Bought a textbook online and the seller sends me the International version instead...

[chiwawa626]

Bought a textbook online and the seller sends me the International version instead...He listed it as the real US version and did not mension it to be the International edition. My concerns are:
A) The item is not for resale in the United States
B) The item is not what I ordered
C) The does not have the same $$ value of what I ordered

It is mainly C that bothers me, I paid a premium price for a book and I get a cheaper version of it...As a student who resells old books (something i planned to do with this) the International edition wont go for as much....

what should i do? Is is ridiculous to ask for a small percentage of money back as the international edition goes for a lot less then the US version?

 

[memo]

id get my money back. international editions have cruddy paper that is totally see through. kinda lame. and it doesnt resell well like you said

 

[brtspears2]

I was pissed when NiceBookSeller.net, an amazon.com marketplace participant sold me an international version book for my DBMS class. Of course technically I did get the right book. I never got a response back. I would be more mad but I only paid $20 for the book and it was going to a new edition, so the value of the book was going to the dump anyways.

 

[Baked]

You got Served

Ok, did you ask for a return/refund yet?

 

[duragezic]

If he explicitly stated you were receiving the regular US version, then I'd be pretty pissed. Otherwise, the book is identical. The only problem I have with buying Intl editions online is that you won't be able to sell it back to a bookstore, so you have to keep it or try and get a small price selling it to another student if they'll even take a Intl edition. Most students probably think it's a different book and won't buy it, even though it is exactly the same otherwise. OTOH, if its a book for my major and I'd like to keep it (like my Digital Logic book I just got), I ended up saving buck or two by getting the paperback, Intl edition for $30 as opposed to ~$120 otherwise.

 

[chiwawa626]

I have to admit it is a nice International edition, hardcover, printed in the USA, I have it here side by side with the US version and just the cover has diffrent things written on it. I emailed them and asked what they wanted to do about it. I really want to keep the book because I need it, yet my class seems to only use the book for 3 chapters...I could save a boatload if I just photocoppied the 3 chapters i need hah

 

[magomago]

If he said USA and you got Intl than that i would assume that is fraud.

OTher than that...enjoy it~ a guy did that to me for one of my engineering classes~ but as long as the book is exactly the same the cover could have titles like "Kangaroo Edition: Not for resale outside of Australia" and I wouldn't care!

As for the quality being worse...I've noticed they are EXACTLY the same. While true it isn't legal to go buy Intl Editions, if the price is cheap, I don't ask questions

But note: I do keep ALL my textbooks. I'm a pack rat like that, whose parents are paying for his college

 

[chiwawa626]

I dont think its illegal to sell international versions of textbooks...Theres something about a 1998 supreme court case....I read that on a slip of paper included by the seller...eek

It seems that he sells US and International versions, he might have just sent me the wrong thing or listed the wrong thing...we'll see...

 

[PoPPeR]

a year ago I woudl've said eh, it might not be worth the trouble if the $ difference is more than $20. But last year for my calculus class, I intentionally ordered an internation edition (bookstore price: $100, half.com price: $70, internation edition: $20) to save some money, and it turns out chapter 5 and 6 were reversed. Now you might just say "well that's not a big deal, when you get assigned section 5.1, just do 6.1 instead", but it's a b!tch when the teacher just gives you page #'s, and there were a couple problems that were reversed as well, so sometimes I found myself doing the wrong problem.

How I escaped that class with a B after getting a D in algebra II and skipping pre-calc, I'll never know. I must just be fvcking smart