Theoabma, Chino Army Navy, TED ABMA, ABMA SALES

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This web page details our opinions of and experiences with:

 

We run the little race boat shown above. It does about 70mph and requires the driver to wear goggles. When operated in fresh water, such as a lake or a river, a little spray on the goggles is never a problem. All one need do is wipe the spray off with a thumb or finger and you're good to go. When operating in salt water (the ocean), there's a problem, because when a little salt water spray gets on your goggles, the salt crystals will scratch plastic lenses, leaving them dull and opaque. Only a few swipes with a thumb or finger will scratch any kind of polycarbonite to the point where the goggles are ruined. Obviously, you can't use plastic goggles when operating in salt water and expect to get more than one or two uses out of them before they're so dull you can't see through them. Everyone knows this.

When operating in salt water, we must use goggles with glass lenses. Glass doesn't scratch like plastic, so we can use glass goggles for years or decades without having to replace them. It's a no-brainer.

Recently we found that the straps on our glass goggles had rotted, and we needed some new ones. They're not overly hard to find on the Internet. Usually, after a two or three minute Google search, we can find some for ten or fifteen bucks. Just before Christmas of 2009 we happened to search eBay and found the goggles shown below. They're described in two places in the seller's ad as being glass, and of having glass lenses. Read the ad for yourself, posted by Mr. Ted Abma (aka theoabma):

 

We bought a pair and they arrived a week or two later. Immediately upon removing them from the box it was obvious they had plastic lenses. A little tap with the back of a fingernail confirmed it. Not fans of eBay or Paypal, we figured eBay had simply struck again (what's new), and we made a mental note to drop our eBay account as soon as we had returned the goggles and gotten a refund. The seller had misrepresented the goggles. That was a fact. But it should be no problem to simply ask politely for a refund and to have the seller apologize for the problem and take care of it. Right? Of course. No big deal. Any seller would take care of something so blatantly misrepresented, and so easily verified. We never thought for one second we'd have the slightest problem with TED ABMA, aka Theoabma, of ABMA SALES, Ontario, California. Why would there be a problem? We doubted the seller had out-and-out lied about his product. Probably he was just too dumb to know what he was selling, but now that it had been brought to his attention, he could easily pull another pair of goggles from his inventory, see that they were plastic, and correct the oversight by taking ours back. Then he'd change his ad to accurately represent that his goggles were PLASTIC, not GLASS. No trouble at all. The pics below show the plastic lenses clearly. Plastic can be moulded as shown in the pictures. Glass cannot. See for yourself:

 

 

We logged onto eBay and sent TED ABMA a one or two line note advising that we couldn't use the plastic lenses, and that we'd like to return the misadvertised product for a refund on the product and on shipping both ways. Still no big deal. It all should have been resolved in a few days with no drama whatsoever. It's twelve lousy bucks for God's sake. No big deal.

Here's our refund request, pasted in here exactly as it was sent:

Dear theoabma,
We just received these. The lenses are NOT glass as you advertise. We need a refund for item and shipping both ways. No tolerance for this. - ireallyhatepaypal

In response to our request for a refund, we received the following, pasted in here exactly as received from TED ABMA (note that our eBay "handle" was "IREALLYHATEPAYPAL" because, after all, we do. Here's Theodore's gracious response:

SO YOU HATE PAYPAL WHY? YOU ARE USING THEM TO CHEAT ME.THEY ARE DESCRIBED EXACTLEY CORRECTLY. WHY DON'T JUST SAY YOU CHANGED YOUR MIND.AND WANT YOUR MONEY BACK INSTEAD OF TELLING A LIE? THATS FINE. BUT I DON'T THINK I SHOULD PAY SHIPPING BACK EITHOR DIRECTION.TED. - theoabma

Up to this point we had assumed we were dealing with just an average human being somewhere. We could not possibly have guessed that we were dealing with a wild animal like this. We ignored the insanity and asked for any special shipping instructions to send back the return. We received no reply, so we filed a dispute through Paypal. When we still received no reply from TED ABMA we had no choice but to escalate the dispute through Paypal so that we were no longer dealing with TED ABMA, but with Paypal itself. We advised Paypal of this website, and TED ABMA was advised of the website as well. We then received the following response from ABMA, pasted here exactly as we received it:

YOU DO WHATEVER YOU WANT. I'VE TAKEN DOWN ALL OF YOUR THREATS.YOU ARE MESSING WITH THE WRONG PERSON HERE.I.M NOT SOMNE JERK EBAYER AS I BELIEVE YOU MUST BE. CHECK OUT THE NAME ABMA SALES. I JUST HAPPEN TO BE ONE OF THE LARGEST WHOLESALERS OF MILITARY SURPLUS IN THE COUNTRY.AND CERTAINLY ONE OF THE LONGEST IN THE BUSINESS AS ONE OF THE MOST RESPECTED. SO GOAHEAD AND MAKE AN IDIOT OF YOURSELF. CHEERS. TED ABMA, ABMA SALES. 1449 S, BAKER AVE. ONTARIO, CALIF. PH NO. 909 9471363 OR 909 9232222. - theoabma

At this point it was clear we were dealing with a mentally handicapped individual. And what threats is this idiot referring to? We urge him to take ANY threats DIRECTLY to his local police department so that charges can be filed.

Unfortunately eBay has no way to screen those people from opening an eBay store, but we can sure as hell screen eBay from our lives and thus avoid this kind of human animal in the future.

We'll wait for Paypal to rule on this, and we'll then send the item back to this nut-case. Since we now know he'll lie at the drop of a hat, we'll package the item in front of reliable witnesses (about a third of our family work in law enforcement either in King County or Seattle PD) and we'll extract a refund from this genetic blank.

We submit that, if this guy keeps treating people this way in his own local area, sooner or later one of those locals will simply put a barrel in his eye socket and send a .45ACP hardball through his brain. It won't be us, but there are crazy people in the world today. Just read the newspapers. We've never seen a more belligerent, dishonest piece of human garbage, and we doubt we ever will again. We cannot even remotely imagine what this specimen thought he could gain with this approach.

The conclusion of this case will be posted below. Our eBay account is scheduled for closure once all remaining transactions have been completed. When eBay first started up we used eBay copiously and bought or sold many thousands of items through our various companies with hardly a problem. Today, however, it seems as though the decent people once to be found on eBay have abandon it, and almost all that remains are society's mental midgets, like theoabma. Too bad eBay couldn't have taken steps to clean it up. We'll never waste our time or money on eBay again

Below, note that eBay ruled in our favor. But we felt more good could come to potential eBay victims if we demonstrated just how blatantly some eBay sellers will lie. Our advice: Stay away from eBay, and you'll automatically avoid human scum like Ted Abma.

BTW, it no longer does any good to only deal with eBayers who have good feedback. Why? Because eBay now ROLLS OFF all bad feedback over time. The good feedback stays; only the bad is rolled off. So, in time, EVERY low-life, bottom-feeding eBay scumbag ripoff artist ends up looking like he or she is honest and trustworthy. Thanks again, eBay. Your buyers really needed that.

 

 

The short video below offers certifiable proof that Ted Abma is a liar. Even when confronted, this miserable piece of eBay trash maintained his story and tried to back us down. We won't tolerate a human being of this low caliber. We simply will not.

 

Mouse over the bottom of the video screen to make the controls pop-up
 

 

We see that this genetic blank (Ted Abma) has finally changed his ad to reflect the truth about this particular product. We wonder how many other products he lies about every single day.