I am in the market to purchase a
Canon Digital Rebel XTi. Like any self-proclaimed nerd, I looked to the internet to find the best deal avaliable. I googled the name of the camera and saw a sponsored link for Expresscameras.com. They had a phenomenal price for the camera at $399. This was almost $300 less than Amazon.com’s price. Also in the Google search I came across Bestpricecameras.com at a similar price of $459. Bestpricecameras.com advertises all over the internet, including the popular
Lifehacker.com. There are even fake rating sites saying how wonderful Bestpricecameras.com is as a store. After checking major sites like
Newegg.com and
Ritzcamera.com, I kept coming back to the two previously mentioned sites. I was very tempted by the low price but was slightly hesitant to pull the trigger.
Something did not feel right to me about the two sites offering the camera at such a deep discount, especially since the best deal I found on
Slickdeals.net was for over $600. Since I had never heard of either website, a friend recommended that I take a look at
Resellerratings.com, which rates online merchants on a score from 0 to 10. I typed in Bestpricecameras.com and saw that it was ranked 0.2 out of 10. Ouch!
It turns out that both sites, Expressecameras.com and Bestpricecameras.com are ‘bait and switch’ operations. According to posts on Resellerratings.com, they lure you in with a deal too good to be true. Once they receive your order online, they send you an e-mail asking you to call a sales representative, who then tries to convince you to buy overpriced, made-up accessories. If you do not agree to the accessories, they become belligerent and still charge your credit cards. If you do agree to buy the phantom accessories, they don’t even send you the right items and also overcharge you.
I always assumed that Google monitored the sites that they took ads from to make sure they were legit. I was surprised to learn otherwise. Resellerratings.com saved me from dealing with the headache of canceling my credit card and having fradulent charges. One tip to consider while shopping is to use the Resellerratings.com Firefox extension
Enjoyed the post? Subscribe to the full feed for daily updates.
Related Posts on Floppyhead.com:
Backing Up My Photos the Low Tech Way3 ways for Emusic to gain market shareHTC Advantage | Making the iPhone Look Cheap2 Tips on How to Share Family Pictures and Videos
January 5th, 2007 at 6:41 pm
Good thing you did your homework and checked Resellerratings.com. Your wife would have been really pissed off if you spent $400 on a camera which you never received.
August 29th, 2008 at 7:08 am
joeyswildace is clearly the owner of one of these camera scammers and he doesn’t know squat about Resellerratings. ResellerRatings has something like 14 policies that they require reviews to adhere to: they only allow reviews from legit customers, and they let merchants post public rebuttal comments in reply to reviews and they even let merchants contact customers by email to resolve disputes, since reviewers can edit their review at any time. They are a very responsible site with good tools for both users and merchants and unlike the many “complaint” sites out there, most reviews at ResellerRatings are positive.
September 2nd, 2008 at 9:42 pm
wow ))
its very reasonable article.
Nice post.
realy gj
thank you
November 20th, 2008 at 12:18 pm
In-depth view. Like it very much. I will follow these tips provided herein to examine its specific outcome after putting into use in real cases. Thanks from me.