Don't buy Manker -- they don't support their products

I was told that I would receive a E01 replacement from them (Manker) and then I never had contact with them ever again. After a few months of no responses to my emails I assumed that they went out of business or something.

as well as Imalent and several others! The list goes on and on. I've come to the point to just enjoy my lights and hope I don't get any duds.

Manker is already on my crappy-manufacturer list.
I purchased a Manker U23 from HKEquipment. It didn’t work out of the box. It just kind of flickers dimly, unless I use a battery that is below about 3.8V, then it works normally. Pretty sure it was used because the inside of the battery tube was dirty and the sticker showing the battery direction was missing, but I could see the outline inside the tube where the sticker used to be. Both HKEquipment and Manker were useless. Manker said it was HKEquipment’s problem and HKEquipment wanted me to pay shipping all the way to China, even though the light supposedly shipped form their US warehouse (which took over 3 weeks).

You were lucky, I had a Nitecore that failed after about 5 months and couldn’t even get a reply from Nitecore.

This kind of situation strikes me as one where it is probably worth disputing the charges if this was bought with a credit card.

I get that buying low cost brands direct from China means normal levels of customer support aren’t there, so paying for international return shipping is common, but them sending back a defective flashlight and then trying to get the customer to pay for shipping again is going too far in my book.

I hope they sharpen up. Manker produces some interesting designs from time to time.

Bought an MK34 from Goinggear . Had one led out . They sent me shipping label to return to them and sent me a new one within a week . US supplier is usually much better .

I probably shouldn’t mention this, but last year or so, someone I work with had an issue with item X that he bought from a 3rd-party vendor. It went teats-up after a few months of light use. No reply or anything from the manufacturer nor vendor. He sees the same item advertised on Amazon. Orders it, gets it, claims it’s DOA, returns the TU one and keeps the good one.

Even if the price is twice what you paid for it, you’d be getting it back anyway, so…

I have no idea if they were both the same version or different. Amazon probably doesn’t even look too closely anyway, though. Flashlights, I don’t think anyone would check if it’s NW vs CW, etc., but something like a leafblower, yeah, model 609 vs model 710 would kinda stand out.

I’ve had to do that before, but made sure it was sold by the manufacturer (Razor scooters in my case), and not an innocent re-seller to get stuck with a dud.

Ethical questions aside, Amazon is not afraid to ban accounts for having too many returns. Other retailers have taken up similar policies as well to curb abuse. Best Buy gained some notoriety from it.

The standards used to determine what constitutes abuse are state secrets, but seemingly reasonable consumers with justifiable cases have been caught in the net.

It’s important to remember that return privileges are generally just that, and not compulsory. Store A takes returns because Store B does, and they are in competition.

i have found though, that aliexpress is almost always on the buyer’s side
if something is wrong, they usually give you a refund and you do not have to send it back to the original vendor
it is also not up to the vendor, ali takes it back from them somehow, after they give you the refund

and since i only order free-shipping things, i don;t lose that part
\
it does help to send them pictures or videos

but if the problem is not photographable (or it never arrived) they understand that too

99% of what i order from them arrives.
10% of it is junk , but that is because i was trying something really cheap, i don;t ‘return’ things unless they are just defective

anyway, i don;t do banggood and fasttech and all those guys any more

wle

What if you’d take a marker, black out “Manker”, write “UTorch” with white-out or something, and see if they’d fix it?

I haven’t had any issues with my Manker lights except one that was received defective upon arrival. They took it back and gave me my money back without any issues.

I do regularly buy from China, and I would always prepare a nicely worded response pointing out how dumb paying postage to return defective product was. Since the postage of both buyers and sellers combined would usually added up to the same amount of the product’s value.

Can i get a copy of that in case I have to go through this again? Maybe it’ll work next time

button at skilhunt s2 pro chipped off. sent it to China, they soldered it, and resent to me. good and quick responce

head at one Fenix burned (non warranty situation - car charger blew up). nevertheless, i sent them pic and they sent replace one.

haikelight sc26 led died out of sudden. it`s been like 3 months i try to get replace from official store. they "yes, i will send it" time after time. and haikelight rep here at BLF doesnt reply at all

Not the exact wording but here’s the conversation that is edited to fit the context.

Then the Chinese dude was like screw it, I better send you the whole thing without bothering with the returns.

As always, your mileage may vary.

Exactly. I had an absolute headache with Lumintop, so much so that it became comedic. Nitecore on the other hand - better than some customer service I’ve had from some native UK companies.

My e11 has been going strong for 2 1/2 years. I have noticed, that too much Vaseline on the threads will cause it to not turn on. The damn thing came with ZERO grease on the threads in the first place. When I first unscrewed it, it sounded like there was sand in the threads (all three sections). NOT cool. So I cleaned and then applied. THEN, I started having the switching on problem. Removed some, and was back to normal. Course, using silicone/dialectric grease would solve this.

if you can order from aliexpress, they have a pretty good refund return policy
usually you just take a picture of something related to the problem
file their report
and ali refunds your money==usually no actual return necessary
they deal with the vendor

wle

Every time an Aliexpress vendor sent me the wrong merchandise, in order to get a refund, Aliexpress required me to return the item at my expense using a shipping method with a tracking number. Return shipping often cost nearly as much, or more, than the purchase price. Plus, when sent by First Class or Priority Mail, USPS tracking numbers don’t work inside China so good luck proving the package was delivered to the merchant. When an Aliexpress vendor sent me a very different (and lower quality) type of coat than what they advertised, the cheapest return shipping method I could find with a tracking number cost over $55.