03.03.07
How to defraud ebay, the emartbuy.com way!
It seems there’s a great way to defraud ebay users, and best of all, it doesn’t violate their policy. Sure, it may be immoral but aparrently doing this is perfectly fine according to ebay. So first, a little history, you see i learned of this scam in the time honored way of being suckered by it.
I was browsing through ebay, looking for somewhere i could buy some additional memory for a computer of mine. There were plenty of cheap sellers in the US, but i don’t like to buy internationally because of the various difficulties involved, it is always better to deal with local sellers. So i was presently surprised, to see some fairly cheap (not the cheapest, but not bad) memory being offered for sale that claimed to be in the UK. The item i found was this:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270084335932
Clearly marked as being in the UK, the seller had loads of them available and the price was reasonable. I read the description, and noted that my motherboard chipset, the VIA K8T800 was listed as known compatible, and that they listed the company name and website, emartbuy - www.emartbuy.com on the listing. I visited this site, and was immediately presented with a choice between USA and UK. Great i thought, they clearly have a UK office and do business in the UK.
So i placed the order, paid for it, and within a few days received the memory. I eagerly put it into my machine and turned it on, and, nothing… The fans were spinning, the drive was spinning, but nothing on the screen. I put my old memory back in, and the system behaved as normal, so i tried again with only one of the new modules inserted. This time the screen came on, and the system started on it’s power on checks. Half way through, it froze and wouldn’t respond to any keypresses. I tried the other modules with similar and often erratic results, sometimes the bios initialization would complete, but i could never boot an OS. Sometimes the system would be able to load the “memtest86″ program, but this never ran for more than a few minutes before detecting memory errors. Frustrated by this, i rechecked the listing and reconfirmed that my motherboard was listed as being compatible.
So i attempted to contact the seller, but to no avail, frustrated i contacted them through paypal. This time they responded, confirming that my motherboard is compatible and asking me to return the defective memory. But here’s where it gets worse. The auction had clearly stated the memory was located in the UK, but when asking for a return this company demanded that i ship it to the US, at my own cost. Nowhere on the original listing had any mention been made of this, and indeed the word “return” in combination with the listing stating the item was in the UK, would imply that returning it would involve returning it to it’s original location in the UK, and not a costly and time consuming international shipping exercise.
This company also only gives you 14 days from receipt of the item in order to return it, yet they freely admit that shipping internationally can take up to 15 business days (that is, up to 3 weeks including the weekends).
They then went on to say that misleading buyers like this is not against ebay policy, and that it’s perfectly ok to demand a return to an arbitrary location that was not once mentioned in the original listing.
So here’s how the scam works:
Find an address in a far away country, somewhere that it’s very expensive to ship anything to (Cuba, Burma, Iraq, The McMurdo Antarctic research station).
Obtain a large amount of broken items that are usually expensive (when working), since broken items are usually worthless you should be able to get stacks of defective junk cheaply or for free. Alternatively, you can ship random junk.
Put the defective items up on ebay, but don’t mark them defective, instead offer a refund or replacement guarantee. Tell buyers where the items are currently located, and wait for the suckers to start bidding.
When someone wins, add some extra to the shipping amount to cover not only the shipping and packaging cost, but also a small profit for yourself, and send them their broken merchandise.
Before too long, you will start getting complaints, but this is no problem because you have a returns policy, the buyer can return the item at their own cost and you’l refund them, so the buyer is mailing you asking for your address. Just give them your far away address, remember it’s not against ebay policy to do this. Don’t forget to request the buyer send the item insured, lest it be lost in transit.
Now with any luck, the buyer will consider the cost of shipping too expensive to bother, and just drop the whole thing.
And just incase they don’t, you can refund them their payment less the shipping cost, so worst case is you make the small profit on shipping, and a small amount of interest while your holding the buyer’s money. And don’t forget, international shipping takes time, so you can hold on to that money for a little while longer and make a little more interest.
Holly Gage said,
April 4, 2007 at 1:30 pm
I sure wish I would have read this prior to placing my order on Amazon.com for some camera equipment. Buy this and get the memory for just $13.00! So I buy the one item and they cancel the memory portion. I am told I can re-order the memory but of course I will incur the cost of shipping as well as the full price of the memory as I would no longer have the benefit of the package deal.
I plan to report them to the Better Business Bureau.
Sorry this happened to you and me.
Holly
Antonio said,
April 17, 2007 at 4:03 am
Just to let you know that I sympathize with your plight as I myself is a victim of “fastmemory man” on
E-Bay. I purchased a 2 GB Sandisk Ultra Plus card from this person on February 2007 and what I received is the plain 2 GB Ultra Card which is entirely different and cheaper than what I paid for. Writing to him is futile as he doesn’t respond immediately to the problem. He asked me to send him a picture of what I received which I did and then just told me to send it back to him on my own expense..ON MY OWN EXPENSE!!! He sends me the wrong item and wants me to pay to have it returned to him?? What a scam artist!! So, for anyone out there thinking of purchasing from this person on E-Bay, do yourselves a favour and delete his name from your seller’s list. It will save you all kinds of aggravation. The other thing that really bothered me about this transaction is it was supposed to be protected by Paypal. My advice to you people out there is to forget Paypal as they just delayed the processing of my refund which I am still waiting to receive. I paid the merchant way back in February yet. If you are a buyer, just pay with your credit card and not go through Paypal so that if you run into problems you can immediately call you credit card company and ask for a charge back. and STAY AWAY FROM FASTMEMORY MAN ON E-BAY. You may not get what you paid for and will only spend more of your own money to send the wrong item to him. If you read the sellers’ return policy, they make it hard and expensive for the buyer to return. BEWARE!!
Andrew said,
April 24, 2007 at 10:57 pm
I had the EXACT same problem. I ordered 2-1gb memory modules on ebay from “fastmemoryman” aka “emartbuy” and when I received the item my computer would not boot or post for several restarts and when it did boot up, it showed that each module was only 512mb then would blue screen with memory errors. I immediately contacted them and got ZERO response. I shipped the package back and filed PayPal dispute and I am still fighting to get my money back. He even tried to get me to cancel my dispute several times telling me that he couldn’t give a refund if the dispute was open, when PayPal clearly provides the functionality to provide a refund directly from the Resolution Center. NEVER cancel your dispute because it cannot be re-opened and then you are screwed.
Avoid this person at ALL costs he will only take your money and send you JUNK.
FASTMEMORYMAN aka EMARTBUY is a scam artist exploiting a flaw in the Ebay system. DO NOT BUY!!
Antonio said,
May 4, 2007 at 1:42 pm
He is a cheat and a liar! He posts his feedback that he sent me the item as described when in fact what he sent me was the cheap SD Ultra II and NOT THE ULTRA II PLUS AS HE ADVERSTISED. IN FACT HE ALSO LIES ON HIS ADS. DON’T BE SUCKERED IN. HE WILL TAKE YOUR MONEY AND RUN. AND YOU ARE NOT PROTECTED BY E-BAY OR PAYPAL’S BUYER PROTECTION PLAN. THE THREE OF THEM, e-BAY, PAYPAL AND EMARTBUY (FASTMEMORYMAN) ARE THE FATHER, SON AND HOLY GHOST OF INTERNET SCAM!!!
Antonio said,
May 6, 2007 at 1:27 pm
See my feedback on E-bay ID riccoshadow
Item number 270091430722 2 GB Sandisk Ultra II SD Plus which I NEVER RECEIVED!!!
john said,
May 7, 2007 at 10:05 am
Hi as i said in my other comment see the article above this one i am in the process of claiming through paypal for a refund on a motherboard and chip i purchased off fastmemoryman [emartbuy] i fully intend to report this seller to the fbi internet fraud center, when the item did not arrive i emailed the seller but got nothing but simple emails back : ie; it will arrive , please wait 45 days ect, if i had waited the 45 days as he asked i would not have been able to put a dispute in with paypal [ you have 30 days in which to do so] in responce to my emails through paypal he sent a tracking number for royal mail special delivery upon checking with royal mail no item with this tracking number had been recieved by the royal mail it had not been sent when i emailed fastmemoryman through the dispute console about this he just replied it will be with you anytime , i then escalated my dispute to a claim , it has been on going now for nearly 4 weeks and still no refund, as i see it it is a open and shut case the tracking number he sent shows that i never recieved the items yet paypal are still draging their feet , i am not a happy bunny
as i said at the begining i do intend to report this fully to the fbi internet fraud center
http://www.fbi.gov/majcases/fraud/internetschemes.htm#nondelivery
iwill let you all know how i get on
john
Antonio said,
May 7, 2007 at 12:23 pm
Hi John:
It took me over a month to get my money back MINUS the money I spent to return the wrong item, so be on top of it. I was so frustrated that I even phoned Paypal but as I said in my other comments above, NO USE IN USING PAYPAL as they are protecting fastmemoryman/eMartBuy as he is bringing them good business.
I am asking your help in contacting potential buyers and warn them of this cheat. I have been through the feedback section and been sending e-mails to those people who received negative feedback from fastmemoryman to send their comments to this site. Also if you can help me contact potential buyers by going through the sellers’ items for sale and warn bidders to cancel their purchases or bids. I can only do five in a day and E-bay sends me a message that I have reached the limit of number of mails to send to other members.
I also posted in the members’ discussion board but I am not sure if e-bay will post it as they are involved in protecting this seller, I suspect.
Good luck and more power to you.
Antonio
Antonio said,
May 7, 2007 at 12:30 pm
Hi John,
It took me over a month to get my money back MINUS the money I spent in returning the wrong item. Be on top of it especially in dealing with Paypal.
If you can help me contact other members or potential buyers by going through eMartbuy store and warn people to cancel their bids or purchases. I can only do five in a day then Ebay cuts me off.
Good luck and more power to you.
Antonio
john said,
May 11, 2007 at 6:53 am
Managed to get full refund via paypal today so at least i have got my money back i am now going to put togther a full case for the fbi internet fraud center any infomation anybody has would be most helpfull
john
Project-SJ said,
May 22, 2007 at 7:53 pm
Hi,
Firstly, thsnks to Antonio for informing me of this site.
I was suckered into buying a HDD from this Con artist.
I am in the middle of getting a refund, although, I havent returned the item. But he has provided an invalid tracking number, so I win here. Thankfully.
He sold me a ‘160GB brand new hdd’, ’shipped from birmingham, uk’.
What I actually got was a very badly used, but working 160GB HDD. This is after I waited over 3 weeks for delivery. Every time I emailed him he responded with the same automated answer, giving delivery times. Stating that delivery is 5 days to UK.
I have never hated anyone so much. I have reported him to the OFT, but I have heard nothing.
In my paypal resoplution centre, it states ‘refund pending’, so I’m looking forward toi getting my money back and keeping this HDD as compensation for the stress and time he has wasted of mine and everybody else.
Sorry to those that werent so lucky.
But he wont get away with this.
Keep this updated, I’ll contact any bidders he has also. 5 a day it is then!
Well done people, lets fight this prick!
Ben.
Kooltek68 said,
May 28, 2007 at 1:01 pm
Hello there,
Greeting from a Power Seller on eBay UK.
I read all of the comments and I think this is serious. I have reported this to eBay UK as well, using my priority email support.
So I hope eBay can do something to prevent this scam seller. I hope this won’t ruin our Power seller reputation on eBay.
Please check out my store, I got almost 1000 feedbacks (100% positive).
You see, there are still lots of good sellers on eBay.
Best regards,
Kooltek68
Dan said,
May 28, 2007 at 2:35 pm
Thanks for the blog. This saved me from using this seller.
Matt said,
May 31, 2007 at 3:24 pm
I bought 2x 1gb of ram off this wanker, one stick was not working and they where both non genuine Samsung after checking with cpu z.
I googled fastmemoryman and was shocked to see the amount of people this guy had scammed and quickly launched a Paypal dispute, I hope Paypal will refund me.
Good luck to all still trying to get there money back off this low life
Matt
ImSm0kin1 said,
June 3, 2007 at 9:21 pm
yep, he robbed me too, the stick of ram he sent me was D.O.A. and falsely labelled as Samsung brand. 8 days worth of messages and he still hasnt bothered to reply.
this man has ripped off so many people that he has a website set up in his (dis)honour, do a search on ‘ fastmemorymansucks ‘ : )
he wont last much longer, he’s getting more famous by the minute.
btw anyone else find it ironic that his name is Chetan (Cheatin) Saraf.
Richard Crow said,
June 4, 2007 at 1:51 am
I am an american who is currently dealing with this (I’ll just call him) “Seller” on Ebay I purchased a 1mg memory card, paid for it instantly and from what I can tell from the postal service tracking number he sent it right away, HOWEVER (you knew that would be in here somewhere) for the last 30+ days the postal trail leaves off at a processing center 125 miles away from my home.
I tried asking him for help (Yeah, that worked!) so now I have complaints filed with paypal and Smartbuy, apparently he took a bond out on the item.
He keeps claiming that it is a postal service “Delivery Confirmation” and I keep telling the 2 companies “The hell it is!” it was never delivered.
I only hope he does read this because I would like to tell him “You have lost this one chuckles!” I am going to fight this high and low till the end of time if I have to. Why? Answer: principle. My feedback score is 100% positive, currently he has over 200 negative feedbacks in the last 30 days.
I don’t care about the memory card, I already bought one from another source and use it constantly, so now the only issue is that I paid for something that never arrived.
And I will continue to turn up thje heat on Ebay & smartbuy until which time as they finally discard him like the garbage he is.
Peter Sabol said,
July 31, 2007 at 10:11 pm
OK, I wish I had seen this earlier. I too have been scammed by Fastmemoryman.
My 2×1G DDR memory I received reads only 512M each. On examination, it appears the board is only populated on one side with chips and appears to need the equivalent chips on that side also. BEWARE of FASTMEMORYMAN eBay SCAM! DO not give Them your Hard earned Dollors and Euros!
Matt Morris said,
August 7, 2007 at 4:57 am
Same story. $40 4GB MINI SD that doesn’t work. Paypal/ ebay (price grabber where I saw them) needs a lot emails to take theses guys off thier list. Let me know if you want more detailed info from me about my purchase for your FBI and BBB complaint. Follow through and punish these guys.
Clemens Rene said,
August 10, 2007 at 4:01 pm
Hell O all
yes Fastmemoryman :((( i found a CPU Intel 3,4 giga HT 81 € new ! ok nice price ..but then the CPU came in the most fragile sending i ever recived
just a thin foam once around it in a envelop with broken airbubbles
and the CPU had a broken of corner ! and for shure not working !!! till now i got a mail to tell me that i have to send back on my charge to far far away
i adviced a few ebay-user not to by @ memoryman but there is a limit of mail u can send …looks like ebay also protect sellers like memoryman since the bring profit….
lets fight for a better more honest world
mfg Prima
Pia said,
August 29, 2007 at 8:18 am
Hi,
I just thought to add one thing to your very nice description of how to make money the fastmemoryman way. Not only can you make money buy making people give up and not return the junk, on interest while you hold their money, and on bogus shipping charges, but you can also state a return policy that allows you to keep a huge chunk of money as a “restocking fee” in the cases where the customer actually returns the non-functional item.
Now, reasonable people may claim that such a policy cannot be valid when the item you sent is an obvious piece of no-name junk not in accordance with what was on the order, but there’s a perfect solution to that too: just deny it and say the customer is an idiot who don’t know how to use it. Et voila! More money for you!
/Pia
(I got my money back through Amazon’s guarantee)
Tony said,
September 22, 2007 at 7:51 pm
Just like to say thanks to all who have contributed to this blog… especially ImSm0kin1 for the heads up on http://fastmemorymansucks.com
Have not paid for the item I was going to buy but will now cancel.
Pete Broad said,
September 28, 2007 at 10:17 am
Beware of his OEM AMD CPU’s. They are Engineering samples and they don’t always work as they should. His CPU/Motherboard bundles will have a hacked Bios to show the incorrect speed. If you update the Bios the PC will stop working or revert to a different speed. This guy has had 1,000 negs and neuts since August 1st. EBay and Pay make a lot of money through him so I don’t see him being removed. I now only deal with people like Kooltek who has 100% over an extended period
Maria said,
October 18, 2007 at 8:28 pm
Sadly, I found this after having paid for a memory. The memory doesn’t work cause apparently my motherboard doesn’t support high density memory ( I say apparently cause some friends say it should whereas others say it wouldn’t be compatible anyways). Thing is….I looked the supposedly 1GB Samsung memory up at Samsungs site and it’s clearly stated that THAT memory is only 512. So basically, regardless of whether it’s supported by my motherboard or not , it’s not even as advertised ( even if not compatible I could always sell it to a friend or just give it as a gift).
Also..I paid £8 for S&H thinking that MAYBE it’s a fair price for sth to be shipped from the states ( AS STATED in his ad) to Greece BUT when I received the parcel I realised it was posted from Germany! So I basically paid over 10 euro for something that never cost him more that 1-2 euro.
I’m not good with the whole dispute thing..english is not my native language ( however good my English might be) and I’m not quite sure how to proceed. I’m waiting for a reply from him…a reply to my ‘why did you sent me a ram the samsung site doesn’t acknowledge as being 1GB’ (though nicer stated) and if I’m not satisfied with his reply I’ll file a dispute with ebay.
On top of everything else, I’m worried about buying another memory online as in a greek shop I’ve looked ( and usually buy from) there’s no mention of low/high density RAM’s.
Armando said,
November 6, 2007 at 7:01 pm
I’m another victim of fastmemory.
I ordered two memories cards on August 2nd last for an amount of 40 Euro and so far (November 6th) I received nothing.They replied that I could’nt complaint on the delay because 45 business had to be passed.So just in these days I understand that for Paypal reimbursement neeeded 45 days from the payment(August 2nd) and on ebay the related comment has expired too because had to be left within 60 days.
So at this point I’m without items,without money and I cannot leave any negative comment too.
Anyone could help me in case of some action to be taken ?
Thanks in advance
Armando
by Rome
Georgia said,
January 25, 2008 at 4:21 pm
We too have fallen prey to this scam. We bought a motherboard bundle but received the wrong model and Fastmemoryman won’t exchange item, only offers refund but with a catch - we must post item to US at our expense, sent trackable (£57!!). Paypal and Ebay’s hands seem tied to prevent this guy from trading with them. Therefore I have lodged a complaint with my local Trading Standards department (I will post you any replies suggesting the appropriate avenue for mass complaint) and have also reported him to http://www.econsumer.gov - a site for international e-commerce complaints (basically somewhere we can report international internet consumer fraud complaints). Maybe if enough of us complain we might be able to shut him down? Thanks for the useful warnings - just wish we’d read them before we bought!! Georgia
paul said,
January 30, 2008 at 8:02 pm
found this on the guy while searching the net
http://www.sarafchirag.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/PaymentCS.html
CHIRAG SARAF
24 HAMPTON CLOSE
SUTTON COLDFIELD
B73 6RQ
fastmemoryman
emartbuyer.com emartbuyer.co.uk
Date of Birth:29/06/1977Nationality:IndianOccupation:Manager
Komputer Solutions Ltd
Director
120 THE BIG PEG VYSE STREET HOCKLEY BIRMINGHAM WEST MIDLANDS
NAME : CHIRAG SARAF
BANK : NATWEST
A/C : 51003155
SORT : 600741
Cheque/MoneyOrder
CHIRAG SARAF
17 GRIIFIN HOUSE
233 HAGLEY ROAD
BIRMINGHAM
B16 9RR
http://www.sarafchirag.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/PaymentCS.html
David Green said,
February 6, 2008 at 7:55 pm
Similar problems.
They eventually offered full refund including postage and my costs to send to UK address. It took ages and I wonder they did not feel it would save a lot of trouble just to give a refund in the first place. I did warn them it would be itrritating and so it turned out!
Question - is the UK agent liable under the 7 day distance selling regulations? I tried to evoke that at the start of my saga.
David Green said,
February 7, 2008 at 6:03 am
Oops!
“invoke” that should have been.
David Green said,
February 9, 2008 at 12:34 pm
I received the refund as soon as they received the goods (to what they call their shipping agent) - they were as good as their word.
FMM does not seem entirely dishonourable, just very very odd and annoying. It is a pity they do not stop their rather bizzare business practices. There seems little point in it when they could just drop the prices a bit and come clean about all the hidden details! For example they would not give me a company name for the ’shipping agent’ and this is not surprising as it is in fact Komputer Solutions (as another respondent and also the UK Post Office discovered) and I bet it belongs to the same guy that owns FMM. In fact I would have had more confidence in the company if they had just told me the name - it was lack of a company name that made me initially very reluctant to return the goods to the ’shipping agent’.
Well I got my £42 back at a cost in time of several hours by me and probably a fair bit of FMM’s time that could have been put to better use.
jack said,
February 14, 2008 at 1:57 pm
Just had a full refund including my return postage and packing for an item that was different to what I had ordered.
Told by Fast memoryman to first return it to the US address even though it had come from Birmingham, UK and it was his fault. But just kept sending emails and eventually told me to return it to a Birmingham address. This is the address of Komputer Solutions.
Just told him that as the item was different to what i had ordered that if I did not receive a refund in full, including my return postage, that I would have to contact Ebay and paypal. Soon had a full refund!
Eric Pontbriand said,
March 4, 2008 at 1:16 am
I wouldn’t trust ANY memory, CPU or Motherboard components from ebay. Nearly ALL are grey market or purchased lots that were either returns from large retailers like Staples or Comp USA or just badly treated in transit and insurance claims. (think flood cars)
It’s important to note that you can download ubuntu (linux) for free and boot directly off the CD. It comes with memtest86 right at it’s boot menu. Memory I bought hastily from a local seller produced 2,500 errors in 20 minutes and proved a no-go, which made sense since system wasn’t stable and wouldn’t boot. Even my Gateway laptop bought direct failed on the second pass on one memory address, meaning my machine locks up now and then for “no reason”.
So all of you know, you should be able to run memtest86 infinitely, all day, and never return a single error. Only then is your RAM “good RAM”.
I buy all my memory from newegg.com now, and certainly pay more than ebay auctions but get quality components for sure.
Ms said,
March 17, 2008 at 11:00 pm
I cannot believe it, I too have been scamed, the person is pretending to be ‘nicole’
Two cards of memory £10, postage, £8 each, thus £16p&p and sent in one small pack. Item was not Samsung as advertised but Fudar (what the ****). So many BSOD, its crazy, wants me to return it, tempting to turn up to his home address with a couple of heavies
Adam said,
March 30, 2008 at 2:44 am
Ive been had as well brought 1gb stick from ebay even though it says on the stick 1gb its actually a 512mb stick ….. anyone have a phone number for emartbuy or fastmemory man ? ? ? all i can find is email addresses…
H. said,
March 31, 2008 at 8:28 am
I bought a 512MB SODIMM for a notebook.
Thanks god I did not have to pay customs and taxes…
FMM stated the item is in Germany (where I live), even he is registered as on Ebay USA. Found this strange, but however - the price for the memory was very low, so I ordered.
Item came about 1,5 weeks later, and from NEW ZEALAND!
Put it in my notebook (IBM Thinkpad R30) - nothing. Would not even boot. Holy shit!
So I took another, working module from my 2nd notebook (IBM Thinkpad T23) and tried it in the R30 - worked.
Okay, last test: Put the module from FMM into my T23 - worked too?!
Tested the module in use and even with memory testing programs, it is okay and works fine.
So the item I bought is not defective or crap, but seems not be very compatible. Another thing is shipping from New Zealand, but stating the item is in Germany - why???
All in all the whole FMM thing is a bit strange.
I can not complain, but next time will buy from a seller here in Germany. The risk of getting “memory crap” is just a bit too high, I think.
B said,
April 3, 2008 at 1:57 pm
BEWARE
EBAY and scamPAL make millions from the fees from sales of these criminals and play the rogue vendors game with them.
thiefBAY and scamPAL protect their $$$ criminal vendors… they bring in REVENUE for them.
BE WARNED
Chris said,
April 17, 2008 at 10:51 am
Bought a 16Gb CF flash module some time ago, and got it delivered allright.
It was supposed to be a 150x unit, that i were to use in my Canon 1Ds Mk II.
Very soon, in fact, after the first few shots, i realized that something was very wrong. It took almost 15 seconds to save each picture, compared to the usual < 1 sec for the Sandisk 133x card.
I did some testing on the card, and found out that it was only capable of doing a meager 1Mb/sec in writing, and about 4Mb/sec in read.
After pealing off the label, i could see what the manufacturer and the type code was, and that just confirmed what i by now already knew. Engineering sample.
So, back onto FMM, complaining about the item not being sold as advertised, and not meeting the specification.
I supplied the test results as evidence in support of my case.
Nothing.
They demanded the usual stuff - return to US, at my expense.
After they had received the item, i got a mail, saying that they had tested it, and found no fault.. (of course not!!)
Initially, the FMM claimed that my camera couldn’t use cards that size (duuuhh, he must know better than Canon engineering dept. then!)
Refund?? No way - the part was fully functional and sold as advertised.
To make a long story short:
Contacted Ebay/Paypal, and demanded a refund due to item misrepresentation.
Paypal took it’s time, had a few questions, but eventually decided to refund the whole lot. (i did all the stuff the right way, to nail the guy. Got a Fedex transport, provided Ebay/Paypal with pictures of the item and the part code under the label, and test results.)
Got my $450 back, and bought it elsewhere for slightly more, and guess what? it worked like a charm…
Got a 32Gb card now, and it works like a charm in the camera, but the win box has problems with it sometimes (!), but that is a different story.
justin said,
April 25, 2008 at 3:37 am
I’m glad I took time to look up. I’ll pay an extra 30$ to compusa (Strangly the next best price).
Rob Jones said,
April 29, 2008 at 11:51 am
Hi,
Unfortunately I have to join this list of people who have been scammed by this guy. I bought 2 1GB sticks of so called compatible memory from this rogue seller and yes, you`ve guessed it, it certainly was NOT COMPATIBLE.
Ebay are an absolute joke. If you look at their so-called philosophy and mission statements you may think that buyers are well protected. SELLERS are well protected, buyers are a necessary evil as far as they are concerned. Ebay is a very profitable business and all their profits come from sellers.
The only way to think about Ebay is to regard them as an auctioneer. They think that the only responsibility they have is to facilitate two people making a bargain. That is basically the truth of the matter.
I have to say that I was offered a refund plus 10$ to return the item but I had to send the item back first. after everything that has happened I didn`t feel I could trust the guy so I asked for my refund first. He refused of course.
I decided that the only way forward for me was to write the money off and get my own back some other way,
I am currently running a couple of listings which show fast memoryman in his true “yellow” colours. I have had a lot of hits on the listings and hopefully I am hitting him where it hurts, in his pocket. I intend to keep it going for a long time. He has had the listings removed a couple of times but I have corrected them and relisted. It is costing me very little to list and I feel I am getting my money`s worth by informing people about him and getting a lot of satisfaction from that alone. My Ebay user name is robjones555 and one of the listings is number 180236750118. Take a look, hopefully some good ebayers in other countried can run the odd listing, I am not sure if I am getting any visibility in the US. I am in the UK.
So there it is, I have been scammed but I think I am getting my own back.
Rob Jones
Richard Wh said,
May 4, 2008 at 2:12 pm
I seem to have been caught by this.
Bought some PC3200 ram for an oldmachine here. Item location listed as “united kingdom” as i only buy off UK sellers to save grief. Got suspicious when the item failed to arrive - it eventually turned up after 2 weeks having come from the USA via The netherlands and Germany.
Both ram modules were faulty and failed to even POST at any setting at all on 5 different systems. I check returns and now it seems i have to return it at MY expense to the USA ! Given that could well cost me more than the actual items i can see how this scam works in that it hopes most people won’t bother.
Im about to open an ebay dispute based on this but from what ive read it seems i may have just lost my money.
george said,
May 5, 2008 at 4:57 pm
i got one 512 sodimm memory for my laptop fron this guy it came late but ok i suppose i was lucky.i was ready to buy onemore but after reading all this i think i wont.thanks people
Daz said,
May 18, 2008 at 1:43 pm
Yes, these con artists are still at it…..
We got caught also, 2 laptop chips, totally defective, from Germany, £12 P&P, usual story.
Paypal dispute open and running.
Just for fun used the new Virtual Earth from MS to see where these jokers operate from in Birmingham……If we were closer I think we would have returned them personally !!!!
It’s about time ebay shut these guys down.
Don’t buy anything from these jokers.
Thanks for this page to vent some steam.
Brandon said,
May 30, 2008 at 9:00 pm
I’m glad I found this blog. I was about to buy a couple 1GB DDR 333mhz sodimm for my Ferrari 3000 laptop. I’d rather spend double the amount and know I’m getting quality components. Too many horror stories from this fucking wanker to make me want to gamble.
Bob Latchford said,
June 8, 2008 at 8:56 pm
Paul, let’s post all your details on the internet shall we eh?
I see you didn’t even have the bottle to post your own second name, but you’re sneaky enough to post somebody elses home adress.
I bought some memory of emartbuy Uk and it worked fine. In fact i came here to commend this company - and before anyone says I don’t know what I’m on about I do.
dave said,
June 29, 2008 at 2:32 pm
fastmemory man is a scam artist i have just escatated my claim to paypal and this is what i said:i have waited 20 days and the item i purchased hasnt arrived,if i dont get a full refund within the next 5 days i will be taking further action.the ebay contract that i made between fast memory man is a legal document and i have honoured me side of the contract.http://www.ev4.org/wordpress/2007/03/03/how-to-defraud-ebay-the-emartbuycom-way/ this website is going to be advertised all over the world wide web so you cannot scam anyone else!!!
dave said,
July 7, 2008 at 1:03 am
an update on my paypal claim with fastmemoryman.fastmemoryman told paypal he posted my flash drive on 6/10/2008 at 2.34 pm.i didnt buy the item until 6/10/2008 19.02 hmmmmmmm a lier aswell as a defraudster.ps i will get my money back.
Stu said,
July 9, 2008 at 5:35 am
I was just about to order 2 x 1GB SODIMM memory off this guy. I won’t now. Thanks for the heads up. I look elsewhere and not be tempted by a dirt cheap prices. Cheers
dave said,
July 9, 2008 at 8:57 am
Hello,
Thank you for contacting us regarding the flash pen drive (item
280234647431) that you purchased from “fastmemoryman”. I understand that
you haven’t received the item you paid for and you want a refund.
As an eBay Customer Support representative, I’m pleased to have this
opportunity to investigate this matter for you and explain the situation
further.
I can understand your frustration in this situation since you bid on
this item with good intentions and you paid for it immediately then
something like this happens. I realise you want to know what course of
action you should take regarding this situation and I appreciate the
chance to assist you with this.
I understand your concern that this transaction had disappeared from
your “Won” listings and your seller is now showing as no longer
regsitered in eBay.
I’ve looked on our system and I can confirm that “fastmemoryman” is no
longer a registered eBay user. As a result, we have removed all their
listings from the site. As much as we would like to give you further
information though, it’s important that eBay maintains member privacy.
As such, I’m afraid we can’t share the details about your seller’s
account.
This means you won’t be able to leave or receive Feedback for this item.
At the same time, the seller can no longer bid, sell, leave or receive
Feedback on eBay.
dave said,
July 9, 2008 at 11:23 am
User ID: fastmemoryman
Name: EMARTBUY Ltd
Company: EMARTBUY LTD
City: WASHINGTON COURT HOUSE
County: OH
Country: United States
Phone: (614) 589-8253
Registered Since: Saturday, 28 Jun, 2003 12:17:06 GMT
rob yes you dont know what your on about i have spent hours emailing ebay and paypal so if you guys want your money back just phone him 24/7 maybee ill get on to the trading standards aswell as the inland revenue!!!!!!!
because he hasnt paid any tax ever !!!
dave said,
July 21, 2008 at 12:02 pm
hey guys i got my money back yippppppppppppppppppyyyyy
it took 2months but i got there in the end lmao
Kim said,
July 28, 2008 at 9:23 am
Hela,
after ordering a 4gb sdhc card from this guy, and after making the payment I got a bit suspicious because he didn’t answer my mails after the payment.
I wonder if I am ever gonna get the ordered item…I allready contacted my banc telling them about this but they can’t seem to help me out.
Also, I really dispise E-bay for this, because they don’t say anything about any possible trouble untill the point were I marked the stade as ‘payment sent’, then I got a little message stating this seller is not known or something in that range…It seems loads of people have been screwed over by this guy allready, and ebay doesn’t seem to care.
Thx for providing me with his details, I will spread them over here in Europe as well so nobody else gets screwed over by this guy…
Whish I lived near him, I would pay him a visit, get some coffee and have a good talk…