well, i caved. Andertons said it would take up to 14 days to give me a refund so i just took the £40 in store credit. i like the syntakt and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it, i’m just aware i paid more than i needed to, oh well. sorry for not holding the line! i can’t afford to lend a big retailer £775 for two weeks!
Probably a bit of an unpopular opinion, but: if you can’t notice it’s B-stock, does it matter?
I also think this is a bit of a ”have cake / eat it” problem – if we want the luxury of being shipped products for us to try and return at our leisure, maybe we can’t, as consumers, expect a hefty discount if the starting pattern is A02 when you bust it open and turn it on?
That being said, transparency is paramount – nobody can just try and pass stuff as new when it’s not.
If I’m buying a new product and I’m given a not-new product, I expect to either get a full refund/return (and not pay for return shipping), or to get a refund for the full difference between a new unit and a b-stock/opened one. I don’t think that’s unreasonable.
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I also think that’s totally reasonable for as long as there is this this system of B-Stocks.
But is that a sensible system? If somebody tries out a pair of shorts, commando, and puts it back on the rack, should it be B-stock? O’d argue that’s a more troubling case than breaking the seals.
I kind of think that maybe the system could be changed to where it’s normal that somebody might have opened the box and it’s not grounds for a huge discount – of course the device needs to be 100% functional and visually like new.
But, to be clear, under the current system, I agree with you 
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I recently bought Antelope Audio’s USB modeling mic.
I still don’t know if I bought a refurbished one or a brand new one because their Reverb pages are conflicting.
One mic that I missed was $20 cheaper and definitely sold as refurbished.
The one I bought says new, but a preview image had the refurbished info, saying any refurb item would ship in new packaging.
Upon receipt, all was sealed like new (compared to an unboxing video) and nothing inside suggested it was a refurbish.
In this case, I don’t really care. It works. It looks like new and sound good too. I think $200 was fair.
The core issue with B stock is that, on the internet, you can often not see what the B stock’s actual condition is precisely about. For example, Thomann uses the same pictures for both B stock and new stock. So it basically becomes a “surprise stock”.
New gear on the other hand is barely ever unused because of the testing procedures. So the only thing that can make it appear new is the packaging. If a retailer wants to avoid rebate discussions, then making the packaging look like new again seems to be the logical course of action. You never know what’s going on in the kitchen.
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There are generally laws against reselling used items as new, I’m sure especially for potential health concerns like “intimate apparel”.
I don’t know if there are explicit differences between “b-stock”, “open-box”, or “refurbished” beyond subjective grading and seller whim.
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Yeah – it’s a more facetious issue than I made it seem. I was trying to highlight the fact that if there’s no discernible wear on the product, could it actually be okay?
(And the odd undies comparison was about the fact that people try on clothes in the store, even in nasty ways I’m sure, but that’s not as widely considered to be an issue)
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Apologies, i’m dreadfully dry and pedantic sometimes to try and get a point.
I was just saying there were legal protections against certain resale without marking it down somehow (but how it’s marked down I don’t think matters really?)
Similarly, I may have gotten repackaged goods at some point, but unless something is very wrong, I may not have noticed. Which doesn’t justify the practice, especially as some of these people don’t do the vaguest scan over of functionality and reason for return.
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Not at all, it was a great point
Somehow this discussion triggers some consumerist angst within me. I fully believe that rules are to be obeyed, i.e. no trying to pass b-stock as new, but somehow I’d like to see some systemic solution to just everything getting shipped to and fro all the time. No individual is to blame, of course.
(Undisclosed) B stock is the corollary to the consumer’s right to return a product within a given period. The thing that will suffer the most from this va-et-vient is the packaging.
As long as the product is in a flawless esthetic and working condition, there is no reason to worry. Hopefully, in your country, the burden of proof is on the merchant during the initial period of the business to consumer relationship.
Laws being there is one thing, enforcing them is another.
There is also a small number of people who order expensive gear, try it for a few minutes and then decide their gas-passion has expired and send it back.
The machine is no different from A-stock.
The expense of that entitled ‘I’ll send it back after 30 days if I don’t like it’ pushes the price up for everyone, to allow for the B-stock nonsense.
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Pulling up this thread because I don’t like the other recent one ranting. I don’t want to rant, just share what just happened to me.
Ordered a beautiful Walrus Meraki. Full price, sold as new, from one of the big big shops in Europe. Won’t name them, but what arrived is outright horrible. Damaged box, fingerprints all-over and a lose pot-cap that fell out of the box. Never could have expected that to happen. Damn. Asked for compensation. But it’s making me sad to most likely be forced to return that beauty…
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Ohhhh menn!
This is why I always film each unboxing, so many times it went wrong.
It came with some small gifts:
Walrus Audio sticker
Guitar pick
lovely quote
All there. Somewhere. 
I’m returning it. Not really happy to do so, but potential discount as compensation is not really an option for me right now.
This happened to me too! Exactly this - pedal is fine but it did detract from the overall experience. Contacted them and they offered me a poxy discount. Grubby corporate money grabbing DKHDZ
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I finally received my first piece of gear from Sweetwater that I think was used. They were the last holdout that had never sent me used as new. But my rep is great and he sent me a new one out next day air lol.
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…maybe because they got caught. 
(disclosure: Sweetwater customer service has always been stellar for me)
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I always buy through my local retailer https://rubadub.co.uk if I can, they are great. They weren’t stocking the Meraki, so I bought from one of the big online places too! Absolutely sh!Te service - I will never give them my business again.
Yeah, I don’t if I got lucky or what but my sales rep is the only reason I still order stuff from Sweetwater when I could get the gear tax free ordering from somewhere else. I can text him any question I have or to place an order or anything and he will answer in like one minute. Always gives me discounts and free two-day shipping and handles any issues immediately. Feels like I have a personal assistant lol.
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