This article is very focused on the UK but its still possible to try and avoid supporting Amazon if you are willing to pay for shipping or use alternative outlets like EBay although many of those selling on that platform still use Amazon for fulfillment.
Well, I tried to buy an item from eBay 3 weeks ago. eBay said the article was shipped few days after the purchase. 3 weeks later, nothing came. I asked the vendor, what happened, can you give me the tracking number? The vendor's reply: "our supplier haven't given us the tracking number yet." You mean to tell me that the item hasn't been shipped yet, despite that you told me it did 3 weeks ago? Yep. That's eBay.
eBay is a mixed bag, you should review the seller accordingly. Some are good some are not. Items coming from independent sellers on Amazon could be the same.
On the other hand, eBay customer support is very friendly to buyers. Open a case the day after the advertised delivery, you will get refunded.
As a long time seller/buyer I’ve developed a set of heuristics around eBay (most of them obvious - avoid non US based accounts, descriptions where the photos are clearly not the actual item itself, etc) and I’ve only had one or two bad surprises in over 10 years. Both times customer support came through.
A buyer screwed me out of 5 drone (DJI Mavic 2) batteries and $700. Two weeks after getting the drone, “none of the batteries work”. Really? All five? I was skeptical, but said I’d do a partial refund if he’d commit in writing that the partial refund was contingent on him returning the batteries so I could repair, or replace (at least two were still in warranty, if there was ever even a problem). At no point did he show any actual evidence of battery issues (DJI Go battery diagnostics, etc.), just "it's not showing anything".
He sent a message agreeing, via eBay messages with the text I'd sent him, even with "should I not do this, I understand that seller will dispute the transaction".
Not even an hour later he sent another message “USPS won’t ship damaged batteries so I am not returning them”.
I went to eBay with all this, and his agreement. eBay said he could keep the $700. And the five batteries.
>although many of those selling on that platform still use Amazon for fulfillment.
That’s what makes me weary that there’s any way you can truly avoid Amazon. For many sellers it’s just easier to outsource their warehousing and fulfillment operations to FBA and use Amazon’s warehouse as a 3PL (third party logistics), and I wouldn’t be surprised if <random eBay/Shopify seller> used Amazon for fulfillment purposes.
