I have shopped online using Facebook, One2car, Shopee, Lazada etc.  I have noticed a propensity to provide as little detail about what is being sold as possible.  If you are looking for a car, often the listing won't include the year of the car, what options are on the car, and only occasionally will it include the cars mileage. On cars it seems typical to put a price that includes only the down payment not the total cost.  Even worse are those that advertise the amount financed but omit putting in that the price listed is after you make a down payment. 

On ads on Shopee and Lazada it is very typical for the listing not to include the product dimensions, color, or weight.  Now you might say, they are trying to get you to contact them.  No, getting a response from a a Thai seller is like trying to nail Jello to a wall.  Is it just cultural to include as few details as possible so that you can not complain about not getting what was advertised.  

Pet gripe of mine is the "buy 1 get 1 free" in fact its just twice the price of buying just one !

45 minutes ago, CharlieH said:

Pet gripe of mine is the "buy 1 get 1 free" in fact its just twice the price of buying just one !

 

Better than "Buy one, get one".

Same issue with Vietnamese listing apartments, as well as restaurants and other businesses, in the Viet Facebook forums.

 

The most basic details, such as what city, price, etc. omitted.

 

Bizarrely when asked for specifics the answer is often "Inbox" - they send the answer in a private message.

 

 

On Lazada and others I guess that some of this has to do with copy and paste and translations.

I.e. a dealer sells 10 different notebooks from one brand. Maybe 70% of the text is the same for all of them. But some have 8GB RAM and another 16GB and different CPUs and things like that. I saw it a couple of times that the headline showed other information then the text below and maybe again other information in a later part of the page. This is also often with different information about warranty.

If sellers would do this carefully then they would make sure that everything is correct and matches. But I wonder how many, mostly Thai, buyers will read it all. I guess very few. And then I wonder how many would complain and if there is a right to complain about things like this. It there? I don't know.

What I do from time to time is that I try to chat with the seller i.e. on Lazada. If I get relative fast competent answers then likely I will buy from that seller. If I don't get answers or incompetent answers then I won't buy from them. Until now I have good experience with this.

But I understand it's annoying if people i.e. want to buy a car and not even the basic information are shown.

Several times I've had a deal set up, arranged for a pick up, shipping, in some cases sent money (they had established shops and I got a refund). Then I got the call back, the item's "not available". What? They went to turn it on, it doesn't work anymore. Something happened to it. It got damaged, it got lost. Haha.

 

They're flippers, scalpers. They never had the item in their possession. They saw it for sale somewhere else, listed it themselves, and added to it their finder's fee. Then when it sells and they go to get it from the original seller, it's gone. Hah. Condo rental agencies work this way too. A load of BS.