Tell a fake from a 'grey'

05 June 2017 - 10:41 By Wendy Knowler
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BOGUS DEALER: The Afritech store which is selling the fake Nokia 3310s
BOGUS DEALER: The Afritech store which is selling the fake Nokia 3310s
Image: SUPPLIED

Do you know your fakes from your parallel imports?

While the former are counterfeit goods - illegal con jobs - the latter are genuine, just not intended for sale in South Africa.

The retailer acquires the parallel import or "grey" product from sources other than the local manufacturers or licensed distributors and the local companies don't honour any warranty on it.

Provided the retailer boldly discloses the fact that the product is a parallel import, and what that means for the warranty, it's perfectly legal, and you'll find these products in many major retail stores, including Checkers and Dis-Chem, as well as for sale online by the likes of Takealot.

For many consumers, the lower prices are worth the "back door" implications, but bear in mind that the product may well not be identical to the version sold via authorised channels in South Africa, especially when it comes to cosmetics.

The well-known baby lotion may be thinner or smell different, for example, or the perfume may be fairly old by the time it gets to these shores and lack potency as a result.

The fakes are another story altogether - those you really want to avoid.

If you're among the "must have it now" camp when it comes to electronics, you're the fakers' target market.

 

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BAD COPY: My R700 fake Nokia 3310, against an image of the real things. Picture: SUPPLIED

The surprising must-have phone of moment is the revived Nokia 3310, which went on sale just over a week ago in the UK and almost immediately sold out. Clearly some people value long-battery life above all else when it comes to a cellphone.

Last Monday, Nokia brand owner HMD Global announced its arrival in South Africa, saying it would be available in Cell C stores for R749.

A techie colleague of mine was unable to get his hands on one, but a Cell C staffer referred him to an electronics store in Durban's Musgrave Centre - Afritech - saying they were selling the genuine article.

I went to check it out on Friday and was assured by the two men in the store who offered me a black and white 3310 that it was indeed genuine and could be mine for R750. When I protested, they knocked it down to R700.

The phone was naked - no box, no instructions. They pulled earphones and a charger off the shelf.

I paid, left and then got my colleague to check out the phone - definitely fake, he said. No surprise there.

Back in the store I got shrugs and muted denials when I asked the men why they were selling fake phones. "It's got a guarantee," said one. Of course it does; it's a guaranteed fake.

And the cheek of it - they're asking the same price as the original sells for. You can be sure many are being flogged online, too.

How can you tell the fake from the genuine article?

  • Cheap packaging - or in my case, no packaging.
  • The battery is a 1500mAh unit, whereas the genuine phone has a 1200mAh unit.
  • When you open the back and remove the battery, the fake's SIM card slots are near the centre of the phone, instead of tucked away almost out of sight at the top right of the battery compartment.

CONTACT WENDY:
Email: consumer@knowler.co.za
Twitter: @wendyknowler

 

'Sorry' came just in time

A few weeks ago I wrote about Thoko Mampane's shocking treatment at the hands of Cell C. A few months before her 24-month contract ended in 2013, her smartphone malfunctioned so she took it in for repair and has never seen it again, despite her protests.

In retaliation she did not pay the last few subscriptions, but clearly the network still owed her a lot more - the value of the missing phone - than she owed them. And she was "blacklisted".

All went quiet for years until recently, when the network began debiting her bank account.

I took up the case with CellC, which responded with: "We have sent an instruction to all the bureaus and asked them to update the client's details. The client will also be getting a letter from our legal department confirming that she has been cleared."

This week Mampane e-mailed me to say that Mario Davis, a consultant with CellC's escalation department, had contacted her to apologise, and then he delivered a new smartphone to her home.

"I would like to thank Mario for his customer care," she said. "Cell C should thank him for saving their name (at least from me)."

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