also bought a Dyson fan recently and what came was an obviously used, yellow
stained, disgustingly old model of a Dyson fan. I hopped on Live Chat, they
apologized, initiated a return - few weeks later I get a semi-threatening
email from Amazon telling me that the Dyson fan I sent back "wasn't sent back
in its original condition" \- I hopped on Live Chat and made sure everything
was ok with my account (it was) - but still, ..wtf. this is a problem.

~~~
jeanvaljean2463
I keep telling everyone I come across, STOP BUYING THINGS from Amazon. They
know they have a huge problem and refuse to face it.

I was injured in 2010 by counterfeit toiletries and since have embargoed them
completely. I'm happy to buy things from the manufacture and pay shipping, at
least I know with a reasonable confidence that what I am getting is going to
be the real thing.

~~~
bduerst
There need to be better indexed shopify and big cartel sites. So many great
online stores I've bought from use that as a web front.

~~~
thirdsun
I don't think that's a solution. While I really, really like Shopify as an
ecommerce platform its usage alone tells you nothing about the legitimacy of
the seller. Indexing all products on a certain platform just seems like
another marketplace to me.

------
mattlondon
I recall seeing youtube videos about people who purchased pallets of returned
items from Amazon. Kind of an "unboxing" video for a huge stack of returned
items. Yes I was bored.

They had a few similar scenarios where people had clearly purchased expensive
computer components like motherboards etc and then returned the box with some
worthless motherboard in there instead of the expensive one. You can imagine
some poor Amazon warehouse worker receiving the package, opening it up and
seeing the motherboard "yup - looks like some computer gubbins. approved." and
off it goes.

The video people seemed to react like this was quite a common occurrence.

So this makes me wonder, if amazon are bundling-up returned items into pallets
and selling them in bulk, how did clearly returned items get sold back to an
end user? Frankly I am amazed the scammer went to the effort of putting in a
8TB device and connecting it, rather than either returning it empty or with
some random old IDE drive in it as a decoy.

~~~
AnssiH
> So this makes me wonder, if amazon are bundling-up returned items into
> pallets and selling them in bulk, how did clearly returned items get sold
> back to an end user?

If the item is (looks) unopened and pristine, Amazon will usually sell it
again as new.

Some switcharoos are caught, some are not.

~~~
adrr
They could catch it multiples ways. Simple precise weight measurement would
catch basic scammers. They could X-ray the package and use cv to determine if
the contents have been modified or not.

~~~
qppo
Why automate? Pay someone to open the box and check.

~~~
skylanh
Cost of multiple shifts at multiple locations + cost of implementing
verification process + cost of security and oversight + cost of extra
inventory loss due to employee theft

vs

Cost of negative image (deferred via simple returns) + cost of inventory loss
duo to fraud + cost of inventory loss due to employees

It's simpler to simply eat the cost of abuse.

------
seancoleman
This reminds me of how a friend (as a teenager in the 90s) would buy expensive
video cards from Best Buy and CompUSA only to swap them out with cheap cards
off eBay, re-shrink wrap the box and return for a hefty profit. I thought it
was a clever, profitable hack at 16 years old but now I’m ashamed I didn’t
just call this what it was: theft.

~~~
raincom
Fry's electronics when I was there was a victim of that. Fry's management in
their heydays (before newegg, amazon) gave the directive to open boxes, even
when these boxes appear new, during the return-process. This is the result of
lessons.

Hopefully, Amazon will learn it or make it a problem for the vendors.

~~~
kayfox
Fry's is the only retailer I have been to where an LP associate insisted on
opening up a product I just bought new to inspect it. Yep, its a rice cooker,
I should have went over to returns to return it as its condition changed from
new to open box before I left the store.

~~~
bdowling
> Yep, its a rice cooker

A rice cooker is a cylindrical item that usually comes in a rectangular box
that leaves empty room in the corners. The LP associate was checking for
additional unpurchased items in the box, not that you were getting a rice
cooker.

~~~
kayfox
It was a sealed box.

~~~
icedchai
There may have been some inside theft / collusion going on with employees.

Example: Employee takes a rice cooker off the shelf, puts high value
electronics (memory, processors, etc) inside, reseals it with shrink wrap. He
tells his friend on the outside to buy the rice cooker to smuggle it out. They
then split the proceeds.

This probably goes on for weeks until the store wonders why they're suddenly
selling so many rice cookers, but are already running low on Pentium Pros and
32 meg SIMMs.

~~~
kayfox
So, what your saying is I should expect being treated like this, after I have
purchased the product, thus making it my property.

I will go ahead and just go over to returns next time and go somewhere else.

~~~
icedchai
I'm just guessing. I don't work in retail but I'm sure all sorts of scams
happen, ones we can't even imagine. Was this recent?

------
raincom
That's why Fry's Electronics--a bay area retailer--scans the serial numbers of
hard drives, DIMM memory and other electronic stuff. During the return
process, Fry's employees check the serial number of the returned item against
what's there in the receipt. This strategy was born precisely because of the
scam that Amazon is seeing now.

~~~
chrisseaton
But here an _internal component_ was swapped. The serial number on the product
was unchanged.

I've never seen a receipt list any serial number, let alone serial numbers of
multiple internal components.

~~~
raincom
At least Fry's electronics used to TEST memory sticks, motherboards, CPUs in
front of customers during the return process. I knew cases where customers
tried to return CPUs with bent pins, and their returns were denied.

IIRC, Fry's did not test hard disks, except to match the serial numbers. So,
now this scam requires testing of hard drives of their capacity during the
return process. And this is a cat-and-mouse game.

~~~
dawnerd
I feel like the testing was more of a way to 1. try to avoid the return by
proving it worked and 2. put it right back out on the shelf for sell. Actually
picked up some good deals in the good days of Frys from returns. It's a shame
they're nothing more than an as seen on tv store these days.

~~~
raincom
First, they used to put these reshrink-wrapped items back on the shelves
without any labels. Few years later, they started to put the label "Returned
item".

Fry's is dead, as their HQ on Brokaw Road is being converted to an office
complex. They missed the dot com gravy train; had they gone to IPO around
1999, they would have made a killing. However, Fry's brothers and their
management are weird.

~~~
jiveturkey
oh is it? last i knew there were 3 bids over the last year or os, all unable
to get through re-zoning. The last news I heard was april 2020 and it is still
stuck.

do you know something very recent, or are you going on vaporware press
releases.

~~~
raincom
Nothing new, just that April 2020 news. Fry's done for now thanks to Covid. It
was slowly dying before that.

Here are some facts: (a) most of the shelves are empty; (b) shelves between
two shelves are removed, to make it appear business as usual; (c) vendors were
not getting paid by Frys; (d) therefore, any decent vendor doesn't want to
send them items on credit; (e) so, Fry's is left with the junk we see on TVs.

In some aspects, I miss Fry's. Fry's used to hire all kinds of people, gave
jobs to new immigrants without English skills. Now we such people driving
Uber, Lyft.

------
Rudism
Way back when I was in high school, it became a fad among the tech-geeks to
have our TI-85 graphing calculators modded with a "turbo" switch that would
let you run some games like Wolfenstein and Tetris at better speeds. It
involved cutting a hole in the back plastic casing inside the battery
compartment to make room for the switch, and then soldering a few connections
on the board underneath.

There was one kid who was doing it for everyone at $20 a pop, but he made no
guarantees about not accidentally bricking the calculator in the process. I
was a little apprehensive about having him do it since TI calculators were
(and still are) ridiculously expensive, and asked him what his success rate
was. He told me it didn't really matter because even if he accidentally
screwed up, all you had to do was go buy a new TI-85 from Future Shop (which
was like a Canadian version of Best Buy before they were actually bought by
Best Buy), put the broken calculator in the box, and then return it the next
day for a full refund. He would then mod the new one for no additional charge.

My turbo switch was installed fine so I didn't have to pull the scam, but I
knew a few kids who did.

------
sixhobbits
The reply from Amazon's support Twitter is the indication of a far larger
problem in most business. Namely, it's easier to deal with the consequences of
"mistakes" than it is to not make them.

e.g.

\- the "fines" Google and Facebook keep getting for breaking privacy and other
laws which are laughably small.

\- customer support teams not dealing with serious customer issues until they
get attention (viral tweet, front page HN etc)

\- monopolies in most forms: e.g. the big-tech anti-poaching agreements

Generally I'm all for "it's easier to ask for forgiveness than permission" but
that assumes that you are acting in good faith but still sometimes screw up.
It seems like "screwing up" has become a good way to ensure short-term profits
and as everyone is obsessed with KPIs and OKRs at a 1-week to 3-month time
frame, the incentives are all wrong.

And "mission statements" and "cultural values" are too synthetic to come close
to fixing this.

~~~
rmrfstar
> Namely, it's easier to deal with the consequences of "mistakes" than it is
> to not make them

What we're seeing is a widespread use of "fractional fraud".

Transactions and business lines that are 1%-5% fraudulent are unlikely to be
challenged, but have a huge effect on profitability.

The best example I've seen is Bunnie Huang's deep dive on counterfeit SD cards
[1]. Margins on SD cards are like 1%, so blending in defective cards at a 1%
rate can double your profit. Another example is retail trade payment for order
flow. A major broker-dealer was just sanctioned for front-running its clients.

As long as your defect ("mistake") rate stays below your customer's response
threshold, you can keep doing it. It is impossible to overstate how important
social norms are for policing this kind of misconduct.

[1]
[https://nostarch.com/hardwarehackerpaperback](https://nostarch.com/hardwarehackerpaperback)

~~~
rement
I'm reminded of an internet fable

> A city boy, Kenny, moved to the country and bought a donkey from an old
> farmer for $100. The farmer agreed to deliver the donkey the next day.

> The next day the farmer drove up and said: “Sorry son, but I have some bad
> news. The donkey died.”

> Kenny replied, “Well then, just give me my money back.”

> The farmer said, “Can’t do that. I went and spent it already.”

> Kenny said, “OK, then just unload the donkey.”

> The farmer asked, “What ya gonna do with him?”

> Kenny: “I’m going to raffle him off.”

> Farmer: “You can’t raffle off a dead donkey!”

> Kenny: “Sure I can. Watch me. I just won’t tell anybody he is dead.”

> A month later the farmer met up with Kenny and asked, “What happened with
> that dead donkey?”

> Kenny: “I raffled him off. I sold 500 tickets at $2 a piece and made a
> profit of $998.00.”

> Farmer: “Didn’t anyone complain?”

> Kenny: “Just the guy who won. So I gave him his $2 back.”

> Kenny grew up and eventually became the chairman of [company you want to
> mock]

~~~
GolDDranks
Sorry, not a native speaker. What does it mean to "raffle somebody off"?
(Edit: googling it says: "dispose of in a lottery", which makes me wonder: why
is there such a specific verb in the English language? I have never even
thought of "disposing of anything in a lottery")

~~~
slongfield
A "raffle" as distinct from a "lottery" in American English differs in how the
prize is decided, and what kinds of things are typically the prize.

Typically a lottery runs in one of two ways: with pre-decided winning tickets,
or a number that's drawn after the tickets are distributed to decide which
ticket (if any) is the winner. In this way, the odds of winning are mostly
independent of the number of tickets sold. The prize is usually money.

A raffle works by selling tickets, and then picking exactly one of those
tickets to be the winner, making the odds directly dependent on the number of
tickets sold. The prize is usually a physical object, and not money (though
there are exceptions, e.g., a 50/50 raffle).

~~~
GolDDranks
Thanks for the explanation. I'm familiar with the both forms of gambling, but
for some reason, I've encountered "lottery" as a term a lot more; "raffle" I
hardly knew, until now. Thanks!

------
eugenekolo
Welcome to Amazon shopping for the past 5 or so years. Everything is fakes,
used goods marked as new, and low quality goods with 4.7+ stars from fake
reviews.

The convenience is so nice, yet about 50% of the time I'm disappointed with
any purchase made on Amazon.com. But, those stock profits :heart_eyes_emoji:.

------
pwg
Why the surprise here. This "scam" (or theft) is as old as stores taking "no
questions asked" returns. I knew someone who did this a time or two back in
the mid-90's to Circuit City and/or CompUSA. I warned them that this could be
traced back to them if the stores became interested enough to do so, that did
not deter them much.

~~~
diehunde
I wonder what the consequences can be for doing this. Just pay full price or
also face legal actions.

~~~
sukilot
It depends on how much the local DA wants to nail you.

It's definitely criminal behavior, some kind of theft or fraud

------
vincenzow
I recently bought a Nintendo Switch from Amazon (not a third party seller)
only to open the box and find the switch itself missing. Baffled at how this
slipped through.

~~~
AnssiH
I guess the box looked unopened so the returns worker didn't look inside.

------
laurentdc
I've ordered three Xbox Play and Charge kits from Amazon, two were blatantly
counterfeit (came in a plastic bag, scratched and with no markings, I don't
believe it's "OEM"), the other was genuine but with batteries manufactured
four years before and pretty much DOA (probably used and sent back by
someone?)

I had to order from Microsoft directly to get an acceptable product.

------
jasonv
I have a new Lenovo laptop, purchased on Amazon directly from Lenovo, arriving
on Tuesday.

I intend to unbox the laptop and record it on my GoPro.

Seems silly, but...

~~~
FalconSensei
After this
([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23941572](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23941572))
I always record. I had no problem to return and didn't need to prove that it
arrived cracked but... better safe than sorry

~~~
somehnguy
I learned my lesson with TVs on Amazon a few years ago too. There were a
couple reviews noting cracked screens, thought it was probably just rare bad
luck. Bought the TV, it arrived cracked.

Had Amazon schedule a UPS pickup for return and bought the TV locally. Poor
packaging for TVs on Amazon just seems to be normal.

------
bcrosby95
I just plain don't buy electronics on Amazon. I've rarely had it go well. It's
usually something - anywhere from something like this, to paying full price
for something that was obviously previously opened.

~~~
t0mbstone
I don't understand who all these people are who are having bad experiences
with Amazon. I only ever buy products that have the Prime label and have
plenty of verified positive reviews. Stuff always arrives very quickly (often
the next day), and I have literally never had a fake product mailed to me when
I do this.

One time I bought a used product from Amazon and it was a little beat up but
it still worked.

Another time I bought something that was clearly manufactured and sold from
China, and sure enough it sucked, but I just returned it and it was no big
deal.

~~~
sneak
> _I have literally never had a fake product mailed to me when I do this._

It's possible you're not buying commonly-faked items, or possibly it happened
and you just didn't notice. Lots of fakes are of similar reliability for the
first 20-50% of normal lifespan.

------
kveykva
I had assumed this was common knowledge that this occurred. We used to
experience returns like this all of the time that Amazon would accept up-front
before acceptance by our warehouse. >$200 chargers returned in original boxes
containing $10 chargers. There have been other stories of iphone boxes full of
playdough or just anything that would weight roughly the same.

I wouldn't be surprised if there are other 3rd party fulfillment providers
that rather than dealing with having had this pushed on them by Amazon, they
just put that return back on the shelf and they get shipped out to other
customers.

~~~
aimor
What did you do when you get such a return, and what would Amazon do?

------
hknapp
Probably more expensive to train some warehouse workers to analyze returns to
the extent of plugging it into a computer and seeing the size than to just
deal with this happening some time.

~~~
sokoloff
I bought an alternator for my wife's car. While replacing it, I discovered
this:

[https://imgur.com/a/E53NxjE](https://imgur.com/a/E53NxjE)

Prior customer bought, discovered the holes were machined incorrectly (part
would not bolt up), clearly marked the part, returned it, and Amazon put it
back on the shelf to send to the next buyer. With the car half torn apart,
Amazon offered they could get me a replacement item in 8 calendar days. Yeah,
that's not going to work, so I took it over to a milling machine and had it
milled out to fit (first photo shows immediately after milling, second and
third photo are before, third photo has the new part doweled to the old part
to align one of the holes and show how far off the second hole is). Just like
this case, Amazon A2Z was willing to accept the return and ship another one,
but the real customer failure was during the previous return, not when I had
the complaint.

There's a customer satisfaction angle that "Earth's most customer centric
company" should probably be considering here.

~~~
WrtCdEvrydy
If a customer has to physically punch a new hole in a product, I consider that
a full refund without return :)

~~~
sokoloff
That’s what I’d have expected from 2010 Amazon. It’s not what I was offered by
2020 Amazon.

------
bredren
This happened to me buying a Yamaha MG06 Compact Stereo Mixer from Amazon
Warehouse.

The one I received had clear indications that it had been in use for a long
time, dust grime and wear—-it was gross.

In this case it appeared the person returned the same model for a new one. It
was a good trick that Amazon resolved without feedback on my pointing this out
when I returned it.

I bought it brand new after that.

Previous to this, I had ordered something else from amazon warehouse, again a
“like new” item for a steep discount and it was as described. A great deal.

------
jasnk
Sounds about right. I have had overall VERY GOOD Amazon Warehouse experiences,
but I have also had TWO VERY TERRIBLE Amazon Warehouse experiences with two
separate products that could have been avoided if items were actually
"Inspected"...

Hue Outdoor Motion Sensors (May 2019) -- Several sensors in my first order had
obvious water damage outside packaging and MOLD inside packaging. Just looking
at packages during "Inspection" would have prevented this. Requested
replacements. Received MORE water damage and MOLD. Repeat several times until
finally received NON-MOLD items or for refund.

GE Smart Light Switch, Smart Fan Switch (Feb 2020) -- Ordered several of each,
kept receiving wrong model (e.g. ZigBee instead of ZWave Plus, or ZWave
instead of ZWave plus) as if prior customer gave up on large project and
randomly threw products back into whatever boxes. Comparing product number on
item to product number on box during "Inspection" would have prevented this!
Kept requesting replacements, kept receiving wrong items. Finally returned
items for a refund. Amazon CS did finally issue full refund, but had trouble
unraveling the mess on their end because so many items were in play.

------
zimbatm
Pro tip: don't bother with Amazon France, order from the UK.

For some reason, all the non-consumables that I ordered in France were re-
furbished items sold as new. In contrast, the UK has always been stellar. Once
Brexit hits, I will stop using Amazon altogether.

~~~
Asuchug4
Does it matter at all? Won't the item be shipped from closest amazon warehouse
regardless of site used?

~~~
teh_klev
Due to Brexit this is changing:

[https://tamebay.com/2020/07/amazon-fba-brexit-bombshell-
efn-...](https://tamebay.com/2020/07/amazon-fba-brexit-bombshell-efn-and-pan-
european-fba-ends-for-uk.html)

Previous discussion:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23888510](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23888510)

------
sn_master
Got a Motorola phone, same-day shipping from the US, and actually got it just
few hours later.

Phone screen broke. Contacted Motorola for support, they said the phone IMEI
is from India and can't be serviced in the US under warranty, I have to ship
it to India if I want it fixed by them :/

~~~
manquer
I am surprised at this , for a long time the reverse use to happen .

Also it is usually not coz the IMEI, it is because each model has sub geo
variants depending on the spectrum they are allowed to use in those regions
etc. Cross region variants other region decline to service . It is not just
Moto, Apple does the same .

~~~
sn_master
I think the Indian one was cheaper, so they probably bought a big batch then
sold it in the US for more expensive US prices. Indian model also had dual-
SIM, which US phones generally don't have.

------
dhosek
This is a consequence of amazon being too big to care. They aren't doing the
most basic check to verify that what's in the box is what the outside of the
box claims it is. Some years ago, I bought two identical routers from Best Buy
and then decided I didn't need the second so I went to return it. I put it in
the wrong box. Best Buy refused the return because the serial number on the
router didn't match the serial number on the box.

The whole concept of Amazon is fundamentally flawed. I've gotten too much
counterfeit stuff and junk to ever trust them again.

~~~
libertine
Oh and it's even easier when they make the seller pay for their fuck ups and
for fraud - it's peanuts for Amazon :)

------
projproj
What are your favorite alternatives to Amazon? E.g., I go to monoprice for
cables. Are there other niche options that you like for different products
where you can expect quality?

------
timsneath
Even in the best case where you get something that is superficially what you
ordered, you have a sneaking feeling that you're getting something
counterfeit:
[https://twitter.com/timsneath/status/1286821682968051712](https://twitter.com/timsneath/status/1286821682968051712)

It's frustrating when you have to treat every transaction as if you're buying
from a flea market.

------
gibba999
I shopped on Amazon for many years. I never had problems until around the time
of COVID19. It seems to be a cesspool of scammers and conartists now. Amazon
doesn't do much of anything about it either. I'm out a couple hundred bucks.

I'm kind of annoyed. I need a reliable place to order stuff. Aliexpress and
eBay seem ahead of Amazon now. That's bad.

My favorite scam: Futures. Sellers will sell low-availability things at
(slightly) inflated prices and long ship times. If prices go down, you get the
product. If prices go up, they refund you. It's too complex for Amazon minimum
wage drones to understand why this is a scam, so you can't do anything about
it.

Amazon wouldn't refund my Prime, which renewed around the time of COVID19, and
which hasn't really worked. That's turning into a scam too.

~~~
jedberg
> It's too complex for Amazon minimum wage drones to understand why this is a
> scam, so you can't do anything about it.

Too be fair, it's not exactly a scam. No one is really being cheated out of
anything. It's annoying for sure, but there is no deception.

~~~
gibba999
It is a scam. It's a sophisticated scam. I thought I was buying an item. I was
giving the seller a free options contract, valued at a few hundred dollars.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valuation_of_options](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valuation_of_options)

Price jumped up by a $150, and I never got my item. I needed the item and not
receiving it resulted in a couple hundred bucks of damages. If price had gone
down a hundred bucks, I would have overpaid by that much.

The seller, by the way, did charge my card. It was marked as shipped. The
seller issued a refund on the day it was supposed to arrive, claiming it was
"lost in trucking." Many other buyers had their orders "lost in trucking" too
from reviews of that and other sellers.

My opinion is that Amazon should have made the seller fulfill the orders. At
the time I ordered, several items were available at the same price. At the
time I was to receive the order, price had gone up $150. It's not like the
seller couldn't have fulfilled it; they would have just taken a loss to do so.

I'll mention this isn't the only time I got scammed on Amazon this year; just
the most clever scam.

~~~
albntomat0
Out of curiosity, what was the item that has such price swings?

~~~
gibba999
Chest freezer.

A lot of items had these swings though: face masks were the most obvious, but
virtually all emergency supplies went through major up-and-down spikes. Dry
shelf-stable food, some medicines, toilet paper, etc. All of a sudden, the
whole world wanted to stock up.

That made it really hard to buy those items if you have a non-emergency use
for them.

------
lobo_tuerto
In Mexico most of the times you'll get a previously opened and returned
package. Which in turn would usually return myself and ask for a new package
(happened with an AIO cooler unit which even had the thermal paste applied on
it...

Or the items won't work as expected which has happened to me with laptops and
tablets. The only good thing is there is no problem returning the used / bad
stuff. But you lose time and the discount price.

------
gempir
It's cheaper to just accept returns instead of checking every product for
complete function.

And I think it's acceptable considering how easy returns are with Amazon.

~~~
somehnguy
I don't think its acceptable at all. An easy return doesn't fix having to wait
an additional at least a few days before you actually get what you paid for.

That is just basically accepting that Amazon is completely unreliable for
anything even remotely time sensitive, despite what made them huge in the
first place - extremely fast delivery.

------
mike503
Isn’t that what was called pulling a “scamazon” on Shameless? I haven’t had
this happen with Amazon (but I know they’d make it right)

I did just have it happen with an order from a sketchy web front obviously
shipping out of China. I knew it was risky but I used PayPal, which I’ve used
in the past and used their buyer guarantee. This time the dispute is lagging
(maybe COVID-related staffing issues) but I see many reports on their forums
of it happening and claims being closed without resolution, requiring a ton of
extra work to escalate and find someone who can help, etc.

I was supposed to receive $65 of cleaning products, but wound up with a cheap
small pair of socks (lightweight and easy to ship. Even the customs
declaration says “socks” on it)

However according to USPS the package was delivered. So a quick review looks
like they fulfilled their obligation. I’m hoping I get a chance to send in
pictures showing what I got obviously not matching the order (which
conveniently wasn’t line itemed in PayPal, so hopefully they will accept my
email showing the actual items...)

------
davestephens
A close friend has a very similar thing recently, except it was/should have
been a new Ryzen 3700x, not a warehouse deal.

If you've bought one you'll know it comes in a box with a big cooler on top,
and the proc is at the bottom in a bit of plastic packing.

He got the big cooler but no Ryzen. Contacted Amazon, got another Ryzen and
cooler sent out.

I think this is incredibly common...

------
bravoetch
This is not a scam unique to Amazon. It happens everywhere, and has for
decades at least. A more insidious version attacks eBay sellers. The buyer
will send an item back broken and ask for a refund, meanwhile keeping the good
verse;n you sent them. Take serial numbers, secretly hide marks and photograph
them before sending anything.

~~~
etats
But do you do with that serial number mismatch and 'missing secret marks'
evidence? A seller could easily fudge that "proof" and eBay/Amazon aren't big
on taking sellers at their word. There's no fool-proof way to collect evidence
of return fraud and there isn't much you can do once you have that evidence.

------
tsyd
It happened to me when I bought a new motherboard from Amazon (shipped and
sold by Amazon, not Amazon Warehouse nor fulfilled by Amazon). I opened the
motherboard box and inside was a 10-year old motherboard.

I knew this was a possibility when buying from Amazon Warehouse but didn't
expect it when buying new directly from Amazon.

~~~
DavidPeiffer
The way Amazon runs things is completely inexcusable. If you can't order
_directly_ from Amazon and get a non-fraudulent product, then the whole
platform is basically going to a flea market, having all the vendors turn
their backs, shuffling product amongst the vendors, and sending normal
citizens through to buy what they want.

Any traceability and trust the end consumer would have is gone. Amazon may be
able to trace a particular product to a vendor, but that's of no help to a
consumer wanting a consistent supply of goods. Amazon also doesn't show if a
vendor chooses to opt out of comingled inventory, which would go a long way
towards helping end consumer trust.

------
arm85
A similar thing has happened to me in the past. Brought a phone dock from
amazon, and when it arrived, it didn't fit my phone, looking at the serial
number on the dock itself, it was for the previous model of phone but the
packaging was for the latest.

So someone had decided to upgrade for free.

------
mNovak
I think what a lot of people are missing in the comments when they say "I
bought <product> from <brand> not a third party..." is that for new products
the 'seller name' you're buying from does not correspond to which box you get
off the shelf. It's called co-mingled inventory--Amazon doesn't track which
box you (as seller) sent them, they just throw it on the shelf with all the
other "new" same product boxes.

Obvious fraud is at least somewhat Amazon's problem since it gets returned,
but the huge problem for the name-brand vendors is all the support requests /
bad reviews they get when people get counterfeit crap, thinking they bought
from <brand> directly.

~~~
viggity
IIRC, if you're a seller, you have to pay extra to not have your goods co-
mingled with the "same" product from other companies. It would appear that
seagate didn't do that.

~~~
bdowling
> if you're a seller, you have to pay extra to not have your goods co-mingled

It would be great if Amazon passed that information on to the purchaser. It
might even justify paying a higher price to buy from a non-comingled vendor
because it would indicate increased accountability.

------
js2
I recently purchased a open box Apple Pencil from BestBuy. When I got it, it
didn’t work. I realized the pencil s/n didn’t match the box and looked up the
manufacture date. It was several years old and the battery must’ve been shot.
Someone had bought a new pencil and used the box to return their old pencil
and BestBuy must not have checked.

BestBuy gave me a new one, no hassle. But then crazily enough, the brand new
Apple Pencil didn’t work either. Bad luck! They were out of stock at that
point so they just gave me a refund.

Anyway, I know this is a risk with open box. A friend just purchased a brand
new Garmin Fenix via Amazon. When she opened the Garmin box, nothing was
inside! Amazon refunded her. She purchased it from REI instead.

------
TD-Linux
Someone did this scam even at a local Best Buy. When I returned it, they
unpack it and scan the barcode on the case, but of course not on the actual
HDD. (the person doing the scam didn't even do a good job, and broke some of
the plastic clips in the process)

------
makecheck
Reminds me of scrolls with the “king’s seal”...we might need to start
demanding more than fancy shrink-wrap to ensure that something is actually in
factory packaging.

I think an interesting way to do it would be to have slightly stronger plastic
wrap that can be “dented” in several places similar to a UPC pattern, that in
turn can be scanned by a phone for authenticity. (This could be done both by
warehouses prior to agreeing to stock something, and by consumers to verify
what they get.) Scammers might eventually figure it out but at least they’d
need to recreate a complex dent pattern after shrink-wrapping, and they would
need to be able to do it for each unique company they’re claiming to be.

------
Waterluvian
I need to buy 15 16GB SD cards for a high school robotics team for Raspberry
Pis that are guaranteed to be shutdown improperly and bumped around a lot.

I balked at Amazon. I just don’t know how to trust their stuff anymore. Left
having no idea where to get a sensible price.

~~~
yobert
Newegg! Usually it's pretty close to competitive with Amazon for electronics.

~~~
Waterluvian
I have no idea why newegg didn’t cross my mind. I guess because I’m not buying
desktop computer parts.

Thank you.

------
ChrisMarshallNY
This was a big reason that I stopped buying stuff from best Buy.

I would buy some peripheral or appliance, get home, open the box, and see a
dirty, stained, clearly broken device.

They were always very good about refunding, but they treated my wasted time as
if it were nothing.

This has not [yet] happened to me with Amazon, for new devices, but it did
happen once with a used "New condition" peripheral (what arrived was broken,
dirty, and packed with toilet paper and rolled up newspapers). The third-party
vendor jerked me around so much, I had to use Amazon's A-Z guarantee.

I tend to use Costco for home appliances, these days, and my expensive kit
from manufacturers.

------
cft
Amazon has become very difficult. I end up using ebay more and more: sellers
there are small businesses and they bear more responsibility. It feels more
decentralized. Longer shipping, but cheaper and more reliable.

~~~
sneak
WAY cheaper! I used to default to Amazon for everything. So many things that
Amazon charges $10-15 for (with free shipping, of course) can be had for $5
with $0-$3 shipping on eBay. I've saved tons over the last couple years.

------
yalogin
I don't know how best buy our other brick and mortar stores deal with this
kind of scams. Unless they actually hook it up and check for that kind of scam
its tough. In that sense its not a uniquely Amazon issue. At Amazon's scale
though it gets exaggerated and also because of that scale they can ignore it
and keep replacing items for their customers. The process to check each and
every item for scams might be too costly. Its a fascinating study nonetheless
and it will be great to get some real insight from people working on these
issues.

~~~
sn_master
You can just drive back and hand it to them and get a new one or a refund in
just an hour or so. Not so easy with Amazon.

------
netsharc
Gavin Free of the Slow-Mo Guys talked on a podcast how he got 2 cans of Dr.
Pepper instead of a dremel:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-LRgWpyMEI&t=29s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-LRgWpyMEI&t=29s)

I wonder what else could "black hats" do with this "exploit". Buy laptops,
install malware, return them? The higher-end the laptop, the higher the
chances are the next buyer will be rich, and that seems like an interesting
way to access someone's bank account.

------
Zelphyr
I had this exact thing happen with the purchase of a Nest Protect from Amazon.
Nest packaging complete with "Inspected" sticker on the box and a First Alert
detector inside.

I no longer shop at Amazon.

------
5bolts
have a former friend that would do a brick and mortar version of this... even
went so far as to buy a shrink wrap machine.

buy an external drive, take it home and remove the drive.. fill case with
rocks or wood or something to add mass.. put it back in the box, shrink wrap
it and have his wife return it.. doing a slight upgrade to the next size up.
repeat a couple of times.. then get full refund.

he'd even end up with his own crap filled drives once in a while..

~~~
acwan93
Reminds me of how someone went to Target to buy an iPod for her daughter,
found it full of rocks and exchanged it after getting her refund rejected,
only for a replacement iPod from another Target to also be filled with rocks.

[https://www.engadget.com/2007-10-09-birthday-girl-gets-
two-r...](https://www.engadget.com/2007-10-09-birthday-girl-gets-two-rock-
filled-ipod-boxes.html)

------
Orphis
A long time ago, I bought Half-Life 1 in a regular store. I tried to play with
a friend online but it said my CD-key was already being used. Turned out my
friend had bought the game, came without a CD-key printed on the box, so the
store opened a random box and gave him that CD-key. I bought that exact same
box.

In the end, my friend sent a picture of the box to Valve and got a fresh CD-
key, and we could finally play together.

------
redm
This is why retailers are starting to get drivers licenses to complete a
return; its much harder to scam if you cant do it anonymously.

~~~
Nextgrid
I doubt this will do much. They would still need to actually investigate the
issues which they already don't do.

Online banks nowadays do ID verification with passports, etc and yet very
basic fraud committed intentionally by the account holder is still happening
because the truth is even though the information to identify the perpetrator
is there nobody can be bothered enough to act on it.

------
dnissley
Just had something similar happen to myself a couple months ago -- bought some
good condition used Galaxy Buds Plus (released 2020) sold by Amazon, received
Galaxy Buds (Non-Plus, released 2019) inside Galaxy Buds Plus packaging. I had
zero problem returning the item and getting a full refund, but I do wonder if
the person who did this got away with it.

------
GorsyGentle
Bought an Intel CPU, got an "Intel" box that was full of Chinese playing
cards. Amazon rep insisted it was "just a mistake", my ass. It's fraud.

[https://imgur.com/a/P05mh4j](https://imgur.com/a/P05mh4j)

edit: Intel product, Sold by Amazon. None of that third-party stuff warehouse
stuff here.

------
unexaminedlife
I learned many years ago that auto theft is almost 100% committed by a very
tiny fraction of the overall population.

Probably same phenomenon here. Small # of people doing this. I'm hopeful
Amazon does not go easy on these people. The numbers are likely in their favor
even if they decided to take every single one of those cases to court.

------
jonplackett
Curious what countries this is happening in?

I’m in the Uk and never had these problems despite being a fairly prolific
Amazon user.

~~~
tiernano
I buy a lot of stuff from amazon and only on 1 occasion did something like
this happen. Bought a 16Gb DDR4 SODIMM, mind you from the warehouse deals
(half price!) and a 4Gb module arrived. Opened a case with Amazon and they
sent me a second one, but this time the correct size...

------
aimor
I once bought a lawnmower where someone had swapped it out with a lower-end
model. That was from Lowe's.

I'd like to know what action companies take against this type of theft, it
seems trivial to identify the culprit but maybe difficult to prove anything
and probably expensive.

~~~
remus
Unless there's some sort of large scale, organised fraud occurring, or it is
so hugely prevalent as to be affecting the bottom line then I'd be very
surprised if any action was taken. If you think about the amount of time and
effort involved (legal counsel is expensive) then it's not worth it.

------
jsgo
Had a similar issue with Best Buy: ordered a 10TB HDD (quite a few) and inside
was a 250GB HDD.

To be fair, they were champs and replaced it with another unit, but
unfortunately there are people who do this and then they don’t validate it.
The HDD was also an absurdly old one too.

------
benguild
Yeah the return fraud is also a problem for third-party Amazon sellers.

Buyers can essentially destroy the item and return it claiming warehouse
damage, and then Amazon won’t always take responsibility even if it was sent
to FBA near perfect or new.

------
Havoc
I've had this happen with a graphics card.

Bought a 2070. Got a 2060 in scruffy packaging.

To add insult to injury I sent it back and doesn't seem to have arrived yet
and/or covid ate it. 5 fuckin months later it's still:

>Your refund will be processed when we receive your item.

~~~
bentcorner
Curiously enough I encountered the inverse problem the other day.

I received a refund for an item sitting on my desk. I purchased it, received
it, and did not request any refund at all.

I called Amazon about it and they said to let the refund go through and they
sent me an email I could reply to when I was ready to be re-charged.

Extremely odd, and I was worried there was some scam I was missing. Amazon rep
said the returns department made a mistake somehow.

I imagine there's probably someone that returned the same item I bought and
they're still waiting for their refund. :-/

------
Schnitz
This is standard practice at Amazon and it's very annoying. Even defective
items just get sent out until someone doesn't return them and items that were
clearly used get sold again as new without even being cleaned.

------
kirillzubovsky
I am glad to have read this thread. A few of the issues mentioned in comments
have happened to me in the last year, but I just wrote it off as one-off
scamming, did not realize it's systemic and sophisticated.

------
killion
I’ve had this happen to me multiple times with Apple keyboards and mice for
the office. They are listed as brand new and sold by Amazon. But they are
clearly used when you open the box.

------
akerro
There is a post about it every week on /r/datahoarder

------
_nickwhite
This reminds me of the time I bought a high-end GTX video card at Best Buy...
only to find a bottle of shampoo inside. These types of return scams happen
all the time.

------
ents
I bought a 240hz monitor from AWH and there was a 144hz one in the box. Sad
times to set that all up and see that someone got a free upgrade.

------
rju
"But certainly I would expect accounts would accumulate warning flags and at
some point be banned."

------
linkmotif
If you're going to swap the drive, why not swap in a 4tb, or a 2tb, or a
500mb?

------
lubujackson
I bought a new kid's book from Amazon.

A child had written their name inside the cover.

------
neuralRiot
The real scam is from Amazon, selling store return items as brand new.

------
disiplus
why would they swap in a 8 tb one thah still has value and not a idk 500g one
and profit more ?

~~~
pwinnski
I have a NAS that holds four drives. If I upgrade 8TB drives for 16TB drives,
I would have no further use for the 8TB drives. I also don't have half-TB
drives lying around.

~~~
disiplus
sure, but if you are a scammer then selling the 8T for at least 100$ and
picking one for basically free would net you more profit. maybe it was
somebody that did not think he does something wrong because "amazon is big and
will eat the cost"

~~~
netsharc
Huh, honestly it'd be "cleverer" to find a broken drive (that the OS wouln't
even detect) and swap it into the enclosure. Then the thief can say it was
defective, or the next buyer would, and there would be less of a chance of an
investigation/change of policy.

------
all_blue_chucks
What does this have to do with Amazon? Return scams have been around for as
long as returns.

------
dilandau
Another outrage dump where prime members and AWS customers vent their spleen
on the teat that nourishes their lives. It's a frail rebellion. A piece of
performance art. Experimental theatre

