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S3 Fakes

D

Drogyn

Android Enthusiast
Curious if anyone has been stung with a fake S3.
I see a lot of "S3s" for sale on ebay and honestly it has crossed my mind to go after one since they are cheaper that way for me as I am not on a contract, but the cheaper price also makes me very cautious having seen several videos of the fakes that are flying around out there.
 
To make sure it's authentic and not IMEI blacklisted you can use a website like CheckMEND. Well, the website's real purpose is to check if a phone has been blacklisted or not. However, to do the check you would need the phone IMEI number and the model number. Hence, you ask the seller to provide you the IMEI of the phone as you want to run a check. If he agrees and provides you the number, you are set to go. In fact, if the phone's IMEI you provide to CheckMend does not correspond to the model, they won't be able you to provide the check result, so that means it's a fake.
 
sherlock5545 said:
To make sure it's authentic and not IMEI blacklisted you can use a website like CheckMEND. Well, the website's real purpose is to check if a phone has been blacklisted or not. However, to do the check you would need the phone IMEI number and the model number. Hence, you ask the seller to provide you the IMEI of the phone as you want to run a check. If he agrees and provides you the number, you are set to go. In fact, if the phone's IMEI you provide to CheckMend does not correspond to the model, they won't be able you to provide the check result, so that means it's a fake.
Click to expand...

Well. It's just that. I don't know. Couldn't they. Maybe. Lie?
 
Although if you buy it from Ebay and pay through PayPal you automatically receive the benefit of their PayPal protection plan, which means they will reimburse your money if you make an official claim to Ebay on the grounds that the product didn't meet the description. :)

Ebay would then deal with the seller themselves to recoup their loss. You do therefore need to make sure that the product description EXPLICITLY says it is a genuine Samsung Galaxy S3.
 
There are PayPal scams there, absolutely. A big one is to dupe people into paying as a gift to avoid taxes, fees, etc. Good luck getting your money back for a purchase after verifying to PayPal that it wasn't. At that point, there is no protection plan.

I'll stick by the buyer beware part. ;)
 
If you buy used phone, I think there are stores like CEX, they also buy your old phone. It might be a good alternative to online purchases of mobile phones.
 
Yeah I have seen the ways to tell a fake apart from the real ones.. though often the pics on ebay dont really show enough to be sure...think i'll hang on anyway, price is sure to drop when the s4 releases
 
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