Thoughts on buying Parker from Japan (via eBay)

[dekhaus]

Hi All

I'm curious to hear if anyone in/on this site has purchased a guitar from an eBay seller named 'JapanProduct' or other international sellers. I'm interested in hearing about your experiences and whether its safe to consider purchasing a Parker from a seller so far away

Thanks
Dave

[mmmguitar]

I'm interested in hearing about your experiences

I skimmed the past few years' instances of negative feedback for JapanProduct, and they seem to sell guitars on consignment; meaning it's very possible that you'll pay for a guitar they no longer have, then wait for a refund that may end up being less than you paid if conversion rates happen to not favor you that day (I've experienced this firsthand - It comes down to the individual payment processor's policies; as they're the ones applying exchange rates).

Because such hurdles don't violate eBay policy, that store's done a lot of consistent business over the past ten years. The safest thing is to request a photo of the guitar with that day's date written in frame; to prove the seller has it in their possession (or at least on consignment through a cooperative associated store or sibling franchise) before purchase.

I've had positive experiences purchasing used guitars from Japanese retailers, pre and post-2020. To my knowledge, I've never had the experience of purchasing directly from individual owners; because the guitars were listed internationally on retailer consignment. They were all shipped via EMS or DHL, I was promptly notified and invoiced for duties exceeding $800 once the parcel was processed on US soil, and I had the guitar at my home within 24-48 hours of paying the fee.

Here's a post I made somewhat recently, when someone was asking about the duplicate guitar listings between Japanese ebay stores:

The cloned Japanese listings on eBay have been a trend for years. What complicates matters is the common practice in which a single guitar may indeed legitimately be on consignment through a network of franchised storefronts for the sake of increasing visibility (and making the commission earned for the parent company more likely); which is what gives scammers room to keep doing this.

Speaking from experience, the only upside is that the legitimate Japanese eBay storefronts often have a franchise webstore linked off their eBay page whereupon you can both confirm the authenticity of the listing and bypass eBay entirely to purchase the guitar directly from Ishibashi, TCGakki, Ikebe Gakki, etc. for a better price.

[Jack T]

I had a bad experience.
A few years ago (pre-covid), I communicated with the seller of what appears to be very legit website... and confirmed that the Fly was available.
Paid and then just a few hours later I was told that it had been sold. Currency/ transaction loss was in excess of USD100, with no recourse.
Needless to say, I WON'T BE DOING IT EVER AGAIN.

Not a con-job, just unsatisfactory and poor business practice.

[BMA_USA]

Exchange rate bait scam is one I hadn't considered before.

[Mike987]

They are probably proxy sellers. A lot of them will list a guitar that’s for sale locally for example ishibashi music, and list it online for more money. You buy the guitar, then they go buy it for less and ship it to you. It’s a no risk “hustle” they do that I’m not fond of. That’s why a lot of the time they’ll use a lame excuse for why they have to refund you. They’ll go to buy the guitar locally after you click “buy now” only for it to be sold at the local music store. Then they’ll tell you it was “stolen” or “broken” or “damaged” and so on.

I got a guitar for $350 that was listed on eBay for $800. I use Jauce. It’s a website that gives people in other parts of the world a chance to bid on yahoo Japan. Since you need a Japan address to buy on yahoo Japan, Jauce uses their warehouse as the Japan address and charges their not so cheap fee to ship it to you. But they’re legit and if you want something bad enough it’s worth it. Even with the shipping costs, I saved hundreds and had the satisfaction of messaging the proxy seller who lied to me pretending it was his guitar to Show him a picture of the exact same guitar with matching serial number.