calltimtim Seller Of Fake USB Pendrives On eBay Returns – eBay Drops The Ball Again!
Posted by KittyFireFlash on February 11, 2009
eBay and false capacity usb flash drives. It never ends. Money blinds them. Profit at the expense of members rules. Sellers of fake flash rule eBay. Why? eBay desperately needs the crumbs of fake flash profit. These sellers are happy to give eBay a little share for protection. Meanwhile eBay members suffer the consequences. No matter how hard members try to alert eBay to the problem – eBay ignores. The dance of the fake flash profits is just too alluring.
calltimtim investigated by SOSFakeFlash, sold fake (false capacity) 32GB usb flash pendrives on eBay. An alert was issued on the internet on October 30th, 2008. See Alert – calltimtim – Ebay Fake Flash Seller
Like most sellers of these dangerous flash drives (data loss once you exceed the real capacity) this seller was forced into deregistering for a short period of time. eBayers discovered the awful truth and began pounding on doors of eBay and Paypal. After a little insincere spanking from eBay, two months later at the end of December 2008 calltimtim tip toed back.
On February 6th, 2009 calltimtim began to list 16GB usb flash drives. This time with a little twist, stating there are
Capacity : 16GB (Made out of 2 x 8GB Nand Flash enables users to store more than ever)
The FrankenFlash Project is not inclined to believe calltimtim. Why?
The auction for one drive is listed as:
and if you scroll down the listing you will see the drive in more detail.
It would appear that in calltimtim’s rush to feed his fake flash profit addition he is slipping. This drive does not have the typical “sticker” but is stamped clearly 8GB. We doubt there is a photo mix up here. It is more likely this seller will sing the “opphsy a defective one” if caught by an eBay buyer. Or try techno babble on a buyer who is not super tech savvy.
Have a look at the other two models offered – note that one of them is them is the twin of the 32GB fakes he offered in the past. Also we have information on testing and reporting to us.
Here are the other models currently being offered:
This drive is easy to open. You can quickly see if there are really two flash drive chips and one controller chip inside. What did you find? We would be very interested to know.
Do we believe that calltimtim is now selling true 16GB usb flash drives? No. Are we being hard and unfair? No. Even if this seller is willing to sell 16GB drives for an average price of $20US with free shipping – who sells to lose money? Should the drives be good, the fact is, what about all the other eBay members who bought his 32GB fakes? Did calltimtim contact them and offer them refunds? All of them? And apologize? You can guess what the answers are.
What is beyond anyone’s understanding is how eBay can permit a seller who sold such items, to remain on eBay? Is there anyone who actually works at eBay? Are there more then five employees behind the operation? Or is eBay as addicted to the money these sellers generate in fees? eBay is making about .70 US for each of these items sold. We don’t know what Paypal makes on each one. But is .70 cents the going price for data loss?
If you bought a drive from calltimtim please test it immediately. See H2testw 1.4 – Gold Standard In Detecting USB Counterfeit Drives If you have a fake please report it to sosfake flash immediately. See Report A Fake
If you really found you have a 16GB flash drive after testing with H2testw we want to hear from you.
To see calltimtim’s negative feedback Please Click Here
To contact us:
SOSFakeFlash 
Chris Bohdal said
I also bought 2 16Gb usb flash drives from calltimtim. Only got about 2 Gb of data on each.
Have lodged complaint on Resolution Centre of paypal.
Seller replied that he was sorry and in the next reply he offered partial refund and me keeping the sticks which I refused.
Don’t know yet how it’s going to pan out.
kittyfireflash said
Hi Chris
Calltimtim is a seller that has been on the watch list for a long time. Another difficult one to corner. The first documented fake was back in July 2008.
In the last round of fake flash selling there are about 500 victims out there. The only thing he is sorry about is that he finally got caught.
eBay is showing signs of improvement for usb flash drive – MP Players not so (more difficult too). They are monitoring the site and paying attention to the alerts and list we have. We had to reissue another alert and present the evidence on Calltimtim.
The partial refund offer is pretty much what sellers will try to do.
The only way to catch the seller, everyone, is to test your drives and if they don’t deliver the advertised capacity report in at the report a fake tab.
By the way, if you test and you get good results – a true capacity drive – we want to hear from you too. We need to find more of the good guys not just the bad ones. They do exist, it’s finding them that is so difficult.
Alexander said
Calltimitim is not more registered on ebay. I’ve bought an 16gb SDHC Card, and now I really don’t know, is it shipped or not. Item description is no more available. I’ll wait one more week and then will try to resolve problem through PayPal. Be care.
KittyFireFlash said
To Alexander
Yes we know calltimtim is gone. Make sure you are in 45 day window from buying. Do not wait to last moment. For a deregistered seller, give about 25 days from buying for item to arrive maximum! Go to paypal and make a claim “item not received”.
Actually people who do not receive items from a fake flash seller, especially a deregistered seller are much better off. All they have to do is make the “item not received” claim and that one gets refunded quickly as a rule… so so much easier.
Let us know the results Alexander…
Jester said
i’m currently battling PAYPAL’S army of drones about a fake 16GB drive i bought (2GB real memory). anyone knows how to get a hold of a human being, with basic reasoning power, over there?
“we are paypal…we are not reading your communications…send the item back…resistance is futile…”
ridiculous! talk about buyer protection..it’s more about Paypal’s profits protection.
Simon said
I recently bought a 16g USB from an ebay store and have had some troubles with it. i think it may actually only be 2g but how can i tell?
it appears that I can put 16gig on it but only some of the data works afterwards.
is there an easy way to test/check?
kittyfireflash said
To Simon
See https://sosfakeflash.wordpress.com/2008/09/02/h2testw-14-gold-standard-in-detecting-usb-counterfeit-drives/ for information on testing and where you can go to get the testing software.
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