AliExpress ! UPDATE

[Jezrant]

I've never bought from Aliexpress but most of my online purchase trouble is from Amazon. Currently I'm waiting on an aluminum front rack -- last whereabouts update was on the 3rd of December still in China.

With about 3 times as many of my purchases from eBay I have next to zero problems with them.

Have you ever bought any vintage or supposed NOS rare bike parts on eBay? Ho, ho, ho, Merry Christmas to all yer. bargin hunters.

[simonineaston]

The sea change towards doing business with individuals remote from the buyer, prompted by the ultralong tendrils of the internet, has been astonishing. In many ways, it defies common sense. The inability to look the other party in the eye, shake their hand, get their measure etc. is an invitation to be taken advantage of, that advantage being the distance! The protection offered in time-honoured fashion, of legal redress is of course neatly sidestepped by virtue of that distance and international boundaries. What on earth do folks expect, other than a sharp rise in risk?!

[rareposter]

The inability to look the other party in the eye, shake their hand, get their measure etc. is an invitation to be taken advantage of, that advantage being the distance!

You could equally argue exactly the opposite; buying online removes the personal conman element, the in-your-face pushy sales person. There's just as many downsides to buying in person not least the fact that you could turn up to a meeting to sell (eg) a bike and be jumped by 3 blokes in hoodies.

[irc]

The sea change towards doing business with individuals remote from the buyer, prompted by the ultralong tendrils of the internet, has been astonishing. In many ways, it defies common sense. The inability to look the other party in the eye, shake their hand, get their measure etc. is an invitation to be taken advantage of, that advantage being the distance! The protection offered in time-honoured fashion, of legal redress is of course neatly sidestepped by virtue of that distance and international boundaries. What on earth do folks expect, other than a sharp rise in risk?!

Which is what Paypal is for. If the buyer doesn't supply the goods Paypal refund you. Any seller who regularly doesn't supply the goods will (I imagine) get their Paypal privileges suspended). Similar with Ebay.

That said, I buy loads of stuff online, mainly Amazon and Ebay. A bit of Aliexpress. I have never had any issues. The ony thing I can recall offhand was an item I ordered from the website of a bikehop. Failed to appear. Paypal refunded.

Of course I tend, apart from Amazon and Ebay, to use the same few trusted sites. Spa, SJS etc.

As for buying things off individuals on this or another forum I use I only buy from regular forum users not anyone who just pops up to sell stuff. So far, so good. Most people are OK. You just need to avoid the minority who aren't.

If I see something on an unfamiliar website I try to check it out before buying as well. Recent examople bargain tyres on Banana Industries. Prices too god to be true. A bit of research found that it was the guy who used to run Planet X. Good enough. Ordered!

[rareposter]

Which is what Paypal is for. If the buyer doesn't supply the goods Paypal refund you. Any seller who regularly doesn't supply the goods will (I imagine) get their Paypal privileges suspended). Similar with Ebay.

Very much this ^^.

In many respects, paying online using a trusted payment platform is a lot safer than turning up in person, shaking the hand of a supposed "good bloke" and handing over a wodge of cash only to discover a day later than the car you've just bought is an absolute shed on wheels or the painting is a fake or the bike has crash damage....

Useful stuff too about checking out the reviews - same way as you'd look at a seller's rating on ebay.
Someone on here once asked a question about some cycling trousers and eventually, after a bit of back and forth about whether links were allowed, he posted a link to the item and the website name was so weird that I started googling it rather than click on the link. Before I was even half way through typing, google was auto-filling suggesting the search: "is [website name] fraudulent?"
Sure enough, it came back with a host of 1* reviews all from people who'd been scammed.

Quite how the user in question had ended up there is a mystery but he deleted the thread once I pointed it out.

[rareposter]

Video here from a guy on YouTube called Trace Velo, he does a lot of bike content, knows his stuff and has sort of created this niche of building bikes based almost entirely on parts from AliExpress. Anyway he goes through what to look out for, the pros and cons of using the site:

https://youtu.be/_bdB2qt0Tp8?si=7UxizXsHITi6GpD6

Can see the rest of his work here, he does call out AliExpress for counterfeit or poor quality parts as well
www.youtube.com/@TraceVelo

[Caver_Paul]

Which is what Paypal is for. If the buyer doesn't supply the goods Paypal refund you. Any seller who regularly doesn't supply the goods will (I imagine) get their Paypal privileges suspended). Similar with Ebay.

Very much this ^^.

In many respects, paying online using a trusted payment platform is a lot safer than turning up in person, shaking the hand of a supposed "good bloke" and handing over a wodge of cash only to discover a day later than the car you've just bought is an absolute shed on wheels or the painting is a fake or the bike has crash damage....

Yes indeed about buying online from eBay and paying with Paypal. I bid for a bike on eBay and won and paid using Paypal (£1,000 +). Then I had no contact from the seller nor any delivery. I waited a couple of days in case they were slow on dispatching the bike and then informed eBay. A day later the amount I paid was paid back into my bank account via Paypal and kept informed of the progress on the repayment.

[Cowsham]

I've never bought from Aliexpress but most of my online purchase trouble is from Amazon. Currently I'm waiting on an aluminum front rack -- last whereabouts update was on the 3rd of December still in China.

With about 3 times as many of my purchases from eBay I have next to zero problems with them.

Have you ever bought any vintage or supposed NOS rare bike parts on eBay? Ho, ho, ho, Merry Christmas to all yer. bargin hunters.

Actually yes -- but not bike as in bicycle but bike as in NOS rare ( very rare ) vintage motorcycle parts and turned up some fabulous deals. Like the NOS seat for my 1975 Yamaha DT250B ( from Arizona USA) -- fabric cover completely deteriorated inside it's original wrapping but the seat pan was perfect which is rare as hens teeth. Footrest brackets still in their plastic with Japanese symbols and English part numbers on but the best thing was the airbox essential not just for the purpose of housing the air filter but essential because it has the fixings for the side covers without which the bike wouldn't look right or finished. That's just one bike which is very rare I have others for which eBay has been a mine of parts.

[Bmblbzzz]

There’s no such thing as a free lunch, folks…

Or to quote John Ruskin: “There is hardly anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little cheaper, and those people who consider price alone are this man's lawful prey, as it is as unwise to pay too little as it is to pay too much."

I wonder if you are the first person to quote Ruskin on this forum? Even if you're not, it's a good thing to do.

[hondated]

Just read further contributions to this thread and agree with most of what has been written With regard to criticism for spending so much money on an unproven seller I think that's a fair point and take it on the chin. If I don't get a refund I may have to build yet another bike.
Love the John Ruskin quote and of cause he is right. I follow Luke Trace Velo and given his experiences I felt more convenient in buying from AE. I am a big boy now & old so that's not any criticism on Luke.
Once I get a response from the seller either negative or positive I will let you know but until then Happy Christmas to you all.

[Manc33]

The first thing I do on AliExpress is click the "Orders" button so I see listings based on most orders first. This doesn't always help, but if they have sold 10,000+ of an item, you know it's not going to disappoint but even then, it can. You know if you're getting a smart watch for £10 it's not really going to be a smart watch, even though everyone is buying it due to is being so cheap.

The second thing is the rating it has. Anything under 4 stars out of 5, I don't buy. Those sellers with 10,000+ sold and the stars on 4.7+ are basically guaranteed to have a decent product, or at least, a product that is clearly worth the money.

I've bought a lot of stuff from there and only ever had 2 problems... it was this whisk thing you push down to make the whisk turn. I ordered one, it never turned up and when I looked months later, the seller page was a 404 and they had scarpered. So I ordered another of the same style whisk from another seller and the same thing happened. The whisk never arrived and the page became a 404. These whisks only cost about £2 each but it was just bizarre to me that these were the only items this ever happened with. I still think to this day, when they got imported, customs thought it was some sort of throwing star or weapon and confiscated it. The fact that the sellers scarpered (the web page became a 404) tells me perhaps they never had anything to sell and were scamming.

The most worrying thing I ever bought from there was a £200+ eBike battery and a £350+ eBike rear wheel hub motor kit, but that got here just fine and I am still using it 3 years later!

The most important thing to me is to check the amount of sales it's had, check the rating... then try to ascertain if they are legit by looking at how long they have been trading on AliExpress. So many call themselves the official store of a certain brand and they just aren't. When they have setup in 2023 or 2024 it's a bad sign, but not always, it depends how much money you're risking.

[st599_uk]

There is some great kit on AliExpress, there's also some utter s***.

I normally watch video reviews and follow the links from them.

I've got some great kit like StVZO style lights from Ravemen, TPU inner tubes and a device for refitting super tight tyres from RideWow and a tiny battery powered air pump that will inflate tyres accurately to any pressure up to 120psi.

Not sure I'd buy anything safety critical without a lot more research though.

[Brucey]

There’s no such thing as a free lunch, folks…

Or to quote John Ruskin: “There is hardly anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little cheaper, and those people who consider price alone are this man's lawful prey, as it is as unwise to pay too little as it is to pay too much."

I wonder if you are the first person to quote Ruskin on this forum? Even if you're not, it's a good thing to do.

I have also attributed something very similar to John Ruskin, only to later be informed that it may in fact be a misquote, albeit a popular one. Regardless of whether it comes from the pantheon of things that John Ruskin actually said or the sightly lesser one of things people wished he'd said, I more or less agree with the sentiment expressed.

[SimonCelsa]

I've never actually had a good look at the stuff on Ali Express, but as a quick experiment I searched for a pair of Dia Compe hubs for a fixed gear build I have been contemplating for the past couple of years:


Ali Express £86.89 + £17.38 (tax estimate) with free shipping = £104.27

SJS Cycles £128.48 inclusive shipping

Which would you choose?

I'd go for the SJS cycles offering, but reckon the Ali Express hubs are genuine. Why choose SJS when they are £25 more expensive.....? Probably as the AliExpress 'tax' is an estimate and basically a bit of mistrust of anything from China which, personally, is pretty unfounded really.

If the Ali express hubs were much cheaper then you would start to suspect they were probably fake, so it must be quite a headache for their sellers to set a competitive pricepoint.

[Brucey]

I suspect that if there is the slightest chance that the hubs will have to go back, you might be better off going with SJS, warts n'all.