Scam or legitimate music site ?

D

Dave M

Guest
This is way off topic for many, but I have a feeling that there are more
than a few real musicians and even more aspiring musicians in this forum.
I am searching the net for online music shops for a new guitar. Google led
me to http://www.bossmusicstore.com/. They have a guitar listed on their
site that I would like very much to buy. However, their listed price is
several hundred dollars below all other online music stores and many hundred
dollars below the local music shops. I'm well aware of the axiom that says
that if sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

I've searched the web for any reviews of this site,and found a couple of
complaints, but no real reviews of the site by real customers. Has anyone
here ever done business with this site, or know of anyone who has? I'd
really like to hear from someone who can verify that it's a real business,
and not a scam site.

Thanks for listening,
Dave M
 
In sci.electronics.design Dave M <dgminala4444@mediacombb.net> wrote:
Has anyone here ever done
business with this site, or know of anyone who has?
Click to expand...

I've never bought anything from them.

You might contact the guitar manufacturer and ask if that site is an
authorized dealer for their guitars. Almost all manufacturers are happy
to tell you this; they don't like shady dealers either.

http://www.bossmusicstore.com/about-us
"Based in Jakarta, Bali & Singapore, we specialise in selling high
quality of pro audio, [...]"

Hmm. Not in the US.

I put a random item from the front page into my cart (Fishman Aura
Spectrum guitar amp/footswitch) and went to their checkout page. When
I get to the "payment" section, the only option is bank transfer to
"BANK RAKYAT INDONESIA". International bank transfers from the US are
often uncheap ($35+) - you'd think a web store would take credit cards
or PayPal or something. I also don't know if you can reverse or stop
a bank transfer in case things don't work out.

You might have to pay import duties on things you buy. They have a page
that talks about this, http://www.bossmusicstore.com/sales-tax , but it
doesn't list the US as a country they ship to. That page also says:

"We've heard from customers that one common way to avoid or reduce these
duties is to ride your new item while you're here visiting (great idea,
right?)."

Hmm... I don't know how to ride a guitar. Interestingly, the "payment
options" links at the bottom of that page (Mastercard, Paypal, etc) all
lead to a different site, http://www.fave-bike.com/index.php/sales-tax .
Going up to fave-bike.com , it appears to use exactly the same site
layout and design as bossmusicstore.com , but with bicycles instead of
musical instruments.

http://www.bossmusicstore.com/about-us lists two addresses in Indonesia
(even though one is headlined Bali) and one in Singapore. The two
Indonesia addresses appear to exist, but conveniently, there is no
Google Street View for them, so you can't see if there is really a shop
there or not. The Singapore address appears to belong to a shopping
mall, and Street View shows a mall there. Going to the mall's website
at http://www.hougangmall.com.sg/hougang-mall/stores.aspx and clicking
the "Search" button yields a list of all the stores; nothing named "Boss
Music Store" is in it.

http://www.fave-bike.com/about-us lists addresses in Indonesia, Bali,
and Singapore. The Indonesia address appears to be a complex of high-
rise hotels and shopping (JNE Plaza Indonesia). Going to their Web
site only shows one bicycle store, Deltacycles - no Fave Bike I can
see.
http://www.plazaindonesia.com/store_detail.php?id_store=49&id_ref_store_category=20&id_ref_menu=6
The Bali address goes to a road on the beach with several hotels, no
bike shops listed in Google Maps, and no Street View. The Singapore
address goes to a small island in Singapore that seems to consist mostly
of resort hotels.

Googling on fave-bike.com leads to a complaint from someone who tried
to buy a bicycle:
http://www.cyclechat.net/threads/beware-indonesian-online-bike-sales-scam.138815/
and another page that claims that fave-bike.com is a scam:
http://419advancefeefraud.blogspot.com/2013/08/indonesian-bike-scammers-fraud-scam.html

Seems kind of sketchy to me.

Matt Roberds
 
On Thu, 01 May 2014 10:43:04 +1000, Dave M <dgminala4444@mediacombb.net>
wrote:

This is way off topic for many, but I have a feeling that there are more
than a few real musicians and even more aspiring musicians in this forum.
I am searching the net for online music shops for a new guitar. Google
led
me to http://www.bossmusicstore.com/. They have a guitar listed on their
site that I would like very much to buy. However, their listed price is
several hundred dollars below all other online music stores and many
hundred
dollars below the local music shops. I'm well aware of the axiom that
says
that if sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

I've searched the web for any reviews of this site,and found a couple of
complaints, but no real reviews of the site by real customers. Has
anyone
here ever done business with this site, or know of anyone who has? I'd
really like to hear from someone who can verify that it's a real
business,
and not a scam site.

Thanks for listening,
Dave M


Pay with PayPal and you can claim it back if they try to shaft you
Click to expand...
 
In article <2IKdnffAsZsEBfzOnZ2dnUVZ_sqdnZ2d@giganews.com>,
"Dave M" <dgminala4444@mediacombb.net> wrote:

This is way off topic for many, but I have a feeling that there are more
than a few real musicians and even more aspiring musicians in this forum.
I am searching the net for online music shops for a new guitar. Google led
me to http://www.bossmusicstore.com/. They have a guitar listed on their
site that I would like very much to buy. However, their listed price is
several hundred dollars below all other online music stores and many hundred
dollars below the local music shops. I'm well aware of the axiom that says
that if sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

I've searched the web for any reviews of this site,and found a couple of
complaints, but no real reviews of the site by real customers. Has anyone
here ever done business with this site, or know of anyone who has? I'd
really like to hear from someone who can verify that it's a real business,
and not a scam site.

Thanks for listening,
Dave M
Click to expand...

100% scam.

The domain is registered to PrivacyProtect.org in Australia, which is a
favorite among criminals.

Web and mail hosting is on "Turnkey Internet Inc" in New York.

Their "contact us" phone number is for Indonesia.

www.bossmusicstore.com does not have an SSL certificate. Their checkout
cart and account management pages have no security and do not meet the
requirements for their claimed payment processors.

Components of their web site were clearly stolen from other sites.
http://www.bossmusicstore.com/customer/account/create/ retains links to
www.fave-bike.com (looks fake too).

Nothing but fake security badges:
http://www.bossmusicstore.com/site-security
 
mroberds@att.net wrote:
In sci.electronics.design Dave M <dgminala4444@mediacombb.net> wrote:
http://www.bossmusicstore.com/ [...] Has anyone here ever done
business with this site, or know of anyone who has?

I've never bought anything from them.

You might contact the guitar manufacturer and ask if that site is an
authorized dealer for their guitars. Almost all manufacturers are
happy to tell you this; they don't like shady dealers either.

http://www.bossmusicstore.com/about-us
"Based in Jakarta, Bali & Singapore, we specialise in selling high
quality of pro audio, [...]"

Hmm. Not in the US.

I put a random item from the front page into my cart (Fishman Aura
Spectrum guitar amp/footswitch) and went to their checkout page. When
I get to the "payment" section, the only option is bank transfer to
"BANK RAKYAT INDONESIA". International bank transfers from the US are
often uncheap ($35+) - you'd think a web store would take credit cards
or PayPal or something. I also don't know if you can reverse or stop
a bank transfer in case things don't work out.

You might have to pay import duties on things you buy. They have a
page that talks about this, http://www.bossmusicstore.com/sales-tax ,
but it doesn't list the US as a country they ship to. That page also
says:

"We've heard from customers that one common way to avoid or reduce
these duties is to ride your new item while you're here visiting
(great idea, right?)."

Hmm... I don't know how to ride a guitar. Interestingly, the "payment
options" links at the bottom of that page (Mastercard, Paypal, etc)
all lead to a different site,
http://www.fave-bike.com/index.php/sales-tax . Going up to
fave-bike.com , it appears to use exactly the same site layout and
design as bossmusicstore.com , but with bicycles instead of musical
instruments.

http://www.bossmusicstore.com/about-us lists two addresses in
Indonesia (even though one is headlined Bali) and one in Singapore.
The two Indonesia addresses appear to exist, but conveniently, there
is no Google Street View for them, so you can't see if there is
really a shop there or not. The Singapore address appears to belong
to a shopping mall, and Street View shows a mall there. Going to the
mall's website at
http://www.hougangmall.com.sg/hougang-mall/stores.aspx and clicking
the "Search" button yields a list of all the stores; nothing named
"Boss Music Store" is in it.

http://www.fave-bike.com/about-us lists addresses in Indonesia, Bali,
and Singapore. The Indonesia address appears to be a complex of high-
rise hotels and shopping (JNE Plaza Indonesia). Going to their Web
site only shows one bicycle store, Deltacycles - no Fave Bike I can
see.
http://www.plazaindonesia.com/store_detail.php?id_store=49&id_ref_store_category=20&id_ref_menu=6
The Bali address goes to a road on the beach with several hotels, no
bike shops listed in Google Maps, and no Street View. The Singapore
address goes to a small island in Singapore that seems to consist
mostly of resort hotels.

Googling on fave-bike.com leads to a complaint from someone who tried
to buy a bicycle:
http://www.cyclechat.net/threads/beware-indonesian-online-bike-sales-scam.138815/
and another page that claims that fave-bike.com is a scam:
http://419advancefeefraud.blogspot.com/2013/08/indonesian-bike-scammers-fraud-scam.html

Seems kind of sketchy to me.

Matt Roberds
Click to expand...

Yep, surely sounds like a scam site. I saw the credit card images on the
checkout page, but didn't click on them to see where they took me.
I tried Google, Bing, Dogpile and Yahoo searches but none of them turned up
anything. I also tried to find a physical location from their addresses,
but Google maps was no help.
I sent them an email in an attempt to get more info about shipping an item
to the USA, but so far, no response.
I think this is a scam site. I'm staying away from them, and I advise
everyone else to avoid them as well.

Dave M
 
On 04/30/2014 05:43 PM, Dave M wrote:
This is way off topic for many, but I have a feeling that there are more
than a few real musicians and even more aspiring musicians in this forum.
I am searching the net for online music shops for a new guitar. Google led
me to http://www.bossmusicstore.com/. They have a guitar listed on their
site that I would like very much to buy. However, their listed price is
several hundred dollars below all other online music stores and many hundred
dollars below the local music shops. I'm well aware of the axiom that says
that if sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

I've searched the web for any reviews of this site,and found a couple of
complaints, but no real reviews of the site by real customers. Has anyone
here ever done business with this site, or know of anyone who has? I'd
really like to hear from someone who can verify that it's a real business,
and not a scam site.

Thanks for listening,
Dave M
Click to expand...
Boss Music was what 93/KHJ was claiming to play in 1965. I haven't heard
of an online music store by that name, but I only know what Yahoo and
Google push at me.
 
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