Ordered a "Bel STi Driver" radar detector. It arrived without the usual shrink-wrapping on the box from Bel. I have ordered 3 of these from other sources and they are always shrink-wrapped. I have a small high-end car installation facility and I sell these to clients who don't want to spend $1700 or more on a super high-end radar installation, so I know this product very well.
There was a 3 day delay beyond normal UPS Ground shipping time from Brooklyn to southern New Hampshire. I called, gave them the order # and he could not give me a tracking number, saying it will ship out "in a day or so" even though they claimed to have it in stock. It arrived today, Thursday, Feb. 26 at my shop.
The radar detector itself was put back into the box but you could tell it was removed and hastily stuck back because it was slightly askew in it's form-fitted space.
The plastic serial number plate has been removed!
This is the most troubling part of this whole fiasco. Written on the radar detector, under the slightly recessed area where the plastic serial number tag is affixed at the factory by Bel, is a capital letter "P" with a period after it, written using a black Sharpie pen.
Maybe this is a quality control step that all Bel STi Driver radar detectors have, but who the f*ck knows? The only way to tell is to remove the plastic serial number tag!
1: Where is SBH Corp. Getting these radar detectors? Mine appears to be brand-new except for the removed serial number plate and the fact that the black cardboard box from Bel was taken out of the shrink-wrap.
2: Why would they remove the serial number plate? And who exactly is doing this?
3: I used to travel all over New England programming cellular phones for people, during the analog era when you could switch a customer over to a new carrier but usually a trained person had to re-program their phone. Sometimes I could do it over the phone, but some phones had to be done in person. So I met a lot of people. One guy I met showed me some boxes of new car audio amplifiers in his garage, and some other consumer electronics gear. He offered to sell me an amp that retailed at the time for $400 for about $100. They were a very well-known and high-end brand, and again, because I have been in the business since 1977 I could tell they were not counterfeits.
4: My conclusion at the time was they were stolen off of a truck or from a warehouse and I politely declined his offer. My conclusion about SBH Corp. Is they are buying stolen merchandise from someone, or they have an employee who drives a truck and steals it, or some other nefarious arrangement. Possibly involving ready access to a warehouse, like in a friggin' mob movie, and a bad one at that. Cue up the fog-bound loading dock here. Somewhere in the darkened city, a dog barks while a man in a fedora waits for another stolen shipment, smoking a cigar.
5: Conclusion: You cannot trust SBH Corp. To sell you gear that has not been stolen. Buying from this criminal enterprise means you will: A: have no warranty recourse from the manufacturer and B: You are knowingly or unknowingly supporting an illegal, immoral and unethical practice which in the end will cost all of us consumers money. Do NOT fall for the low price of SBH! I paid $430 for this radar but got one from Amazon for $504 and it arrived the next day. I would rather pay retail than receive stolen product with no warranty!
6: SBH stands for "Some Bullsh*t Here"
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