amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flashing

jcalahor · Dec 29, 2014

hi, hope someone can give me some clues on this. i got aftermarket batteries (dji) tagged in amazon as "used like new", but the charger just keeps flashing green and 1s or 2s, or 3s flashing from time to time. seems the batteries are unbalanced, does the charger will balance them someday?

this batteries were sold at 10$, on amazon. how come there are people selling unbalanced (unrecoverable) batteries? is a scam i think. should i just dispose them?. i have a voltimeter on hand how i can know how unbalanced they are?

Monte55 · Dec 29, 2014

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

Why would you want to buy used batteries? I wouldn't buy a pristine Phantom unless I could fly it unless it had a returnable warranty at their cost.

jcalahor · Dec 29, 2014

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

it costs 50% cheaper i guess this is a learning process

J.James · Dec 30, 2014

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

They might balance if you leave them on the charger for ever. But they may also just be to low for the charger to ever start charging them. The only work around is to switch the chargers setting from lipo to the to the LI-fa setting and then see if it starts to charge and only let it do that for a minute or 2 then switch it back to lipo and It may then have enough voltage to let the charger charge it. BUT be warned if they sat completely discharged for a long time. They may be shot already and will not hold much power even when fully charged. So even if they do finely charge make sure you keep a very close on the low voltage alarm and keep the phantom really close to you and be ready to land her fast if they end up only giving you a few minutes of time before they are completely drained. and dont trust them to give you a full amount of time intill you cycled them a few times to know how long you will get from them.

PhantomFanatic · Jan 4, 2015

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

jcalahor said:
hi, hope someone can give me some clues on this. i got aftermarket batteries (dji) tagged in amazon as "used like new", but the charger just keeps flashing green and 1s or 2s, or 3s flashing from time to time. seems the batteries are unbalanced, does the charger will balance them someday? this batteries were sold at 10$, on amazon. how come there are people selling unbalanced (unrecoverable) batteries? is a scam i think. should i just dispose them?. i have a voltimeter on hand how i can know how unbalanced they are?

Just return them! Amazon has a great return policy. BTW, I saw the used ones there too. Also, many don't know that a lot of amazon's products are actually sold by Amazon merchants. If you have a problem, with a merchant, file an "A to Z claim." The merchant is given a short period of time, to respond. If they don't resolve things to your satisfaction, Amazon will step in and resolve the problem.

After an A to Z claim is filed, Amazon reads all communications between you and the merchant. Amazon also records all communications, so they can see what was said prior to the claim. When you are buying something, click on "list of sellers" or something to that effect, and you will see all the merchant's who are selling that product, their price and their customer satisfaction rating.

But, try to resolve things first.

J.James · Jan 4, 2015

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

Yes if they happened to be any thing sold by or for filled by amazon they have a real easy return policy up to the first 5 orders you ever return for 25 items in total. Tho what sucks is no matter what the reason you return stuff if you get ripped off to often they like to cancel peoples account and ban you for actually using there return policy. and not putting up with getting ripped off.

But alot of things such as batteys if its sold and shipped by amazon they will tell you they are not returnable. BUT THEY neglect to tell you that that just means they dont want you to ship them back and will just give you a refund providing you ask and they leave it up to you to dispose of them.

But if you got it from a vender that just happens to sell on amazon you have to go threw the a-z claim process which can take up to 30 days for them to make a decision and a few days after that to resolve it.

PhantomFanatic · Jan 6, 2015

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

J.James said:
Yes if they happened to be any thing sold by or for filled by amazon they have a real easy return policy up to the first 5 orders you ever return for 25 items in total. Tho what sucks is no matter what the reason you return stuff if you get ripped off to often they like to cancel peoples account and ban you for actually using there return policy. and not putting up with getting ripped off.

But alot of things such as batteys if its sold and shipped by amazon they will tell you they are not returnable. BUT THEY neglect to tell you that that just means they dont want you to ship them back and will just give you a refund providing you ask and they leave it up to you to dispose of them.

But if you got it from a vender that just happens to sell on amazon you have to go threw the a-z claim process which can take up to 30 days for them to make a decision and a few days after that to resolve it.

I've never heard of Amazon hassling people for returning items. I am an amazon merchant and it isn't true that you have to go through the A to Z guarantee, just because you bought from an Amazon merchant.

In fact, my return policy was for anyone who received a defective or wrong item, I would give them an instant and full refund. Then, we would immediately ship out the correct item or a working item, at no charge.m Sometimes, I wouldn't even have them to mail the other item back. but, when I did need a return, I still gave a full refund and I shipped out the item before receiving the returned item. Not one customer ever failed to return the item.

I've never seen an A to Z to take so long. An A to Z is the last resort and it counts against the merchant's score.

J.James · Jan 6, 2015

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

ya an A to Z is not nessasary IF the merchant has a good return policy. and even if some one does have to still go as far as the a to z it still goes much faster when the merchant does not try to drag it out to the max "up to" 30 days.
Some merchants are not cool. BUT its not the norm usually and is the exception. and the ones that are horrible about stuff like that tend to not last very long either.

and amazon dont usually give any one a hassle on returns esp if they dont have to return a lot of stuff. But they do have an arbitrary number they use and will be cool right up to that number of items. Its not some thing to really worry about but is good to be mindful of if some one ever orders a lot of stuff from amazon and happens to get a few hits and misses on some Items. Tho amazon still has one of the best and most liberal return policy's of any place there is. Many times I have had to return stuff or extange it and they some times even ship out the new item before the return is even picked up and other times they have refunded me as soon as an item is picked up and not even back to them yet. Last year I had a night mare of a time with some car parts I desperately needed to get my truck fixed before a trip and they keep shipping the wrong item and also keep taking much longer to ship the items each time. But they not only were very cool about me returning the items that were the wrong thing they also keep also giving me $15 credits every time I bitched about them not shipping them intill after the promised delivery date. and in the end when I finely got the right part sent and all the credits It basically made the parts costs come out to be negative $5

PhantomFanatic · Jan 7, 2015

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

I can say that I, honestly have never heard of a maximum number of returns. I have returned way more than five items, with no problems. And, they do not know I'm a merchant. I receive no extra favors.

You should notice who you are buying from, as number 1, Amazon does not sell all products on their site. Merchants sell a large portion of the products. But, merchants adhere to amazon's policies or they are booted out.

There is a merchant forum, within Amazon. I recall being a new merchant and I read this, from an experienced merchant: "Do not ship a replacement product until you receive the returned item."

It made sense, but I decided to do otherwise. In addition to immediately shipping a replacement item, I gave the customer a FULL refund, including shipping. It was unheard of, yet not one customer failed to return an item. Plus, I paid them their shipping costs.

Why did I do this, when no other merchants did It? It was the right thing to do. Plus, those customers became faithful customers and they rated my corporation as five stars. That is big on Amazon. I've sold products when my price was higher than other merchants. Why did they buy from me? My customer rating was 5 stars, while the other merchants were 4.7 or lower.

Sorry, I got going there!

J.James · Jan 8, 2015

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

Sounds like you are the person to buy from. Even my self I would rather but from any one that stands behind the items they sell

Sketch6995 · Jan 9, 2015

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

yeah dont buy used anything for a phantom, unless you want to buy my old swollen used ones? lol
you get what you pay for, if you go cheap here you'll end up regretting it.

J.James · Jan 10, 2015

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

actually some of my best battery's I got for my fc40 were cheap Tho brand new. But there all better then the stock dji battery's and higher capacity as well as higher C rating and can charge then much faster and they dont get all ripping hot after an aggressive flight.. I ended up giving my dji 2200s away to sweeten the deal when I sold another fc40 that I had.

jcalahor · Jan 21, 2015

Re: amazon scam on aftermarket lipos? charger just keep flas

thanks guys for the replies, i'll try to get refund from the merchant i was able to rescue 1 battery by leaving/balancing it charging for about 12 hours. i'll buy new batteries only in the future