So I’m in the market for a small camcorder. After doing some research, I settled on a model (Samsung X210L) and started looking for the best price. Most online retailers I was familiar with were in the $400-$500 range, but one store (GearXSmall.us.com) was $340! Once I noticed the store was based in NY, I started wondering what the catch was.
I know enough to be wary of NY-based electronics merchants. They have a tendency of ripping you off on shipping or delaying your order unless you purchase overpriced accessories you don’t need. Of course not all NY merchants are so shady, B&H is one of my favorite merchants because of their good prices, fair shipping and no haggle return policy.
So I started looking for reviews of GearXSmall. For a company who had been in business for about 2 years it was odd to not find one review. So I decided to see how much they were going to charge me for shipping. I added the item to the shopping cart and was greeted by this message:
Minimum order is $500? You’ve gotta be kidding me… So yeah, GearXSmall is an obvious scam site. No legit business requires you to spend $500 when many of their items are far less then that. So I clicked on their FAQ and they had this to say:
Why Is There A Minimum Order!?
We cannot process orders with a value less than US $500 because we have too many international orders and it is easier for us to process less orders with higher values. We are sorry for this inconvenience.
That has to be the lamest excuse I’ve ever heard of.
I put in an order and I saw that they required a social security number. I thought twice and decided not to put it in, thinking it will refuse to allow the order and tell me why they need it. Well they PROCESSED it… Then I got real nervous since they still had my card number. I went to my email and it said the bank was down for credit card processing and if I can send money thru western union. Heck no…. I’m about to get hold of my bank and put a hold on my check card. It has to be a fraud but i sent an email to the site asking for information to convince me if it’s legit or not. I’m still waiting. DON”T TRUST IT
Thanks Mike. BTW, Reseller Ratings has plenty of horror stories from people who placed an order from them.
The scammers / identity thieves have changed their website’s name from http://www.gearxmall.us.com to http://www.gearxs.us.com
Different name, still the same scam…