Unfortunately you're wrong, it's a huge problem for books as well. No Starch Press already left Amazon because it was the only way to prevent fakes being sent out to customers buying the genuine book. Fakes including ones where the back cover wasn't printed or everything was printed black & white, low-quality paper etc. As Amazon just mixes fake & genuine products because they say the same thing on the package it's impossible for both sellers and buyers to know what they'll get. You get what the person handling the package will draw next from the pile.
Serious question, how do you find reputable specialty web stores nowadays? (for items which are not your professional specialty, i.e. when you don't have direct knowledge of the market or trusted contacts that can recommend those for you). Trying to google for items of medium quality, you only get shady reseller shops that are as bad as Amazon third-party market, or worse.
Headphones.com - headphones, tax-free
Drop.com - general hobbyist goods
DigiKey/Mouser - miscellaneous parts
Your local bougie salon - high-quality body products (bodywash, hairspray, etc)
Bed Bath and Beyond - bedding and bath products
Design within Reach - furniture
Ubiquiti - wireless APs, PoE switches, and the nicest Ethernet cables I've ever used
ProtectLi - firewalls
Crowdsupply - miscellaneous gadgets for supernerds
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Best way to find a good quality product is to go to the hobbyist subreddit/community for said product and see what vendor people use. Also, r/BuyItForLife.
Haven't they been having issues recently?
I don't know exactly. I believe they were trying to force cloud-signon for even locally managed devices, and since then I think I've picked up "used to be great" complaints that their quality and support is slipping (like they off-shored their engineering teams or something).
Their switches and APs are pretty good and don't require cloud nonsense.
B&H has been collecting sales tax for about two years now. Still a great place to get electronics from though.
Opening the line of credit will lower your overall credit utilization, actually helping your credit score in the long run.
Let's be serious, literally no one cares about paying tax on the rewards.
The new program is exactly the same as the old one. The backend card provider is changed.
(Sorry, love their furniture, not so much their prices.)
But when the box arrived, it was an opened box with an old used and abused Nikon DSLR, parts even missing! Wow.
At least the return was painless so I guess there's that.
I try hard to avoid Amazon now. I prioritize a locally owned store if possible, second option is a reputable specialty web store that specializes in the kind of item I want. Third option is the local big box chain stores, at least I can see what I'm getting.
Mostly I use Amazon only for books these days since I figure it'll be difficult to substitute a scam item for those. I hope.