The Indian gaming market is one of the fastest growing markets, with demand for computer hardware and peripherals reaching records. This also means that unscrupulous people also get a chance to cheat honest gamers out of their money. And what’s a better way to scam people than make a few jaws drop over absurdly low prices of peripherals on a big ecommerce site like Amazon?
We already have had price tampering issues in the past, where seller Blue_horse was seen selling graphics cards for absurdly high prices,by making people believe that they are selling at the proper prices. This makes it troublesome for people to buy,especially since smaller e-tailers like MD Computers and Vedant Computers don’t deliver to remote locations. Now, a different form of scammer has hit the Amazon market, trying to scam gamers of their hard earned money. While the exact name of the guy is not fixed (he keeps changing the name of his seller account so that no one can catch him in the act). Dealing with gaming mice, his seller profile has been spotted selling the Logitech G402 and the Logitech G102.
When this article was written, the seller was using the name of “Khush shivam”. It is a newly launched account offering the G402 for an astonishingly low price of 1500 INR. We have seen the G402 go for low prices (as low as 1800 INR), even on Amazon, from trusted sellers like Cloudtail, but this pricing looks absurdly low.
The same seller, Khush shivam, is selling the Logitech G102 for a price of 1000 INR. Offline retail prices can go as low as 1400 INR, but no one could match this guy’s pricing.
Indian gamers don’t have big pockets – they look for long term investments, and cheaper goods. Getting a decent deal like these would make many people click the “Checkout” button, which would mean falling right into the trap of the scammer.
Amazon needs to check the seller’s profile, and follow up on how he’s procuring the mice for sale. Even if he’s legit, absurd pricing like that would mean anti-competitive tactics, which would probably get the Indian branch of Logitech involved – which would mean a long judicial mess. However, instinct says that he’s the usual guy taking advantage of a niche passion and an obsession for acquiring decent items for cheaper prices.
The best place to buy gaming mice to avoid scams like these, would be the LXG online store (check it out here), or e-tailers like Primeabgb or Theitdepot, or MD Computers and Vedant Computers.
An update to the article will be posted when we inform Amazon about this, and they actually take some action about this. However, considering that seller “Blue_horse” was let off free in the first case, there is a high chance that the present scammer would be let off too. The only option is to steer clear of the seller, and not be enticed by the pricing. Because when something is too good to be true, it probably is,right?