FF:NZ LOTR collectors - heads up....

Paid direct cash deposit I believe.

Here's his listings, I assume;

Scimitar
Hadhafang

Nowhere on the page does it say licenced WETA Sideshow Movie collectible or the like. And if those photos are true representations of what you bought, well you may have just learned a hard lesson.

The pictures I posted up on this page are the ones that were supplied with the auction.

That scimintar link JP - is my auction. That Hadhafang is a NEW auction, currently still going.

I took one of the rings in to a store and there is no way that it is 9ct gold - false advertising there. He stated they were NOT cheap india imports and that the swords were the real thing. They are not. I have done a search on the net for ligitimate official swords and the paintings and handles are different. (though these copies are fairly similar - but the scruffiness is what I was shocked at on the ones I recieved).

The backing plaques for the swords I recieved, have no engravings like the official ones also.

No where did he state they were "Official replica's" but I - and I'm sure other bidders were/are under the impression they were. If he is any sort of descent guy he should refund me as I'm not happy.

My friend who works for pascoes who I took the ring to today asked if I wanted to get New Line involved - as the rings I recieved are fake - and he personally (my and Chans' friend) has busted "gypsy" sellers of these fake rings before. I said I'd wait till I hear from the seller - if he is not accomodating I'll try take him to the cleaners.

I'm still pissed, and I havn't heard from him yet - but I think I have some options... I hope.

> My friend who works for pascoes who I took the ring to today asked if I wanted to get New Line involved - as the rings I recieved are fake - and he personally (my and Chans' friend) has busted "gypsy" sellers of these fake rings before. I said I'd wait till I hear from the seller - if he is not accomodating I'll try take him to the cleaners.

I think it'd be worth getting New Line involved ... they could certainly stop him from selling knock-off junk. But I'd get my money back first in case he gets nasty.

Actually, one look at this guy's auction would put me buying from him ... the spelling is so dodgy ... he's obviously not a "professional" and is probably making these things in his garage.

The pictures I posted up on this page are the ones that were supplied with the auction.

Yes, what I want to know is if the photos accurately represent what you received.

I took one of the rings in to a store and there is no way that it is 9ct gold - false advertising there.

Good. That's one thing you have on him.

He stated... that the swords were the real thing.

And can you link to the pages of the auctions you won please? I'd like to read his exact wording on that.

Uruk-Hai Scimintar

Hadhafang Arwen's Sword


Please note the questions and answers at the bottom of the pages.

edit 2 = note the pictures. They uruk sword includes the back plaque with hand of saruman design. No such plaque was recieved. Also with arwens sword - that pic shows the stand with gold engravngs / elvish. The stands with my swords:

1/ are made from MDF wood and painted.

2/ have no engravings

3/ have a big crack in the one for sting

4/ the uruk sword doesnt even fit in the grooves for the blade


oh, and Cen and I are sure the rings pictured are not the same as those recieved. The one's i got look like copper pipe hack-sawed and diped in gold paint.

Very rough and shoddy. The edge's not rounded like the one pictured - it's very FLAT CUT.

Well, looks like you have a good case. Also a quick web search for variations of "Fantasy Swords Sarasota Florida" came up blank.

oh, true. Never thought about searching for that store.

it's interesting looking at the Q&A ... there are a _lot_ of questions as to whether or not the swords are oficially liscenced, and the seller never actually responds to those requests ... dodgy dodgy dodgy.

He does imply the rings are official.

this line in the auction seems particularly sus to me:

Trademe rules forbids using copy pitures so I have tried to copy the actual item or parts of with the scanner

there are definitely pics in the auction 'montage' that are not representative of the actual product. this I believe is false advertising, definitely not condoned by trademe (even he admits that!!)

I also noticed there are unanswered questions on his current auctions. hes not giving any more info than he wants to it seems....

Well, luckily SFL recalled the guy had a URL in amongst the sword packaging.

http://www.swordsmen.co.nz

Now, from the look of the site this kid looks to be making the sword sales a legit business. He's not some guy who puts one auction on to rip someone off and does a runner.

I think he's a kid because of the atrocious spelling on his site (and his auctions) plus when I did a registration trace on swordsmen.co.nz and found his name, landline number, and a few other details (his site only has a mobile number and a PO Box), and then did a white pages lookup of that name (which matched the phone number in the regstration lookup) to discover his residential address, it seems the first name initial differs from the website owner's. Meaning it's most likely the residential phone listing is under a parent's name.

Now, on his site there are a lot of what appear to be genuinely happy trademe customers (with links to their trademe profiles), so I'm confident this guy will see you right as one rare guy that's not satisfied with the merchandise.

But what I find interesting is the images he uses on his LOTR sword page imply the genuine article.

Especially this image;

[image=http://www.swordsmen.co.nz/LOTR-HADHAFANG.jpg]

That says it's a 2 Towers release and (like the others) uses a film still / promo shot to help sell the item.

Just make sure when you talk to this guy (and give him a few days to reply before you call him up), that you remain calm and polite at all times. Don't make threats about dobbing him in to Weta or coming around to his house with a big stick (remember, this guy is well armed ). Only if he refuses to refund you do you need to drop hints about knowing his address and having contacts at Weta you'll be forwarding his site details to (remember to save all his LOTR pages first incase he deletes them from his site).

JP, I owe you a night out - drinks on me. I really appreciate the time and effort you are putting in to help me. The fact that you have found out certain information that I wouldn't know where to being to try and find is amazing. I really do thank you. I also thank the positive backing you other guys are giving me. I'm pretty stressed about this, and the straws I can clutch at trying to get my money back are all I have, although the straws seem to be getting bigger with his details you've discovered JP.

Spoke with mum tonight and she said I should sent an e-mail tonight, but be more firm - I think I'll take your advice JP and hold off another few days.

//checking e-mail now//

Bah, one from JP and one from mum.

ok, well, if he doesn't reply in the next 24 hours, i'll re: e-mail him. And if no reply to that within 48hours I'll ring him I guess.

Well, on a brighter note, I asked my mum to try and find an Eowyn LOTR ROTK Figure. She e-mailed every store in NZ and one in New Plymouth had one left. They're posting it to mum's store for me now.

This from mum's e-mail:

Do you love me or what!!!! Yesterday I put out an all point bulletin to
all warehouse stores in the country. So far no one has Prologue
Bilbo BUT Bell Block in New Plymouth has Eowyn so they are
sending it up to Westgate. Should arrive early next week. Seems
this one is as scarce as hen's teeth but that's not to say the the
next shipment isn't going to be mostly Eowyn & Bilbo with no
Gollum/Smeagol or Treebeard. n the meantime you have secured
Eowyn anyway.

Well SFL, I hope you get your money back.

Mind you this is a great warning for the rest of you. Use safetrader for large purchases and don't trade with people who don't support it!

Yes, Graal is right and he did laugh at me before this purcahse went though.

//learning curve I guess//

I was really laughing more at the thought of you and chansplace slugging it out in the back yard

Dont you wish you had asked if he would use safetrader and spent the $16 odd dollars in fees if he did.

Also the trader that was ripping off people on fair go made false accounts to give himself feed back maybe thats how he got it.

Also on fair go they got the guys pic of the dating site trademe runs you should try that to.

I only got ripped on trademe once with some fake cards but i on sold them to some stupid kids and got miore than my money back

> I only got ripped on trademe once with some fake cards but i on sold them to some stupid kids and got miore than my money back

hmmmm ... ever heard the adage "do unto others as you would have them do unto you?"

It was a face to face deal at the comic shop and the kids even inspected the cards if they couldnt tell they were fake tough *******

Thats The Way Ace!!!!

Obviously it's a character and personality thing, because I *do* have the choice of trying to sell these swords and rings on. But I, as a LOTR Fan and, I'd like to think desent person, don't think I could sell them to someone who believes they are official replica's (like I did).

Yeah well A couple of bucks for some cards is ok , a couple of hundered for a sword is a bit different.

Yea, that is a good point.

Well I decided to alert TradeMe and I also placed feedback. TradeMe said if the police get in contact with them they will release all relavent information. So that's good. Hope it doesn't have to come to the police though.

Well, I hope you've given the guy enough time to respond, and have tried all the various email addresses on his site. Freaking him out with mentions of police, and trademe barring him will not put him in a good mood to happily refund you.

If he's connected through xtra, they've been having email issues this week.

I think you probably should have waited longer and/or tried to ring him before complaining to trademe.

Anyway...

I think you should definitely get the police involved. If this guy is young, he might possibly have the same attitude about fraud as Ace and YouAgain up there, and needs a serious wake-up call about the consequences of this kind of crime.
Having the police turn up at his house might scare him enough not to try this again in the future.