To be fair, Samsung had to scrap a whole phone model because of battery problems. The Boeing 787 suffered with problems of batteries catching fire (and according to some reports still does). It's a tricky problem to avoid.
With a power-supply it's not a hard problem to avoid. You have to hire independent engineers to evaluate the product design and establish testing procedures to verify that the product isn't unsafe. And you have to do QA and design verification during receiving on all batches of product to confirm that the manufacturer followed the design. I've never had a power supply catch fire and I've done some really dumb stuff in my lab. Frankly it's a matter of paying for UL/CE marks(including testing) and actually looking at the component layout, and Amazon doesn't strike me as the kind of company to respect that kind of QA/Verification work.
Batteries are a different story because they're basically tiny plastic bombs. Somehow Samsung managed to deliver almost 15 years of Android phones before having their batteries catch fire, and that was almost certainly a result of skipping essential QA/Verification processes because they've never had a problem before.
Most modern rechargeable batteries have fairly sophisticated chemistry and thus charge controllers needed -- you don't just dump electricity into them blindly and then take it out. It's not quite rocket surgery, but there's a reasonable level of engineering involved, especially if you want optimal performance with the newer standards (which increase voltage on devices which support it, etc.)
Often times that "reasonable level of engineering" only needs to be slapping a ten cent IC on a board with some manufacturer default application circuit.
Ah, I read "power bank", as that's what ikeyboy mentioned above. And when you search (google) "power bank" the results are all about portable batteries for topping up phones and whatnot. Does Amazon even brand/re-sell power supplies like jschwartzi is talking about?
I do hear chargers with a large number of ports called "power banks" - I think the implication is that it's like a line of ATMs serving many customers.
Anecdotally I've spoken to people who compete with Amazon private label in electronics and they tell me Amazon doesn't care about quality, and that the factories they were buying from were known to be lower quality.
I've also heard the opposite about Anker - that they always get the best quality.
The issue, then, is how do I guarantee that the Anker branded product I'm buying through Amazon is genuinely Anker manufactured. I'm of the understanding that Amazon comingle stock from different supply chains in their warehouses so presumably I can't trust them to be supplying genuine hardware.
Anker are difficult to gauge, I've a few products of theirs, mostly bought a few years ago, with nothing recent - those have been excellent quality and value. Yet I've also started to notice precisely identical unknown brands for most of their products on Amazon.
So I no longer have any certainty. Are Anker merely badge engineering some random white label product, or are Amazon / Anker just not caring or able to do anything about dozens of clear counterfeits?
Are those identical products being sold as Anker, or under different brands? If it's different brands then it's not counterfeit just to make a product that looks similar to another one.
There's similar and completely indistinguishable, except for brand name and logo. e.g. their desk lamps, also their mice. Seems to be the case for almost every Anker product I remember looking at recently.
AmazonBasics isn't any more trustworthy than any of the junk you find on AliExpress or at Wal-Mart/Target/Best Buy. (Except that it has a good return policy backing it, I think)
Amazon is at least liable (theoretically, at least) if they sell an AmazonBasics product that winds up giving my kids lead poisoning, and will have a lot harder time disappearing into the wind to avoid a lawsuit. They disclaim any liability for third-party sellers.
Unless Amazon is currently testing products for lead before recommending them, which somehow I doubt, then the potential of a lawsuit against Amazon isn't actually protecting your child.
Samsung also has a very long track record of producing cell phones that are deemed safe which neither Anker nor Amazon can match in batteries. You either need an extensive positive record to easily bounce back or need to be willing to write it off as an auxiliary business (e.g. if Amazon had battery issues).
People buy Samsung phones because they're good phones, people buy Anker batteries because they're good batteries. If they start exploding people will find some other, better battery brand.
Admittedly a phone that explodes is a bad phone, but Samsung can still sell its "good phone" brand the same way Apple can still sell its laptops.
My understanding, and this might just be marketing PR I honestly don't know, is that Anker sends their own QA people to the factories in China, so they're able to meet a higher standard. I always rely on them for battery stuff, and now USB cables since apparently no one else can make cables that reliably work to connect my phone to my car except them. I went through half a dozen different brands before theirs finally worked and remained working.
Its really not though, its just that between insurance and the courts its currently cheaper to enter products into the stream of commerce that will catch fire x% of times and hurt Y people costing $z, than it is to manufacture/supply/distribute/retail a product that won't catch fire in 100% of cases.
Hell even when z exceeds the cost of proper manufacturing, these companies are significantly more likely to spend money lobbying for changes to insurance and/or products liability litigation than fix the products to make the current formula work rather than spend more money on the cost of the product(s).
You’re assuming nothing bad ever happens with the “name brand” product, which is patently bullshit. Every consumer product I. The shelves is cost engineered to death.
I replied to a comment talking about defective Samsung and Boeing products...those are name brand products.
However, knock off products are usually worse, at least if you are burned by an exploding Samsung or die in a defective Boeing...you and/or your family will be compensated as these companies are identifiable and insured. If you are burned by an exploding knock off, odds are: 1) you won't even be able to identify the manufacturer or seller; 2) you won't have jurisdiction to sue the manufacturer or seller; and 3) they probably aren't insured and will just fold up shop and start anew.
To be fair, "bringing manufacturing back to America" would bring these problems back as well. Yes, it's the manufacturer's fault. It's really the company hiring the manufacturer who's at fault, though. Cash Rules Everything Around Me and all that.
If the company writing the checks can write checks to people who are going to cut corners, people will die. Full stop.
Amazon take egregious shortcuts on oversight for counterfeit goods, which they are compelled by law to not sell, so expecting them to suddenly practice due diligence on stuff coming out of a factory in China is just laughable.
>While China has a large counterfeit market, it's mostly restricted to inside the country
There are a huge number of online retailers where you can purchase chinese counterfeit items in the US. If you're in Seattle I can take you down a few streets where you can openly buy counterfeits as well, and I experienced the same in LA and New York. It definitely isn't mostly restricted to China, there is a massive market for counterfeit goods from China in the US
Compared to China, there really isn't. Literally everything in the stores in Chinese markets is counterfeit. I've been there. Fake gucci, fake airpods, fake drones, fake action figures, etc. I doubt you'll find any of this as wide spread, even in major cities, in the US.
And most of counterfeit items online are obviously from China or from Chinese sites. They aren't from the US.
And considering nearly all US clothing comes from China and is not considered fake and is largely the same with electronics and even toys, it isn't so much a quality issue when you get things from China. It more has to do with what company you get it from.
Amazon almost certainly has better quality control that most of the sellers on their platform. The vast majority of their sellers are extremely low effort, one or two person companies who take advantage of how easy it is to source and ship goods in the modern age.