Amazon scam Always check!

[Fangman]

Bought a printer for a friend from Amazon and today got an email offering the usual range of accessories - inks paper etc including compatible 1290 colour ink cartridges at 1p each. Ordered 10 just for my mate and luckily checked the bill before clicking confirm.

£45.00 postage for items charged at 10p

Always check anything from Amazon as to what the carriage will be as their outside supplier seems to charge 4.50 per item not package!

 

[mysteryscribe]

That is all over unfortunately....

 

[fmw]

Amazon has gotten out of the business of filling orders outside of the book business. Now they recruit other on line suppliers to list merchandise there and they take a commission on each sale. The merchants need to make money so they do what they can to cover the commission. You aren't buying from Amazon unless you are buying books. So I now view Amazon as the Ebay of e-merchants. I've quit using them myself and consider this business model to be unfortunate for the "darling" of e-commerce. I don't know who to recommend in the U.K. but there are several reliable photographic e-merchants in the U.S. with my favorites being B&H and Calumet.

As an e-merchant myself, I can tell you that the Amazon suppliers are not the top tier e-merchants. The top tier don't need to and would not pay commissions to someone else to make sales. It's a questionable setup at best.

 

[Don Simon]

Interesting. I had noticed that for a while now every search I did on Amazon was first offering the item for sale by another business... but there was usually the option to buy it from Amazon instead (this being other products as well as books). For example I looked for an SD card on Amazon, the card in question was first listed as being for sale by some random company, but the list of other buying options included buying from Amazon so I bought from them. Standard Amazon postage applied (i.e. free because of the cost of item) and when it arrived damaged I contacted Amazon and it was they who sent me a replacement.

So I assumed Amazon were still in the business of filling orders, even thought they also let other merchants list. Guess I was wrong

 

[fmw]

I'm describing how things were 3 years ago when they were recruiting me to list on their site. Things might very well have changed. Such a change would be to their benefit.

 

[markc]

As far as I know, they've always told you when you were buying from someone else other than Amazon. It looks like some items are Amazon only, some e-merchents only, and some are available from both. You just have to pay attention.

 

[Iron Flatline]

I buy a LOT from Amazon (it tends to be my default vendor) and have found that most products are sold by them. The only bad experience I ever had was buying a filter from Adorama via Amazon.