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To buy any Finecast off EBay? I was wondering due to my own fifty percent fail rate for the ten Finecast miniatures (Grotesques) I purchased and the things I read here and in other forums. I know GW will not reimburse for bad product purchased on EBay, so it seems to me a huge roll of the dice to buy Finecast from there.
I know a person could say they got the stuff from a brick and mortar store, but who really values toy soldiers more than personal honor?

Ya I wouldn't bother buying finecast from ebay. Even though the few pieces I have bought from GW have turned out fine I still wouldn't take the risk.

Think of it this way:

You buy finecast, and it turns out to be not so fine.

You could either

1/. trade it out for the same thing a dozen times to get a perfect cast, taking much frustration and time.

2/. take dodgy pics of it, slap it on ebay and get rid of it.

Frankly any finecast you get on Ebay that isn't perfect will probably end up on there again, and the proportion of dodgy casts will rise.

Yeah..

I'm very leary about buying ANYTHING on ebay, as usually it's been dodgy if not NIB.

But who would you trade it to? Anyone who see's that the thing is jacked won't want it, and GW doesn't give exchanges on EBay purchases.

Judging from prior ebay experiences the picture will be taken with the miscast facing down/hidden or with such a bad picture that you can't make the miscasts out.

I just couldn't bring myself to try to pawn junk off to somebody. I think you and I are in the same camp of just not getting any.

Isn't there a function on ebay called negative feedback?

Big deal if you've been hosed,though. Some of these people don't care.

Ascalam wrote:Think of it this way:

You buy finecast, and it turns out to be not so fine.

You could either

1/. trade it out for the same thing a dozen times to get a perfect cast, taking much frustration and time.

2/. take dodgy pics of it, slap it on ebay and get rid of it.

Frankly any finecast you get on Ebay that isn't perfect will probably end up on there again, and the proportion of dodgy casts will rise.

Yeah..

I'm very leary about buying ANYTHING on ebay, as usually it's been dodgy if not NIB.

3. You could contact GW and complain, and get a whole new set shipped to you free of charge, and you get to keep the old finecast minis, which... with a bit of elbow grease, can easily be fixed. This of course assumes you receive the packaging, etc.

And the new set will also have flaws.

I did this dance 12 times before i got a flawless painboy to replace one i bought at a GW store, and i'm probably tagged as someone trying to cheat them out of minis these days.

If i really wanted to be patching up fethed up minis i'd buy them on ebay. If i wanted to sculpt a new model/limb/weapon i'd do that in the first place.

It it too much to ask that when i pay massively inflated prices for a new model from the 'finest wargaming models in the world' that it doesn't look like someone's been shooting it with a BB gun before i get it?

I'm sticking with metals and plastic, and having them in my hands before i buy them, unless i get really good photos or am in a gambling mood

ChaosOxomega,
If GW replaced items purchased on EBay, it might not be as bad. As I said from the first, though, GW does not reimburse items on EBay due to the fact that anyone can do anything to the product before it's put up for sale.

Ascalam,

You hit the problem dead on.

Relapse wrote:ChaosOxomega,
If GW replaced items purchased on EBay, it might not be as bad. As I said from the first, though, GW does not reimburse items on EBay due to the fact that anyone can do anything to the product before it's put up for sale.

Ascalam,

You hit the problem dead on.

I've purchased via ebay and had replacements... granted what I purchased on ebay was sealed product, etc. so I had all the info they needed and all I told them was I purchased from a non-GW store.

Are you saying that you don't tell them you bought it from EBay, then, knowing they wouldn't refund if they knew?

All you basically have to do is E-mail a photo of the damaged product and they will replace it for you.

you could always claim you bought it from an independent retailer.

Grey Templar wrote:All you basically have to do is E-mail a photo of the damaged product and they will replace it for you.

you could always claim you bought it from an independent retailer.

A couple bucks worth of toy soldiers is a piss poor trade off for personal honor, but that seems a topic for another thread.

They never asked. I simply stated that I didn't buy the stuff through one of their own stores. There was no issue of personal honor, when a couple pieces are half formed on the sprue, then its clearly a manufacturing issue that has nothing to do with the ebay store I purchased it from (which I recalled happened to be a legitimate brick and mortar that ran a side business via ebay, its fairly common...).

Relapse wrote:

Grey Templar wrote:All you basically have to do is E-mail a photo of the damaged product and they will replace it for you.

you could always claim you bought it from an independent retailer.

A couple bucks worth of toy soldiers is a piss poor trade off for personal honor, but that seems a topic for another thread.

This is no issue with personal honor.

its a GW product with a manufacturing defect. GW has a policy of replacing faulty products and you are replacing a faulty product. the fact its changed hands a few times means nothing.

Grey Templar wrote:
This is no issue with personal honor.

its a GW product with a manufacturing defect. GW has a policy of replacing faulty products and you are replacing a faulty product. the fact its changed hands a few times means nothing.

As it should be, If you get a faulty product, that was bought new, kept new, never used and resold, then the manufacturer should replace the product if it has a defect.

Most retailers give you a whole year of use, and if, within that year there is a manufacturer defect in the product, they replace it at no cost to the consumer.

This happened to a new alternator I had bought, after six months of use I found it was not charging, I took it to the parts store where I bought it from, they ran a diagnostic of it, determined it was a manufacturer defect, and replaced it on the spot, no questions asked.

This is known as good customer service.

If you buy it from ebay then try to pass it off as a purchase you made from an independent retailer or from a GW store and this is repeated enough times by enough people....

Don't be surprised if GW make it extremely difficult to get a swapped model.

It'll start at "No receipt, no swap", then it'll switch to "No refund unless noticed within 30 days" and before you know it, this forum will be full of people whinging because it's not as easy at it used to be to get the swap.

Then you'll only have people to blame that took the piss out of their customer service team.

Right now they don't even expect you to send the original back, that's pretty good customer service if you ask me. I'm sure more than a few people have passed around their miscast models for multiple returns.

Kijamon wrote:If you buy it from ebay then try to pass it off as a purchase you made from an independent retailer or from a GW store and this is repeated enough times by enough people....

Don't be surprised if GW make it extremely difficult to get a swapped model.

It'll start at "No receipt, no swap", then it'll switch to "No refund unless noticed within 30 days" and before you know it, this forum will be full of people whinging because it's not as easy at it used to be to get the swap.

Then you'll only have people to blame that took the piss out of their customer service team.

Right now they don't even expect you to send the original back, that's pretty good customer service if you ask me. I'm sure more than a few people have passed around their miscast models for multiple returns.

No they won't. They might ask for the mini back for "qc". I dont thing anyone was talking about cheating the system, just asking gw to replace crap minis.

There is a reasonable point that engaging in deception woul be a step too far for some folks.

But the point holds that if you buy it new-in-box, where you buy it from shouldn't matter. It's still clearly the manufacturer's fault and responsibility if something's wrong with it. If it is indeed GW's policy not to swap any items bought from EBay, even when they're brand-new in shrinkwrap, then that's a bad and discriminatory policy by GW. If it's their policy not to swap clearly used stuff, that's another matter.

I do think the original point of the thread is a valid one; it does seem that with a higher miscast/quality error rate with Finecast, there is greater danger in buying Finecast stuff on eBay or anywhere used for that matter.