Counterfeit goods

Last week I went searching for a Mophie Juice Pack Plus battery for my iPhone as I’ve been traveling more and my iPhone doesn’t quite last all day when I use it. I did a Google search (after I decided that I wanted it over the other batteries) and found prices ranging from about $50 to $100. The list price is $100 so all the prices in that range seem legitimate. The $50 price on Amazon looked too good to be true. After reading through a bunch of reviews, I discovered the reason. It would appear that some Amazon sellers are selling counterfeit products.

I would have expected Amazon to better screen their sellers especially when they are fulfilling the orders for these merchants and are offering it via Amazon Prime. This also happened with an OtterBox case we bought for my wife; the build quality is not up to par and didn’t come it the retail packaging. Does it matter? Now that the case is falling apart, I’d have to say yes.

How can you protect yourself from counterfeits? First off, a tip off is “does not come in retail packaging to save you money”. Second, if the price is too low, there is likely a problem. However, I’m taking another stab at an OtterBox off eBay. In this case the seller says that it came from a store that they closed and it is in retail packaging; the packaging has AT&T on it and not OtterBox. After a little research, I found that the seller is an AT&T reseller, so this adds legitimacy to the seller. Third, is it shipping direct from China? Not everything that ships from China is counterfeit, but companies usually ship to distributors in the US and ship from the US.

Of course, buyer beware. Safe shopping!

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