"gray market" electronics...

[Ginevive]

I just wanted to post this, as I read an article in USA today regarding sleazy firms that sell "gray market" brand-name electronics, such as digital cameras, laptops etc.. basically, they buy the goods in a country that's cheap and import them to your country; sometimes they bust the packages open and remove components such as battery chargers, etc, (to sell seperately..) Then you win the ebay auction or whatever for a "too good to be true" price, and get an item with an opened package, foreign instructions (or none at all!) missing components that they'll try to sell you seperately, or worse, something with NO warranty that is defective.
Just a heads-up; watch out for this stuff. I just thought that if I could save one person from this kind of back-alley- pathetic wannabee entrepreneur con artist stuff, it'd be a good day!
A side thing that some of these types do is, they start the bidding off VERY low, sometimes with no reserve, or post a tiny buy-it-now price.. then charge 500% the amount that shipping should be, for shipping costs.

[SPJ]

Pick up any photography magazine and browse the ads. The ones that don't list prices or say call for price, usually have grey market items. Also be wary of the ones that advertise that they warrenty everything they sell. They will sell a grey market item and charge an arm and a leg for a worthless warrenty.

[Schlyne]

Also watch out for this in the computer industry. These are the companies that will put in terms like "open the box" you accept the package kind of thing. These are also the companies that will add extra charges for things you'll need, like the special am/fm antenna for a speaker system.