Y'all gather 'round, ol' Uncle Samurai has another sad tale to tell about how someone thought they were gonna save a buck or two buying cheap, generic parts off of Ebay or Amazon but it turns out the parts either don't last long or don't work at all. I rectum this is an increasingly common story in these tough economic times with everyone pinching pennies so hard you can almost hear ol' Abe screaming. But, as we're gonna see in today's saga, buying cheap, knock-off parts from the online peddlers of phony appliance parts is false economy, what we call "penny-wise and dollar dumb."

I got this email from confused and frustrated Karla who contacted me about a (surprise!) non-functioning knock-off part she bought from some peddler on Ebay. For some reason, she thought she bought it through this website, www.Appliantology.org. Why did she think that? Who knows! People think all kinds of strange and unpredictable things. That's why humans are so interesting and frustrating at the same time.

For the record: all parts sold through the parts links and search boxes at this website are new, genuine OEM parts and all come with a one year return policy, even on electrical parts that have been installed. I do not sell parts on Ebay but there are peddlers there who do using names that sound confusingly similar to this website.

Your Name: karla *******

Your Email Address: karla********@********.net

Your Appliantology Username, if you have one:

What would you like to talk about? Other NON-APPLIANCE REPAIR problem

Talk to the Samurai: Less than a week ago i bougth thru ebay and pay by paypal a part to my fridge apparently it came ok but once intalled only worked for two days, is there a possibility to return it and change the part for one that works please call ***-***-**** i need the fridge to work

Item title

Price

Shipping price

Qty

Item total

NEW GE refrigerator main control board part WR55X10942 ( item: 261174184655 transaction: 1192412668016 )

Paid on Apr-16-13

$89.25

Free

1

$89.25

Shipped on Apr-18-13

USPS Priority Mail

Estimated delivery: Tue. Apr. 23 - Wed. Apr. 24

Tracking number: 9405503699300397360687

The control board she bought for her GE refrigerator is the famous Muthaboard. A genuine replacement Muthaboard, brand new in a GE box with a one year warranty retails for about $165.

Karla paid about $90.

How does that work? Well, in her case, it didn't. The board she bought from the parts peddler on Ebay was probably scavenged from another refrigerator that was junked for a bad sealed system. The parts peddler had no way of checking the board and probably didn't care-- just sell it and let the customer see if it works.

Read more about online appliance parts ripoffs and scams in the March issue of our newsletter, Appliantology: The Oracle of Appliance Enlightenment.