TeamBuy ripoff exposed and they don't like it

[thepersianguy]

So apparently TeamBuy didn’t appreciate my honest questions on their deal page as to why they are allowing a sham company to sell overpriced products on their website…. The fact that they removed my post leads me to believe they know about this, don’t care and just want money, or worst case scenario are the owners of NextGen Stylus.

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-bdXVp8G_cV8/T16SZcHuDHI/AAAAAAAAAb8/yoVaiCtCHXA/s640/teambuy%2520question.jpg


This is the TeamBuy deal in question:


https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-bvd1zy9RlvM/T16Sc8DAMOI/AAAAAAAAAcU/2LCR3oOEyyU/s640/teambuy%2520deal.jpg

This magical pen is supposed to be worth $20 regular price, according my the folks at NextGen Stylus. And here is the same item from China for $3.90 (single item price, if ordering in bulk then expect prices around $1.00-$1.50 per pen):

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-JWkgHHMUi14/T16SWjbtZzI/AAAAAAAAAb0/m-fqcRV8nUg/s640/dx%2520pen.jpg


http://www.dealextreme.com/p/2-in-1-universal-capacitive-screen-stylus-ink-pen-71450


NextGen Stylus, the company promoting their item on TeamBuy’s site, is a sham company that registered on Jan. 11, 2012 via www.enom.com
Enom Inc. is allegedly a rip off company with it’s own issues: http://www.ripoffreport.com/internet-services/enom-inc-0001183199/enom-inc-0001183199-ripoff-d-a7md7.htm

Redflag #1 - domain registered 2 months ago and the site is dedicated to a single item. Why you might ask? Because you likely need a business number/website to be able to sell on these group buy websites to make the deal seem more legit.
But let’s get back on track shall we?

A domain registration search gives us this information about www.nextgenstylus.com:
Domain name: NEXTGENSTYLUS.COM

Registrant Contact:
WhoisGuard
WhoisGuard Protected ()

Fax:
11400 W. Olympic Blvd. Suite 200
Los Angeles, CA 90064
US

Fancy, ain’t we?

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-y_CCPI377eM/T16SaiB6D3I/AAAAAAAAAcE/svHPHPAcNkU/s640/building.jpg


Looks like a pretty penny to afford an office here. This building also plays host to other scams:
http://www.scamwarners.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=24523

TeamBuy, you can suck it. Do your research, find good deals, and stop ripping people off.

[epik89]

they gotta make money some how

[Longobongo]

you can post the deal in the hot deals forums :D

sorry to hear about that, maybe take it to teambuy's fb page? (if they have one)?

[nsx]

:arrow:

Moved from "Off Topic" to "Group Deals > Group Deal Discussion."

[thepersianguy]

Of course this thread was moved to a forum where it will receive less traffic. RFD is probably enjoying good kickbacks from ScamBuy

[ital_dj]

Of course this thread was moved to a forum where it will receive less traffic. RFD is probably enjoying good kickbacks from ScamBuy

Maybe TeamBuy themselves didn't fully do their research? If you go to the NextGen website, look at all the other sites they claim to have discount codes with:

http://www.nextgenstylus.com/redeem.aspx

AppleDOD
DealGetters
Kijiji
LivingDeal
Pennywise
TeamBuy

Come on, Kijiji? I wouldn't say it's entirely TeamBuy's fault.

[RiCHC3]

Similarly, this item on wagjag
http://i43.tinypic.com/14pikh.jpg
($30 for a $60 watch w/ calorie counter + heart beat sensor) is on dinodirect for I believe $5.99. I snagged one from DD awhile ago with a free $x coupon code for new customers.

How shady

[keljai]

l dont think teambuy will go such in depth to location information. all they really care is their commissions to be honest.

[TeamGuyDaniel]

Hello,

It is our policy to remove posts that contain links within them, this is outlined in our Q and A section when you post the question. The price listed on our site is provided by the company that we are featuring, our Q and A team does research on the price provided to make sure it is comparable. As well the price you outlined does not include shipping, this is another factor to consider. Many products these days are manufactured in China, as this item is. I hope you have a good day.

Daniel

[kmarcie]

Hello,

It is our policy to remove posts that contain links within them, this is outlined in our Q and A section when you post the question. The price listed on our site is provided by the company that we are featuring, our Q and A team does research on the price provided to make sure it is comparable. As well the price you outlined does not include shipping, this is another factor to consider. Many products these days are manufactured in China, as this item is. I hope you have a good day.

Daniel

Right, but a $3.90 pen weighing less than a pound would not cost $16.10 to ship, not factoring in the bulk buying price. A markup is to be expected for certain items sold in store, but this is a ridiculous markup for the online site which is hosting this deal. Perhaps the information was provided by the company, but then that means your team was not competent enough to do research on comparable products.

[hellohowru]

Hello,

It is our policy to remove posts that contain links within them, this is outlined in our Q and A section when you post the question. The price listed on our site is provided by the company that we are featuring, our Q and A team does research on the price provided to make sure it is comparable. As well the price you outlined does not include shipping, this is another factor to consider. Many products these days are manufactured in China, as this item is. I hope you have a good day.

Daniel

$3.90 includes shipping, you should read. For $40, I can buy 10 of them from Dealextreme with free shipping. I agree with OP this is a ripoff.

[daikman]

Hello,

It is our policy to remove posts that contain links within them, this is outlined in our Q and A section when you post the question. The price listed on our site is provided by the company that we are featuring, our Q and A team does research on the price provided to make sure it is comparable. As well the price you outlined does not include shipping, this is another factor to consider. Many products these days are manufactured in China, as this item is. I hope you have a good day.

Daniel

Teambuy is one of the worst daily deal sites for completely misrepresenting the price of their merchandise to their customers. They have no standards for what they promote as a "deal" and do absolutely zero background checking on the vendors they promote. The standards by which they operate are a joke. Pretty soon the only merchandise these DOD sites are going to be pushing out are "ipad accessories" and "MAGIC STICKEY PADS" wooohoooo. Its all a gimmick people. Remember that :)

[Cas77]

Teambuy is one of the worst daily deal sites for completely misrepresenting the price of their merchandise to their customers. They have no standards for what they promote as a "deal" and do absolutely zero background checking on the vendors they promote. The standards by which they operate are a joke. Pretty soon the only merchandise these DOD sites are going to be pushing out are "ipad accessories" and "MAGIC STICKEY PADS" wooohoooo. Its all a gimmick people. Remember that :)

They (deal sites) are all grasping at straws to survive. The original business model is dead (when is the last time you saw 5 ads for local deals on any given day from all deal sites combined). The whole "me too" business was based on greed when these greedy people saw the margins. Now these companies would sell their own mothers for a 100% markup.

The problem with Teambuy (and others but Teambuy is the biggest culprit) is the price they set for items. I mean anyone can say a $20,000 car is really worth $50,000, there are no laws against it...they just prey on a customer base of gullible idiots. It's just a matter of time before they all go belly-up and that day won't happen soon enough.

[thepersianguy]

Hello,

It is our policy to remove posts that contain links within them, this is outlined in our Q and A section when you post the question. The price listed on our site is provided by the company that we are featuring, our Q and A team does research on the price provided to make sure it is comparable. As well the price you outlined does not include shipping, this is another factor to consider. Many products these days are manufactured in China, as this item is. I hope you have a good day.

Daniel

You need a new Q and A team. I'm available for hire with good benefits and a cushy salary :D
iPhones are manufactured in China too, but it all goes back to the quality of the item and what it's worth. Can you guys give me 75% off an iPhone 4S?

[thepersianguy]

$3.90 includes shipping, you should read. For $40, I can buy 10 of them from Dealextreme with free shipping. I agree with OP this is a ripoff.

If you buy 10 the price goes down to $3.04 each :lol:

[HungJai]

then stop bitching and buy 10 from deal extreme...and resell for $10

you can buy phone plates for $2 dollars on ebay yet people still buy them for $20+ dollars at malls...

why? because people are Lazy, don't wanna do reaserach or wait for shipping...

The companies gotta make $$ somehow...

[thepersianguy]

then stop bitching and buy 10 from deal extreme...and resell for $10

you can buy phone plates for $2 dollars on ebay yet people still buy them for $20+ dollars at malls...

why? because people are Lazy, don't wanna do reaserach or wait for shipping...

The companies gotta make $$ somehow...

this is the laziest logic ever. if the company has to resort to false advertising, inflating prices and hiring sham vendors then the don't belong in the market place.
"why don't sell i these chinese made tires for half price, who knows if they'll blow out while people are driving. not my problem, gota make money somehow."

[daikman]

this is the laziest logic ever. if the company has to resort to false advertising, inflating prices and hiring sham vendors then the don't belong in the market place.
"why don't sell i these chinese made tires for half price, who knows if they'll blow out while people are driving. not my problem, gota make money somehow."

Right on! Epic post lol :idea:

[hightech]

It all comes down to intelligence and resourcefulness. You can go to Future Shop buy a Monster HDMI cable for $100 or if you are smart and resourceful, find a cable for $5 on Monoprice.

I don't find dealfind any different then some stores over inflating products. I hardly see this as newsworthy. Heck even Apple does it, but many just buy it like lemmings. Their IPOD cables and chargers that they want $40 and can be bought on ebay from China for $5 shipped.

[EPcjay]

Lots of business has crazy mark up on things. From the top of my head Ink Cartridges, laptop accessories like bags and locks, HDMI cables, rust proofing, soft drinks, etc. Unfortunately, that’s just how the world is. If you don’t like it, don’t buy it

[slowtyper]

this is the laziest logic ever. if the company has to resort to false advertising, inflating prices and hiring sham vendors then the don't belong in the market place.
"why don't sell i these chinese made tires for half price, who knows if they'll blow out while people are driving. not my problem, gota make money somehow."

I definitely agree with you that companies have the responsibility of providing safe products to their customers but this isn't really an argument against what this company is doing.

I think its way out of line to call this a sham. There is no law to say what one company can sell a product at (obviously not talking about regulated industry products) . This is the whole concept of capitalism! If the price is not fair it eventually will die out, a few people suffer in the meantime, partly which is their own fault for not doing research, but thats the lesson they learn. Happens to everybody sometimes.

As for teambuy supporting their customer, I stand that teambuy should not have taken the product in the first place to uphold some sense of integrity to the public, however, once they already agreed to sell it, they absolutely should honor the rules of their agreement with the vendor and stick up for them (as long as they are not causing harm criminally or misleading about what the product actually does).

This is how the economy works. Do you really think it would be okay to go around futureshop and drop flyers on each product indicating what they could buy that exact product for cheaper at another store?

[Corleone187]

yeah you can pretty much charge whatever you want like Apple and Canada Goose and those Herman Miller chairs :confused:

The thing is you're also selling "perceived value" when someone buys them, same with this pen thingy. YOu can just slap on a logo and say it's worth $12. And if people believe you then that's what its worth.

What this pen company should have done is slap on a logo or whatever and give the pen a fancy name before they jacked up the price. THat would at least differentiate itself from the $3 pen. But they were too lazy to do that and now they are paying the price

[kzod]

This is the dumbest RFD thread I've seen in a while, even though the OP is 100% right. Tons of 'deals' and 'sales' aren't very good value. The goal of most companies is to make a profit, by charging the highest possible price over cost while still maximizing profit. May not be a good deal for us on RFD who know better, but for the guy cross-shopping at futureshop it's a bargain (think of all the bozos paying $20 for an HDMI cable). These Deal websites are out there to make a profit, so they need clients that will make more money on the deal as well, which could explain why DX doesn't sell through them.

[Corleone187]

This is the dumbest RFD thread I've seen in a while, even though the OP is 100% right. Tons of 'deals' and 'sales' aren't very good value. The goal of most companies is to make a profit, by charging the highest possible price over cost while still maximizing profit. May not be a good deal for us on RFD who know better, but for the guy cross-shopping at futureshop it's a bargain (think of all the bozos paying $20 for an HDMI cable). These Deal websites are out there to make a profit, so they need clients that will make more money on the deal as well, which could explain why DX doesn't sell through them.

I agree that the thread does have some dumb aspects to it but I think what OP is trying to say is that sites like Redflagdeals and these group buy sites or whatever have the responsibility to make sure the deals are good so that the visitor doesn't have to worry about price.

But yeah even though it's a deal site you still have the responsibility to make an educated decision weather you are being ripped off or not because a lot of things can be perception in regards to value. Like Herman Millar chairs and Canada Goose that appear on the site all the time, brand names do carry value to them even though the product is poor value. This is why this pen company should have slapped on a logo on these pens but as of right now these $12 pens are no different from DX $3 pens

[Rainne]

The world is full of people making money off of each other.

[Chigu]

This is why I only purchase deals that actually give me a credit on my bill i.e. $25 for a $50 credit at a particular restaurant etc.

[psyko514]

Enom is the second largest domain registrar in the world with ~9% market share and ~10M domains. While it isn't unexpected that people have had problems with them, it is absurd to insinuate that they are in any way involved in this rip-off.

[Bookpreviews]

Teambuy is one of the worst daily deal sites for completely misrepresenting the price of their merchandise to their customers. They have no standards for what they promote as a "deal" and do absolutely zero background checking on the vendors they promote. The standards by which they operate are a joke. Pretty soon the only merchandise these DOD sites are going to be pushing out are "ipad accessories" and "MAGIC STICKEY PADS" wooohoooo. Its all a gimmick people. Remember that :)


Teambuy also says some deals have free shipping and then you go to the actual company;s site and end up paying shipping.

This happened to me with the Kill Clothing deal- it said shipping was included in the voucher cost and when I bought my items had to pay $9 extra for shipping.

Teambuy said they "would look into it" and never got back to me.
I contacted teambuy 5 times about this w no response.

Kill clothing is not very good quality either- good to wear to the gym for cheap stuff.

[DanielWesley]

This is the way it works everywhere... I was in wal-mart. I usually buy the keg burger pack(10 patties) for $14.00, they raised the price to $15.40 on sale... how does that happen???
Just because you see a sales sign or a great deal doesn't mean it is. Do your homework... good thing we have this site..

But there are a lot of people in the dark.. so this stuff will continue to sell.

The problem with deal sites...they have run out of deals... daily deals are hard to come by...so anything goes

I'm totally tired of seeing spa deals and cheap goods, but what else is there??? nothing good goes on sale

[SkiLLz]

You can't be mad at businesses trying to make money by gouging customers... that's what businesses do. Why is it okay for DeBeer's to artificially set diamond prices at astronomical levels, but it's not okay for TeamBuy to artificially set made-in-china crap at retail markup prices? The only difference is the availability to the customer. I can't bypass DeBeer's markup and buy my own diamonds because they control effectively the entire legal diamond trade. I _can_ bypass TeamBuy's markup and buy my own made-in-china crap, but that doesn't make TeamBuy any less honest than DeBeers. It just means that we don't have to pay their asking price. If an uninformed customer DOES pay their asking price and is happy with the product they receive, who cares? I actually own one of the stylus pens in question; I got it from Deal Extreme, and I think it's a great value at 3 bucks. I probably would have been just as happy had it been 5 or 6 bucks. Who's to say that there aren't people that think there is $12 of value in them?

As others have mentioned, an HDMI cable at a big box store might be 10 times the price of one available at MonoPrice and plenty of people still pay the big box prices. Does that mean that the big box store is doing something illegal or unethical? It's in a business' best interests to make money, not to pass on savings to customers. It's in a customer's best interests to find the best products at the best price. Customers buying from TeamBuy aren't doing their due diligence and it's allowing TeamBuy to continue selling DealExterme products at a huge markup. The market will correct itself eventually... in the meantime, why are you mad about it?

[JSz]

The problems isn't the company, it is capitalism and the greed that is ripping people off. Hell you might as well complain about everything from that burger you ate to that new iphone since they are ripping you off a ton on everything.

[jackass_ca]

Sites like these that offer a product at a "discount" are obviously hoping to catch the person who needs such an item, but is not aware of sites like DX, Tomtop, priceangels, etc... So, to them, the deal sounds fantastic. Like someone else said, your best value is when you buy a credit note, or giftcard type thing, $25 for $50 worth of product...

My brother and father have bought HDMI cables, cell phone cases, charging cables, etc, at retail prices, then I steer them to sites like DX, and the like and they see what they could have got it for.

The company is not scamming anyone, if you don't do your research, then it's your own fault if you pay more than the item is valued at.
Like people that go to a car lot, and see the sticker price, and pay it, then find out that their buddy did some haggling and got the exact same vehicle for $5000 less... For shame! So, did the salesperson rip off person A?
Or, the people who hoard Hot Deals of electronics and games, cleared out at 25% of the original price, to post on Kijiji at 50% normal store prices. There are tons of people who have no idea about RFD, and also would not see that item in store for 75% off, as the stock is cleared out and think that half price is a great deal...

[dekay]

Pretty absurd that businesses are trying to make money off us. :facepalm:

[stealth]

Teambuy is one of the worst daily deal sites for completely misrepresenting the price of their merchandise to their customers. They have no standards for what they promote as a "deal" and do absolutely zero background checking on the vendors they promote. The standards by which they operate are a joke. Pretty soon the only merchandise these DOD sites are going to be pushing out are "ipad accessories" and "MAGIC STICKEY PADS" wooohoooo. Its all a gimmick people. Remember that :)

i actually find teambuy to be one of the best, if not the best group deals site. Its the one I use most frequently, but as always, caveat emptor.
I remember these styluses and thinking they were cool but overpriced....OP, thanks for finding a better deal for me, lol.

[mystictiger]

wtf is wrong?

http://www.socialshopper.com/edmonton_1990

($549 for an In-Home Far Infrared Detoxifying Sauna, Tax and Shipping Included (Value $1,499)

you can get this from ebay for under $300 http://www.ebay.ca/itm/XLarge-Infrared-IR-FAR-Portable-Indoor-SPA-Sauna-1-Y-WR-/160462715372?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item255c52b9ec

[Jorpho]

Horrors! Next you'll tell me that this eighty dollar Energy Bracelet is just a useless piece of plastic. :eek:
http://www.swarmjam.com/waf.srv/sj/sj/cn/auction_ActionProdDet?ONSUCCESS=swarmofferdet.jsp&PRODID=10537925&_SWCATID=10150489&_TRK=201107&ga_pe=sjem&


They (deal sites) are all grasping at straws to survive. The original business model is dead (when is the last time you saw 5 ads for local deals on any given day from all deal sites combined). The whole "me too" business was based on greed when these greedy people saw the margins. Now these companies would sell their own mothers for a 100% markup.Truth.