Dealing with Mateminco 5 percent discount 6 days from China to my house

Mateminco offers 5 percent discount on sale of 40 dollars or more with code of BLFMEMBER. Hi. I would like to talk about Mateminco’s customer service. Mateminco customer service is ran by a man named Ben Tang. I have had the pleasure of dealing with Ben several times. I have only been on the flashlight scene since the end of November. Also, I didn’t have much experience in ordering online. The first time I dealt with Ben, I was ordering couple of things that were not on the website and I was having a hard time understanding what I needed to do. Ben, even though I am sure he wanted to reach through the phone and strangle me, took the time until I understood. He walked me through the process and I received my order in 14 days.Then, I fried my Mateminco mt18s. Ben made sure I ordered the correct parts, which once again were not on the website. Also, he got me a great deal on a Mateminco mt70 plus head that I can use on an extension tube, that I purchased earlier, once I receive replacement disc for my mt18s. Mateminco is much easier to communicate with than Astrolux. Except for some minor differences, the Mateminco and Astrolux are the same light, manufactured by same company. Communicating with Astrolux is almost impossible and when you do get lucky to get a response they can’t answer your questions. Ben Tang doesn’t have that issue. Ben is great and REALLY know his stuff.I
have learned to trust everything he says. Every question I asked, he answered and I asked MANY. Ben even knew the answer to questions I didn’t know I needed to ask. So I want to thank Ben Tang and Mateminco for the great service and great products. Jim I won’t purchase Astrolux because there Customer service is terrible. I have tried several times to ask questions that they can’t answer. For example I had a question about the mf01s. The service department kept telling me they needed part number but there was no part number. So they sent me an example of a light with part number. The example they sent was right under the actual light I had questions about. But they kept saying that they couldn’t find the light I had question about. And even the light they sent as example had no part number on the page I was on. So why would I buy from Astrolux when there Customer service is so bad

IIRC, Mateminco is also (unofficially) represented by a BLF member here. I am not not sure if that member is still active, though.

Good to see some feedback about Mateminco‘s customer service. If I am not mistaken Astrolux is not a separate branch with their own customer service but more likely a brand of Banggood. So, if some Astrolux product goes south, Banggood is probably the one to reach out to.

Jim, since you have a close relationship to Ben Tang, maybe you can motivate him to officially join the BLF community (unless he‘s already here unofficially). ;-)

I’ll ask him.

Earmarked.

Would have liked to have an exchange with a Mateminco rep after my deceitful purchase of the FT03S. Exchanges with BG regarding the crazy yoyo effect of thermal throttling went nowhere; and as the driver had another faulty issue and was to be replaced, I thought they could make good in tweaking ToyKeeper’s PID algorithm. I threw in the towel after some 3 months of haggling.

If I would have known how to reach out to Mateminco…

LOL, I was coming in there for some Karen’esk diatribe and got nothing but milk and honey.

Haven’t you noticed all my comparative threads only feature Mateminco and no Astrolux lights?

Ben of Mateminco single-handly manages all Mateminco’s sales and complaints/parts affairs superbly.

Official Mateminco Aliexpress store:

Mateminco

So if Astrolux is the same exact brand , why dont they support that as well? BG really does not support anything. They just offer you $10 to keep a broken light. Very generous but that wont fix your broken light.

Most Astrolux lights are subcontracted to Mateminco, and is Banggood’s brand. Astrolux’ aftersale activity is naturally BG’s concern directly.

There is no aftersale activity on BG. They offer you $10 to go away.

One reason I like the Mateminco over the Astrolux is design:

My Mateminco SO3 (Astrolux S43S) has a “scalloped” tube, while the Astrolux version has only the plain straight tube version: (S43S photo courtesy of maukka’s review)

Do all the Mateminco’s have design differences with the equivalent Astroluxes?

If you have a problem with a Mateminco produced Astrolux, will Mateminco stand behind it?

So far they have taken care of.
my issues. And Ben in customer service has responded quickly
When I needed to communicate with him. And he really knows the Mateminco products.

@tatasal:

So BG takes care of their product line and Mateminco theirs. Fair enough.

Still would like to reach out to the engineer/technician to correct the throttling issue with the FT03S. Would Mateminco have a replacement driver? Did they acknowledge the issue?

I suppose I should take it up with Ben at CS.

I would if I had a issue. Guess It doesn’t hurt to ask

$10 off your next order.

Do they offer discounts to BLF members through their AliExpress store?

Not sure

I not 100 persent sure but I think I read somewhere that both Mateminco and Astrolux are manufactured by Manker. But like I said I am not sure about that. And as far as I know Astrolux is manufactured for Banggood and Mateminco is manufactured for Amazon and Aliexpress. Also.I added an example of Astrolux customer on my original post, I added it to the end of original post.

Astrolux is BG’s brand, and has used Manker, Mateminco, and Sofirn as suppliers.

They manufacture the products for sale by BG, but that’s the extent of it. BG is responsible for the sales and service (or not, as the case may be), not the supplier.

In instances where there are shared, interchangeable parts between the models sold by different brands, the manufacturer can be sought as a source, and provide unofficial support if they are willing, such as Mateminco in this case. But they’re really under no obligation to do so, and may be contractually forbidden in some arrangements.

To draw another example — most automotive batteries are made by one of three large manufacturers.

One of those, East Penn, sells them under their own brand name, Deka, as well as supplying them to other parts brands, including Duracell, Walmart, and NAPA.

Those latter three brands are serviced and warrantied by their retailers, not the original supplier, East Penn. Their responsibility extends only to the brand they sell, Deka.

The same also applies to the other manufacturers, Clarios and Exide, as well as myriad other products where a limited supplier chain provides products for multitudes of brands.