Tuesday, January 10, 2017

Wange 34052 Creation Villa Building Set



So here's a set that I actually own, it's the Wange 34052 Villa building block set.  I bought mine back in April 2015 and I paid around $27 USD for it, so this is selling for quite a good price at just under $22 USD.  The quality of this set is good and brick clutch is decent.  I think this set might be a copy of an older Lego set but I'm not entirely sure.  This is a fairly decent size set with 755 pieces and it comes with a giant baseplate and 2 minifigures.  But just a heads up, the minifigures are not Lego compatible and look awful.



Friday, January 6, 2017

Aliexpress: Gudi 8911 Passenger Airplane


Hello, it's time to look at another bootleg brick building set deal I found on Aliexpress.com.  This one is the Gudi 8911 Passenger Airplane.  This set comes with three Lego compatible minifigures, a car and some kind of antenna tower.  There are 334 pieces to this set.  I've recently built the Gudi 9213 Fire Rescue Boat and was pleasantly surprised by the brick quality of that set, so hopefully this airplane set will also be a good set too.   The Aliexpress store selling this set is Biscuit's Toyland and I have personally bought other brick sets from this seller without any issue.


Please remember that I cannot verify whether the seller or the item featured is good or not. Use your own judgement and research before making any purchases.  I have no affiliation to Aliexpress or the sellers found there.

Monday, January 2, 2017

My List Of Top 5 Stores on AliExpress That Sell Fake Lego - October 2016



It's probably the number one question I get asked on my Facebook page (It's Not Lego) and on my blogs, "Who are the best Aliexpress sellers?".   Well, I can't say definitively who are the best sellers or stores on Aliexpress, but I can tell you which ones I personally have had positive experiences with.

I make anywhere between 5 to 10 purchases a month from AliExpress, and for the most part it takes about a month to two months for my orders to arrive in my country.   Hence, the reason why my blog post title lists the month of October 2016, these are the purchases I try to reconcile at this time which is the beginning of January 2017.

Typically if I haven't received my order after 5 or 6 weeks, I will contact the seller to inquire on the item shipment status.  At which point the seller will usually agree to extend Purchase Protection.   At the six to seven week interval mark, if I still haven't received my item, I will start the Dispute process.

The AliExpress Dispute process gives about one week between Buyer and Seller to sort out any issues.   If the item arrives before or during this period, I cancel the dispute and the money is released to the seller from the custody of Aliexpress.

Aliexpress will then take another week to review the disputed case and provide judgement if nothing has been resolved after one week.   At this point, a period of 2 months will have passed by the time AliExpress passes judgement.

If the item has not arrived and the tracking number is invalid or has not been updated since leaving China, usually Aliexpress will side with the buyer and the purchase cost plus shipping will be refunded to the buyer.  If Aliexpress can prove that the item was tracked to the receiving country, then you would not get your refund, because the seller fulfilled his obligations to send your item.

I will review my list of Aliexpress purchases at the end of each month and give you some idea which sellers show up consistently on my Top 5 Best Sellers list.  Maybe at the end of 2017, I will be able to create a Top Ten Best Sellers/Stores on AliExpress List.

In October 2016, I placed 10 purchase orders for bootleg and knockoff brick sets and minifigures.  At the time of this writing, I have successfully received 7 of those orders, with 3 orders still outstanding.
I have not yet raised any disputes for any October 2016 purchases yet, but if I don't get the remaining 3 orders next week, I will initiate my dispute process.

The criteria is pretty simple to make my Top 5 Stores list:

1.  offer a wide selection of bricksets and/or minifigures at decent prices
2.  be responsive to messages
3.  ship within a reasonable timeframe (for my country, that's one to two months)
4.  don't lie and say item shipped when it hasn't
5.  don't give me a bogus tracking number


So, for the month of October 2016, my top 5 sellers/stores (in no particular order) on Aliexpress were:

1.  Biscuit's ToyLand Store
2.  Toy World Store
3.  Big Cabbage
4. WAN MU XING Trading Co., Ltd Store
5. Hamtoys


Please note that my AliExpress experience may or may not differ from your own purchase experience.  I have no affiliation to Aliexpress nor the sellers or stores listed there.   Please do your own research and due diligence before making any purchases on AliExpress.