I ordered a Ultrafire E17 for a relative which was supposed to have a XM-L emitter. However when I received the light I was disappointed to see it came with tiny crappy XP-E emitter.
I spoke with a service person online and sent all sorts of pictures. I even sent a picture of the light next to another light with a real XM-L emitter to show the size difference.
It took them 4 days to return an email saying that I got the right item. So I spoke with another service person online and told them that I want to return to item for a refund. They refused unless I pay for return shipping.
This is worst customer service I have experienced with shopping online. It was the first and last time I’ll ever shop with TMART. What a bad experience.
To make matters worse, the XP-E emitter/driver combo is the dimmest of all my Cree lights. The worse part is that I can’t even use this as a host because the pill seems glued into the body.
I’ll post pictures later.
Edit: It looks like it’s a Fake Cree emitter as discovered in post #9
It’s possible, but to my eyes it looks like a genuine puke blue-ish mystery bin XP-E emitter. It is so dim that my SK67 with a AA which has a XP-E is about same output.
All Chinese sellers will screw you at one time or another, Tmart is no different than the others. It’s part of buying cheap lights from China. File a Paypal dispute if they don’t remedy this.
That’s not even a cree XP-E, it’s a fake. Real crees don’t have that hole in the corner. The Fake-Cree LED Awareness Thread.
Would you be ok with your picture being cropped and used for the Fake-Cree thread to help others identify fakes?
It was bad enough getting a XP-E emitter instead of a XM-L, but now it’s a fake XP-E? Wow I didn’t realize TMART was that bad. Yes I of course don’t mind if you post my picture in the Fake Cree thread. I think everyone should know.
I have already opened a Paypal dispute (which TMART rejected). I am going to escalate and cross my fingers I get a refund.
All the Chinese mega-stores seem to be worsening regarding fake products of all kinds.
When you shop for best price instead of using a more reputable seller at a higher price you open the risk of getting sardines instead of the caviar you thought you were buying. Either accept the risks as part of the game or use paypal so you have at least some protection. TANSTAAFL- you won’t get what you don’t pay for!
and be sure to refuse a “store credit” refund — they pushed that alternative, when they sent me a light in an unpadded plastic bag that arrived broken. It’s not a good option, you can only apply a store credit toward ten percent of a new purchase so they’d rope you into spending more money…
Not sure why - everything I have ever received that was “significantly different” from what was described has either always been refunded in full or the buyer has paid to have the “bad” item returned to them. This has happened to me 4 or 5 times in the last few years.
^ It seems PP has changed the way it rules. My last two were ruled that I have to return on my dime to get a refund. The first was Acebeam were I offered to settle for a $15 refund on a large light that had mismatched colors. The second was also a situation where I offered to settle for a partial refund even though it had 12 fake emitters. Except for certain components and a couple small GB's, I have pretty much stopped buying from over seas.
Does yours look like that?
