Lasersman: Avoid like the plague

I will make this short: purchased a "500mw power certified" Firedragon as part of a LPF group buy. What I got was a laser that barely does 450mw and seems to operate in TEM01 (certainly not TEM00). warming up doesn't help. measurements on a calibrated Kenometer Pro. The return policy on their site said: no problem with returns, report within 7 days, full refund including shipping. I have emailed them about 20 times and their replies either ask me to restate what i stated in my emails or are completely irrelevant. i was never able to get a return address and RMA number for them despite asking 3-4 times. LPKath (member here) has been acting as an intermediary and she has been very helpful and responsive but is also not able to get any resolution from Lasersman.

When I packed up the laser to ship back I noticed a 300mW label on the bubble envelope the laser came in. I told Lasersman about it and sent them a picture. they emailed back that they did in fact send me a 500mW unit. I doubt that. Either way its not to spec because of the weird mode its operating in - either its a non-TEM00 temporal mode or there is an optical problem.

I have opened a dispute with my credit card company and will pursue it that way.

Sorry to hear your troubles. Unfortunately, that's not just Lasersman that does this - it's almost all Chinese laser vendors. Lazerer and CNI might be the only exceptions in existence, they're the only 2 that I have heard of on these forums that are reputable. It's because of this reason I will continue to buy all my laser parts from Survival Laser (US based company), or second hand from one of the members on here. You probably stand a lesser chance of getting scammed by a random guy on the internet than by these scum.

xoul said:

Lazerer and CNI might be the only exceptions in existence

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I would take CNI off that list, from what it looks on the forum they have been dicking around with buyers also. This is one example, but there have been many others before who reported nothing but defective units and bad service.

http://laserpointerforums.com/f41/huge-cni-frustrations-69219.html

Hell that example alone, will never make me do bussiness with them.

Sorry to hear about what happened Plexus, but It seemed ever since dino-direct(Or is it DX? they both did) started that alternative site thier service has been going to shit (well, was shit to begin with, but not that bad when I ordered from them)

There are other companies however, that are reputable that I've delt with personally, but I don't feel the need to advertise them unless asked to, thier track record on the forum speaks for itself with a bit of searching.

Here is something contrary to popular opinion: my Wicked Laser's experience was pretty good: I ordered an Arctic at the peak of PR and yes it was late but i eventually got them (2). They were well within spec and still are working great. I ordered some other lasers from them after that and those were good except one that was dead. Again, I got a full refund and they paid for the return shipping. I'd take Wicked Lasers over Lasersman.

I have had good experiences with O-Like and Rayfoss. no delays, decent shipping and handling of issues has been good.

Just some other examples in my experience. So the Lasersman thing is not excusable.

Here is something contrary to popular opinion: my Wicked Laser's experience was pretty good: I ordered an Arctic at the peak of PR and yes it was late but i eventually got them (2). They were well within spec and still are working great. I ordered some other lasers from them after that and those were good except one that was dead. Again, I got a full refund and they paid for the return shipping. I'd take Wicked Lasers over Lasersman.

I have had good experiences with O-Like and Rayfoss. no delays, decent shipping and handling of issues has been good.

Just some other examples in my experience. So the Lasersman thing is not excusable.

ECHO echo--
BTW AixiZ and JETLASERS has very little neg FB and tons of praise for thier items and service.
All new SS lasers need to arrive O'Spec as they almost always drop some after use.
I suspect that it was an O'Spec 300mW...hak's 2 cents

Thanks for the heads up.
I am used to honest dealings over the net and find the Laserman behaviour inexcusable.

Well me too, in fact I have had such problems with them, and they dont care or respect their customers. They are loosing much business I suppose from all the negative feedback. But they would rather be cheap and not spend money to make their clients happy so that they get more positive feedback and more sales. Stupid ! here is my experiance:

http://laserpointerforums.com/f63/l...anyone-else-had-similar-experiance-71855.html

I never get these companies that do this. Before I switched to Psych, I was majoring in BBA and was taught consistently how beneficial (or damaging) word of mouth is. Especially over the Internet when word of mouth spreads like wild fire. Taking care of customers, even at a loss, goes much farther in the long-run than saving a few bucks in the short-run.

These companies will generate much more sales over time if they think long-term and also about the compounding effects of good/bad customer service. But no, they're only interested at the numbers in their bank accounts at the end of the day.

Pathetic.

Ryanrenesis said:

I never get these companies that do this. Before I switched to Psych, I was majoring in BBA and was taught consistently how beneficial (or damaging) word of mouth is. Especially over the Internet when word of mouth spreads like wild fire. Taking care of customers, even at a loss, goes much farther in the long-run than saving a few bucks in the short-run.

These companies will generate much more sales over time if they think long-term and also about the compounding effects of good/bad customer service. But no, they're only interested at the numbers in their bank accounts at the end of the day.

Pathetic.

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Part of the challenge is that these companies have very little identity persistence. If LasersMan shut down tomorrow and started up a new site, or more likely, kept LasersMan running and started up a spinoff, we'd never know. It's very difficulty to pierce that veil.

There are *literally hundreds* of Chinese gadget sites like DX. Man, I could probably just from memory (no cheating) name off twenty.... DX, DinoDirect, KaiDomain, PriceAngels, FocalPrice, Manafont, BestOfferBuy, Tmart, aHappyDeal, UUBuy, LightTake, LightMalls, Everybuying, LightIntheBox, MiniInTheBox, BuyInCoins, BigBigEye, Made-In-China, GadgetTown, LedSuperMall, QualityChinaGoods.... get the point?

Now how many of those sites are related? I don't know. But I'm sure there are tons of connections between them. Sometimes you can actually spot the connections, sometimes you can't. Sometimes one is a drop-shipper for another. Sometimes they're literally the same business with different web-fronts.

The point is, identity is cheap. They can setup a new store front in a day. Less perhaps. In an era where we buy products based on stock photography, and pages are generated from a database dynamically, it's pretty easy to toss a tarnished reputation and start afresh.

Now you could certainly make a case for the fact that having a loyal customer base is better than starting new store fronts every few months, but I think they do both. I think these guys have all sorts of web-properties, some of which offer good customer service, some of which don't. Basically, it's a crap shoot for them. They try to front load as many sales as possible, and rely on the reality that by the time anyone complains, it may be past the 45 day paypal window anyway. Then "bad press" just becomes one more drop in the bucket. If that bucket eventually gets full, they register a new ridiculously stupid name and start selling from another website.

Most of these guys don't store an inventory. You'll realize that if you've ever bought something from one site that was "in stock", only to find out that it really wasn't, and they have to cancel your order. Then that site will mark the item as out of stock, so you go to another site selling the same item, with it listed as "in stock". Same story. Eventually you realize that none of these guys have much of anything in stock, and that one by one, each of the companies you try buying from, contacts their supplier and finds out the item you purchased isn't available anymore.

Customer loyalty is irrelevant to them. If you look back through the history of this board, I'm sure you'll find a lot of reputable members recommending a lot of website that are no longer trustworthy or reliable. It's just the way it goes.

Just if there were sites like DX located outside China and in a strict country with strict laws, with reasonable prices. Then we would never more have to worry.. I'd go with a Swedish company all day over another chinese, but, the thing that stops me is price. $80 for a 5mW 532nm? $150 for a Aurora C6? Woot? And then the shipping costs. Shipping costs WITHIN the country is 10x higher then shipping from China to here..

rhd, you make really good points. +rep

China is competitive because they can produce products dirt cheap. How? They pay their workers shitty pay. So, the CEOs/owners can still have luxurious pay charging products at low prices. Add on the fact that cost of living is low, you have a super-competitive business on the world market.

In the developed world, companies' largest overhead costs are not storefronts or rent. They are salaries (paying the designer, programmer, marketing team, self). Add on the fact that cost of living is high, business owners/executives have to charge their products at a much higher price to enjoy similar, luxurious pay (not even sometimes). You can see this effect very pronounced in Europe, where the countries are essentially welfare states.

The closest competitor to China is the United States. It's still very hard for them though: they have to compete by working harder, being more skilled, and hiring less workers. Each worker usually has 2/3 jobs (designer & programmer for instance).

It's a tough proposition to solve.

plexus said:

Here is something contrary to popular opinion: my Wicked Laser's experience was pretty good: I ordered an Arctic at the peak of PR and yes it was late but i eventually got them (2). They were well within spec and still are working great. I ordered some other lasers from them after that and those were good except one that was dead. Again, I got a full refund and they paid for the return shipping. I'd take Wicked Lasers over Lasersman.

I have had good experiences with O-Like and Rayfoss. no delays, decent shipping and handling of issues has been good.

Just some other examples in my experience. So the Lasersman thing is not excusable.

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You got a 1W arctic?

xoul said:

Sorry to hear your troubles. Unfortunately, that's not just Lasersman that does this - it's almost all Chinese laser vendors. Lazerer and CNI might be the only exceptions in existence, they're the only 2 that I have heard of on these forums that are reputable. It's because of this reason I will continue to buy all my laser parts from Survival Laser (US based company), or second hand from one of the members on here. You probably stand a lesser chance of getting scammed by a random guy on the internet than by these scum.

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WRONG!!

why post if you are so misinformed??

Stick to giving advice about eye safety-- that is a topic you SHOULD be able to give proper advice on!!

hakzaw1 said:

WRONG!!

why post if you are so misinformed??

Stick to giving advice about eye safety-- that is a topic you SHOULD be able to give proper advice on!!

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He has a point. Royfoss is a pretty reputable company IMHO.

hakzaw1 said:

WRONG!!

why post if you are so misinformed??

Stick to giving advice about eye safety-- that is a topic you SHOULD be able to give proper advice on!!

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So far a whopping 2 or 3 good ones have been named out of the hundreds of bogus ones. I stand by my statement that MOST chinese vendors are fraudulent.

Do you work for them or something? Why are you getting so worked up?