Dodgy overseas on-line resellers (and some good ones)

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chrisc

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Have found 3 in the past 12 months.  Before writing this article, I spoke to 4 people who frequent on-line sellers

There were 2 business who either took an excessive time to deliver items ordered, or did not deliver the goods and then argued about it or ignored complaints

The most frequently mentioned supplier is Fruugo.  They purport to be in S Africa but all purchases are routed through China or Netherlands.  With one exception, items ordered did not arrive.  Fruugo promised tracked delivery,  but none were tracked, or were given a tracking number that did not exist.  Complaints about delivery elicited the same 2 excuses - our supplier has stock problems or Covid has caused shipping delays

The other one is Light in the Box.  After a 3 month delay, a complaint was posted.  However, the ?Send? button on the dialog box did not work, so the complaint could not be posted.  Their website shows identical products with different prices.  Delivery is promised by ?Expedited air? but in practice it is regular post.  One parcel from Hong Kong arrived with Postage due which entailed an extra 10 weeks delay and R110 fee.  When eventually collected from Cape Mail, instead of being 40 quartz clock movements, was 40 digital thermometers

A bit more kosher is Banggood.  Good prices and advertise fast delivery.  Anything but fast, but everything ordered eventually arrived

Very good are Alibaba and top of them all is of course Amazon

Here in SA we are well served by Takealot.  One drawback with TaL is rubbishy products.  Friend bought 3 external DVD writers.  None worked.  Fortunately the 4th did
 
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