Bad PSA: Use CAUTION selling to BF buyer "LIN" (AKA Kai Zhao)

[Casinostocks]

OK, Cray... By the OP I meant this OP of this thread but you must have been referring to this previous saga:

"I sold a $1,200.00 custom knife to LIN. I shipped it fully insured on my dime and it was received at an address in New Hampshire that he gave me in a timely manner on July 31, 2016. I waited a few days to make sure there were no issues and after a PM to LIN and no response, I transferred the money from PP to my bank.
On August 20, 2016 I received an e mail from KAI ZHAO stating that the knife was improperly packaged and that the tip was broke and that the knife was sticking out of the box. He did send a pic of the knife laying on the bubble wrap and box, but no pic of the damaged box. I put the knife in the sheath and wrapped in in bubble wrap and stretch wrap.
After investigation, I found out that he does not live in NJ and is having the knives delivered there to be repackaged and sent to him in China. I think the knife was damaged and then shipped to him hence the three week delay.
Even though I did not feel at fault, I asked him why he waited so long as the package was insured and told him that he could send it to the maker and I would ask the maker to fix it and send it back to the address in NH on my dime.
I waited again for a couple of weeks and received a claim from Pay Pay and the locked up my account. Through Pay Pal he wanted to keep the knife and have me refund him $660.00. I refused the deal and contacted Pay Pal. Figuring that I was in a no win situation with PP having my account locked up, I eventually agreed to take the knife back and refund his money.

They gave him ten days to provided them with a valid tracking number and when I received the knife, they would refund his money and unlock my account.
Eleven days later he sends them a invalid shipping number. I contact Pay Pal and after thirty minutes on the phone explaining that I had kept my end of the deal, they ruled in my favor.

This morning I wake up and he has appealed the ruling and provided them with a tracking number from China and the package will not get here until 9-20-16.
So, be careful who you are dealing with as who you think you are dealing with may not be who you think. If I had known this was going to China and being handled by more than the buyer, I would have never sold him a knife.

Bobby"

Here is my opinion based on this post alone as I have not followed the other posts by Bobby on that thread (no time for that right now). I still don't see how payPal could've ruled in the buyer's favor if the tracking number was issued from China if indeed this buyer was a U.S. based buyer verified through a U.S. bank / bankcard. IMHO the only was payPal could've ruled in favor of the buyer was because he was in fact a Chinese buyer from China from the beginning. Could be wrong but if not, I would've kicked up a major sh*tstorm over this if I was the victimized seller!

 

[Zombie411]

This all came to light in a previous GBU thread where there was a problem with a knife he purchased. I'll post the link in a few minutes. LINK

Just a public service announcement. Thanks.

My apology.
I confused reading several pages of the linked thread with this threads OP.

 

[palonej]

Yup!
Not only that Cray, but the proxy opened up the package Bobby sent. If he, or Lin, saw damage then, why the hell did he take it to China?? No idea.
I feel for Bobby, he got screwed by Lin AND PP.
That entire mess would never have happened if only Lin was up front about the proxy. If the knife was ok at that point, Bobby's responsibilities are over.
We never found out what the resolution was, but I would prefer not to be put into that position by a lying buyer.
Joe

In the linked thread the seller never knew he was shipping to a proxy and it was an address that incurred no extra fees. The nondisclosure is the real problem.

 

[-Corey-]

I sold a few knives to LIN before that transaction that he had with Bobby. When he paid me I did notice an extra 1% fee because he had an international paypal account. I let him know that if no damage or missing items were reported once it reached that US address, I wouldn't take responsibility since that's as far as I could insure the package, and he agreed. Everything worked out fine in the 2 shipments I sent, but I would definitely prefer to be made aware of the use of a proxy service before a deal is made to ensure that both the buyer and seller are aware of their potential risks involved.

After more and more buyers tried to sneak by without informing me of their use of a proxy service, or telling me after they had paid, I ended up setting up my paypal account to not accept payments from non-US accounts.

 

[craytab]

OK, Cray... By the OP I meant this OP of this thread but you must have been referring to this previous saga:

"I sold a $1,200.00 custom knife to LIN. I shipped it fully insured on my dime and it was received at an address in New Hampshire that he gave me in a timely manner on July 31, 2016. I waited a few days to make sure there were no issues and after a PM to LIN and no response, I transferred the money from PP to my bank.
On August 20, 2016 I received an e mail from KAI ZHAO stating that the knife was improperly packaged and that the tip was broke and that the knife was sticking out of the box. He did send a pic of the knife laying on the bubble wrap and box, but no pic of the damaged box. I put the knife in the sheath and wrapped in in bubble wrap and stretch wrap.
After investigation, I found out that he does not live in NJ and is having the knives delivered there to be repackaged and sent to him in China. I think the knife was damaged and then shipped to him hence the three week delay.
Even though I did not feel at fault, I asked him why he waited so long as the package was insured and told him that he could send it to the maker and I would ask the maker to fix it and send it back to the address in NH on my dime.
I waited again for a couple of weeks and received a claim from Pay Pay and the locked up my account. Through Pay Pal he wanted to keep the knife and have me refund him $660.00. I refused the deal and contacted Pay Pal. Figuring that I was in a no win situation with PP having my account locked up, I eventually agreed to take the knife back and refund his money.

They gave him ten days to provided them with a valid tracking number and when I received the knife, they would refund his money and unlock my account.
Eleven days later he sends them a invalid shipping number. I contact Pay Pal and after thirty minutes on the phone explaining that I had kept my end of the deal, they ruled in my favor.

This morning I wake up and he has appealed the ruling and provided them with a tracking number from China and the package will not get here until 9-20-16.
So, be careful who you are dealing with as who you think you are dealing with may not be who you think. If I had known this was going to China and being handled by more than the buyer, I would have never sold him a knife.

Bobby"

Here is my opinion based on this post alone as I have not followed the other posts by Bobby on that thread (no time for that right now). I still don't see how payPal could've ruled in the buyer's favor if the tracking number was issued from China if indeed this buyer was a U.S. based buyer verified through a U.S. bank / bankcard. IMHO the only was payPal could've ruled in favor of the buyer was because he was in fact a Chinese buyer from China from the beginning. Could be wrong but if not, I would've kicked up a major sh*tstorm over this if I was the victimized seller!

I just went through the entire thread again at is so damn messy and fishy, only on lins side. At first he doesn't deny the proxy shipped it to China. Then he says the proxy just accepted and held onto the knife. Even if this is true lin should have immediately contacted the sell and sent it back for a refund. It would have taken minutes and a trip to the post office which the proxy could have even done. I call bs though. I think lin and or his proxy lied in some way. They lied about it not beimg packaged properly im the very least and they did mot disclose the proxy. Why take a broken knife back to China? This eliminated the chance for the seller to get refunded through insurance.

In the end the seller did push back and kept on paypal. Lin closed the claim and they settled privately.

Such a mess. This is why if a proxy is involved the seller should be aware and there should be severe consequences for a buyer not making that kmown.

 

[Casinostocks]

^ glad I didn't have to go through that entire thread. Thanks for the doing the sleuthing

 

[craytab]

I remembered most of it just not how it ended. The posts I made then are exactly what I am saying now. Same with many others.

 

[palonej]

We were never made aware of the resolution though Cray.
I remember Bobby and I had PMed a bunch of times about this mess and his Akita rescue.
Wish I had asked about the outcome, but after getting to know Bobby a little bit, I'd have to guess he wound up with the short end of the stick.
He is such a gentleman I can't see it going any other way.
Lin???? Ignore.

I remembered most of it just not how it ended. The posts I made then are exactly what I am saying now. Same with many others.

 

[craytab]

We were never made aware of the resolution though Cray.
I remember Bobby and I had PMed a bunch of times about this mess and his Akita rescue.
Wish I had asked about the outcome, but after getting to know Bobby a little bit, I'd have to guess he wound up with the short end of the stick.
He is such a gentleman I can't see it going any other way.
Lin???? Ignore.

Yup. We can only guess. I hope he didn't get screwed too bad.

 

[palonej]

Me too Cray. Bobby's a real solid dude.
He's one of those guy's that will literally give you the shirt off his back.
And what he and his family do for those Akita's get them express tickets to heaven.

 

[Peter Hartwig]

There were certainly problems in the prior thread, but is it really a proxy address since he seems to pick the knives up there, rather then having them forwarded to China. I do think he needs to fill the sellers in on the fact that he will not be inspecting the knives on arrival at the US address, but when he shows up.. PP is overly generous on filing time(IMO)

 

[SpyderPhreak]

The biggest problem here, and what I really want to highlight, are the deceptive buying practices. Is LIN upfront about it? Not in the least. That's the reason for this PSA thread. Worse, there are several others here that I'm pretty sure are also doing the same type of thing as LIN, but I cannot prove it (yet). Beware!!!

Now, let's talk a bit about some of the collateral damage. The thread I linked in my OP highlights some of the potential issues that may occur when unknowingly shipping to a proxy address. I mentioned this in my OP, but how many flat-out counterfeits have we seen coming out of China the past few years? Way, way, WAY too many!!! (Sebenza, Hinderer, Benchmade, Spyderco, Busse, Randall, Becker, etc... You get the picture!)

How do they do it? Pictures, dimensions, and descriptions from the internet only get these slimy counterfeiters so far. To get their copies so close, they need to have an actual example of the model in-hand to compare with. How do they get them, when so many dealers/sellers flat refuse to ship to China? I think you see where I'm going with this.

Capitalism? Yeah, sure it is. But that's NOT really the point here! More the point, many, MANY of the knives I've seen purchased by LIN are custom, one-of-a-kind knives. After going to China, what are the odds that they'll ever be seen again in our enthusiast knife community again? Nil. If you're indeed here on this forum to be a real part of that community (and obviously some aren't), that should bother you. More than a little bit if you really start to think about it.

We're not talking about a single foreign individual buying something for themselves here and there through our forum, are we? (We even have some of those folks here, from, wait for it, China! ) We're talking about a business (that's all LIN is ) that's buying up many tens of thousands of dollars in goods out of the hands of our community, and many don't even realize what's happening. Yeah, that bothers me a bit...

TLDR; too bad! Go read it!

 

[JJHollowman]

What if he's just a collector who has a lot of cash from China's recently discovered capitalism? Lotta new millionaires over there these days, not that this excuses any deceptions on his part.

 

[SpyderPhreak]

What if he's just a collector who has a lot of cash from China's recently discovered capitalism? Lotta new millionaires over there these days, not that this excuses any deceptions on his part.

If you would have read the other linked thread, you'd realize that he's not...

 

[craytab]

There were certainly problems in the prior thread, but is it really a proxy address since he seems to pick the knives up there, rather then having them forwarded to China. I do think he needs to fill the sellers in on the fact that he will not be inspecting the knives on arrival at the US address, but when he shows up.. PP is overly generous on filing time(IMO)

I believe lin said sometimes he picks up and sometimes he has them sent to him. Not going through that mess of a thread again to confirm though...

 

[palonej]

He says that the knives he purchases here are his business. He is not a collector.
This statement by Lin is in the thread that SP linked.

If you would have read the other linked thread, you'd realize that he's not...

 

[Peter Hartwig]

I believe lin said sometimes he picks up and sometimes he has them sent to him. Not going through that mess of a thread again to confirm though...

Nor I
Actually I missed this 2nd page of posts somehow as I jumped from one thread to the other.

 

[JJHollowman]

He says that the knives he purchases here are his business. He is not a collector.
This statement by Lin is in the thread that SP linked.

Hmm. That can be taken a couple ways. They're his business, in which case he should be buying a dealer membership, or they're his business, in that as long as both parties are in agreement on the sale it's nobody else's place to say anything. To be honest I think trying to stop counterfeiters by limiting sales is like trying to dam a flood with a cork. I also think that thinking they can't counterfeit pretty much anything with pictures and specs that are easily available is paranoia,- ask any smith here if they could do it even without the CNC, CAD, and 3-D printing machinery I'm sure is available in China, and see what they say. Probably more difficult in terms of an auto, but for a fixed blade?
If he's buying multiple models of the same knife over and over, he's likely selling to collectors himself, in which case he's no different than any other flipper. The question then becomes, do all flippers get booted?

 

[SpyderPhreak]

Here's the proof in the puddin', for those that need to see it in black and white (Post #109):

and you may find, I get lots of knives here, I do not stay in US for long every time, I fly to US, take all these knives, and get them back to China.

I do not want to say it, but that is what I do for work.

Later, I asked LIN to explain himself (Post #121):

Just curious, if I may? How is buying knives at BF related to your job? What do you do with them once you get them to China?

Unfortunately, LIN never responded.

Some of you might also find it interesting what Neil Ostroff of True North Knives had to say about LIN (Post #126):

I also know LIN, Kai Zhao - for many years - he has always been a totally reliable and honest customer - I have shipped him close to 500 knives through this same forwarder system...

So there it is. LIN is most definitely buying stuff, both here and in other places, then reselling it over in China. FWIW.

JJHollowman, as you can see above, this is LIN's business. How he makes his money. Unfortunately, since he isn't selling his wares here on BF, management (Spark) does not require him to purchase a dealer-level membership. He walks the line by only being a buyer here...

 

[palonej]

Yup!!
Since he doesn't sell here, he isn't doing anything wrong and doesn't need a dealer membership.
He sells everything he buys here, in China.
Don't have a problem with that, but I do have one with him not letting sellers know there is a proxy involved.
Joe