Comment by oliwarner
5 days ago
Do you buy anything based on reviews there? They're obviously silly and exchanged for discounts and "coins" so I just ignore them in a way I don't elsewhere.
I quite like AE because you can avoid the app and returns on DOAs often just involve a refund without returning anything. There are silly annoyances, and sometimes buying locally is inexplicably cheaper, but for little electronics, they're hard to beat.
No, I treat AE reviews as written by the manufacturer. Sometimes I'll look to see if a legitimate user has posted something wrong with the product, or a caveat, but I never pay attention to the rating.
I've had almost solely good experiences with AE, but it does take experience to shop there (never trust the photos, if the price is too cheap it's a scam, batteries are always fake, etc).
> it does take experience to shop there
Amen, and resilience. It's a combative UX, trying to force you into bundles instead of single purchases, Choice items rather than cheaper with regular p&p, not advertising that some things (eg bare lithium cells) will be shipped seemingly by sailors chucking corked glass bottles into the sea and hoping they get to you within three business years.
I've not had too much of a problem with outright scams. Some things have been smaller than expected (photo issues - description accurate) and if it's delicate (eg plywood robot models, larger foam planes) they will find a way to grind it into dust before delivery. Both those examples got a refund the next day.
But it's cheap when it works but the central company appears to be honest and helpful when you contact them.
I did have one or two items being scams, eg a mosquito bite pen that ended up being empty inside, or a 2TB USB disk that actually just had a trashy MicroSD card inside, but both cost $3 so I knew they were scams when I got them (I was just curious).