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Ebay has been saturated with GENUINE NOKIA FASCIA/COVERS/ACCESSORIES. Prices vary from 99p upwards. So how can you spot the FAKE from the GENUINE article?
Many of you reading this will have already been caught once, and others will be very tempted by the very realistic looking packaging displayed by some sellers. By voting YES to this guide, you can help make eBay a safer place to buy and prevent other people throwing their money away.
Most people who have bought the fakes initially leave positive feedback. This is because most fakes look genuine to the untrained eye. Problems occur once fitted (they don't fit properly and let dirt into your phone) or the colour starts to wear off within 2 weeks of ordinary use. Buttons/keypads can be very stiff & numbers start to wear off or worse still, the button breaks off altogether. Sometimes you can read an inference into the feedback comment, such as "received" or Quick delivery" with no mention of the item. Other buyers are aware that a truthful comment will lead to a negative on their own account for telling the truth. We sell to many people who have left +ve feedback initially to other sellers & then have to buy again after only a few weeks. We have checked their comments left to the previous seller and they have always been positive! It is one of the great deficiencies of ebay that fraudsters can manipulate the feedback system in this way.
LCDs very often have pixels missing, or the screen will fade or not display intermittently. The covers loose their colour quickly and often break during normal use or even during fitting. Additional problems are related to refunds. Many fakes have ridiculously low starting prices but exceptionally high postage costs & are 99% of the time sent out by standard delivery for the price of a 44p stamp!
Typical example 6230i cover=£2.95, postage £2.99
6230i keypad + £2.49, postage (combined) £2.0.
Total cost = £10.43
If you want to return the item because it's faulty or broken-refund = £5.44 Postage kept by seller = £4.99. Still a bargain?
Both of these items (on a real listing, sold as GENUINE) are FAKE. How do I know-20 years of phone experience & the NOKIA supply cost sheet. We pay more than this to buy them from Nokia as a Service Centre. Also, we have bought a cover (under a pseudo name) from EVERY seller who is selling low priced 'Genuine' covers & have inspected them. If you buy from these people you are throwing your money away!
So, HOW can you find the genuine items?
You can get rid of more than 70% of the search results by using the "show items in Europe" option, because GENUINE Nokia DO NOT come from the Far East! Another 50% of those remaining will disappear by adding the word GENUINE to your search criteria.
Unfortunately, there are unscrupulous sellers who will state that their items are GENUINE or ORIGINAL when they know that they are indeed cheap, imported copies that they have themselves bought cheap from the Far East. They will even state in their listings that their items are NOT cheap copies, but sometimes even use the photo from the Far East Ebay seller with the ID removed! Be careful, because I know of at least one seller selling "GENUINE" FAKES who has a very convincing sales pitch-"Beware the low quality fake's and Trust the high quality Original Nokia Covers Only" . This seller is selling covers & keypads for LESS money than you can buy them WHOLESALE from Nokia! Either they are extremely charitable or lying! I grant that the covers look good when they arrive, but I know what they will look like in a few weeks!
This is where common sense prevails. ALL sellers are out to make a profit. If they are selling a cover for 99p or even £2.99 or £4.99, how much have they paid for the item? Don't forget that they have listing fees, VAT, & Final Valuation Fee to cover. How do they manage to undercut the high street shops by SO much?
How? They are paying, on average, 30p for a complete set, front & back. Good old China! The cheapest GENUINE NOKIA KEYPADS cost on average 6X that amount -to the retailer!
POSTAL PRICES & SERVICES-Usually a good indication of the items quality. ALL sellers on ebay that deal with GENUINE items send their items RECORDED POST. This is because the profit margin is so little, and the initial cost of the item higher than the fakes, that the sellers cannot afford to write off losses or breakages. Standard rates or services offered by the sellers selling fakes are normally standard 1st class & cost them around 41p. They still however charge up to 6 times this amount. We have bought from these people and the item arrives with very little or NO protective wrapping and in many cases the item is broken on delivery. They however can afford to replace as the item cost next to nothing originally, and anyway, you have paid for at least 6 more in the excess P&P charges. Sellers who believe that their item is worth it spend money on insurance & protective wrapping.
There are other tricks. The copies are good, but they do not have the same quality as the original NOKIA. This can usually be seen from the photo on the listing. If they don't have a photo, but only the downloaded picture from the Nokia site-don't even waste your time!
Look closely at the photo. If the picture is downloaded from the NOKIA site, why does the seller not display the item he has for sale? If it is a photo, compare it with the picture on the NOKIA website. Can you see the logo or any other marks clearly. Be very careful however. We know of one seller who has 5 very good, close up photos of the genuine cover - BUT this is not the cover that you will be sent!
This is still one of the best ways to recognise a fake. The writing is different (especially noticeable on the rear cover of a 6230i-see our other guide) ALL GENUINE LCD SCREENS have a code on the reverse. Does the seller show this code? Does he show both sides of the LCD on the photograph. Look out for chinese script on the product or labels. Check other photos in other listings. (SEE OUR OTHER GUIDE ON WHICH LCDs FIT WHICH PHONES!) - LCD screens
Does the photo show the WHOLE item, or just part of it. Again, ask yourself why. What is the seller trying to hide. The question you should ask, is not what the seller shows or states, but what he DOESN'T SHOW OR STATE. Why isn't his photo clear?
The price that you pay will give you some idea of how well you should scrutinise your item. We all know the golden rule. If it's too good to be true, then it probably isn't!! It is virtually GUARANTEED that a cover costing less than £5 is FAKE unless it is 2nd hand. That price is less than the list price from NOKIA!
NOKIA covers DO NOT have NOKIA printed on the screen protector. (as seen on the photo below)Nokia covers DO NOT come in plastic bags with MADE IN CHINA written on them. There are a mass of well known CHINA based companies mass producing cheap copies, and the quality is not intended to last. Nokia covers either come IN FULL NOKIA CARD & should be photographed as such or loose from a Service centre. If the seller states 'wrapped/packaged' but doesn't show it, then again it is FAKE - GUARANTEED.
Some colours sold are not available on GENUINE NOKIA products. If it's not on the Nokia site, it's unlikely to be genuine. For example-It is IMPOSSIBLE to buy a GENUINE BLACK 6630 cover not in retail packaging. Sellers offering this item as genuine (and there are a few!) are lying. Remember, copies can be made of virtually anything, including a logo and packaging! A NOKIA logo unfortunately, does not mean it is genuine! Look for the give away clues, such as "suitable for", "very high quality" or "will fit". If the seller is also selling fake brand new covers, that is usually a give away, as Nokia will NOT supply these sellers with their covers as they ONLY supply to Service centres and they have to follow strict rules. You CANNOT buy GENUINE covers from ANYWHERE else, except from a service centre who will necessarily add their own mark up, so selling for around £6 on eBay is IMPOSSIBLE. We would love to name & shame, but unfortunately can't, so please look at the sellers other items carefully.
Nokia have "EXPRESS-ON" & non-express on covers. The non express-on covers, such as 6680 or N70/80 are ONLY SUPPLIED to Nokia service centres as service items, to be fitted by Nokia trained service engineers. They NEVER come in retail packaging, and each part is supplied seperately as spare replacement parts. Any seller who is selling loose NEW, GENUINE non-express-on items will be service centres and as such ON THE NOKIA WEBSITE. Ask them what their service centre is called! Chances are the items are FAKES or second hand (ie removed from old phones) Sellers who advertise these items as "sealed in original packaging" are not selling genuine Nokia products. Express-on covers may come as loose items from a service centre, or in retail packaging. However, retail packaging DOES NOT GUARANTEE the genuine item, it just increases the price for genuine items.
Other sellers sell GRADE A/USED covers. These have been removed from faulty phones. Their condition will vary. Check seller's feedback. If he has less than 100% READ the comments left. Very often a buyer has received negative feedback themselves, just so they can WARN you. Also read WITHDRAWN comments, as negative feedback is often left to blackmail buyers from leaving negative feedback.
You will be able to feel the difference immediately if you have removed a GENUINE cover from your phone.The GENUINE cover is slightly heavier. Scratch the front cover with your finger nail. A GENUINE cover will show no mark, but the fake will probably scratch almost immediately, leaving a white mark. Look through the camera lens-is it a real lens, or just "a cod's eye view". The lenses on fake covers are DIABOLICAL!
Here are some examples of some very clever copies on sale from Hong Kong. These sellers do not sell them as genuine, but others who have bought this product into the UK in vast quantities are selling them as GENUINE. Even the packaging is fake, so don't be fooled. Note the absence of the Nokia logo on the bottom of the 6610i keypad, as compared to the genuine item.
Note the faint blue NOKIA logo printed on the screen protector on the 6230i cover at the end on the bottom row.
The 6680 cover (in the bottom middle) is sold as an EXPRESS-ON item, which is false. Nokia DO NOT supply this item retail packaged, as mentioned before. The packaging is a very, clever copy.
Take a good look at any retail packaging. The Nokia logo is easily copied, but the packet should also show a diagram on the back, the "CONNECTING PEOPLE" logo and the logo's as displayed on their site. Go to nokia.co.uk and familiarize yourself with their products and logos. 99% of NOKIA products on eBay are FAKE!!! If a seller is selling one cover that you can identify as fake, then most probably all the covers/accessories that he is selling are fake.
Cheap copies may not fit your phone properly, and they definitely won't last. They either break, or the colour wears off. Camera lenses are usually just bits of plastic, rather than a lense suitable for say a 1.3 megapixel camera! LCD screens may not display colours well, or the image may not be as sharp as the original. In some cases they may damage your phone, and they will certainly cost you your warranty!
BE WARNED, and use a bit of sense when looking for that BARGAIN! There are a lot of very professional, honest sellers out there with 100% feedback. You just need to know how to find them. A bargain is not a bargain if it doesn't fit, or needs replacing after a couple of weeks! PLEASE READ FEEDBACK COMMENTS. We regularly sell our fascias to the Far East. Why do they pay our prices & international shipping when there are hundreds of products on sale from the Far East itself? Because GENUINE Nokia products come from Europe, not Hong Kong.
We offer a 100% guarantee that we will replace if it chips or loses colour. That's because we know it won't. We are a nokia service centre and are listed on the nokia website. Go to the website-www.nokia.co.uk and click on Nokia Care on the far top right. On the lower right on next page click on service. On next page click on find service near you (lower right) & enter our postcode SP2 7RP.We are on the top. We would not be a service centre if we sold fakes-Nokia watch our ebay site regularly and audit us every 3 months.
Take a look at our other guide about the law protecting you, and comparison of a fake 6230i cover with a GENUINE NOKIA cover- How to spot a fake and what to do about it.- 6230i comparison
YOU CAN HELP!!
You may want to pay less for a COPY item, but the choice should be YOURS!
12/04/07. We thought that we had heard all the excuses, but the latest trend appears to be the following excuse from some unscrupulous sellers- Nokia make 2 grades of covers; one for the new phones and a cheaper version for replacement covers, referred to as OEM. This is NOT true. Nokia make one grade of covers, which are either fitted to new phones or sold for replacement/repair. ALL their covers are of the highest standard & quality. Cheaper versions are NOT MADE OR ENDORSED by NOKIA. If you buy your new cover from a NOKIA RETAIL OUTLET or a NOKIA SERVICE CENTRE the cover will be EXACTLY the same as your original cover. There is no such thing as a GENUINE ORIGINAL COPY.
If you found this guide helpful, please vote. The higher it is in the ranking, the more people it may help. Let's stop the fraudsters making money from someone else's disappointment!
Other guides by Motaphone- FAKE 6230i COVERS-COMPARISON
CHECKING YOUR BUYER OR SELLER FOR FRAUDULENT ACTIVITY
CHOOSING A CO-ORDINATING COLOURED KEYPAD
GOOD LUCK!
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