UGREEN 5$ was a scam

[Enquiries]

The 5$ deposit for preferred entry into the kickstarter campaign and a secured spot to ordering a System was a scam. Its all over the german Ugreen Facebook group.

Everyone could order the decvices today, the 5$ upfront deposit was in no way linked to the entry into ordering a NAS. The buying process never asks if you have deposited 5$ via Ugreens Website nor does it demand any other means of checking your upfront deposit before letting you order.

So, all this was a scam, noone got any benefit from depositing the 5$ to UGREEN. The users just gifted them that money.

Please report on this.

[Robbie]

The 5$ deposit for preferred entry into the kickstarter campaign and a secured spot to ordering a System was a scam. Its all over the german Ugreen Facebook group.

Everyone could order the decvices today, the 5$ upfront deposit was in no way linked to the entry into ordering a NAS. The buying process never asks if you have deposited 5$ via Ugreens Website nor does it demand any other means of checking your upfront deposit before letting you order.

So, all this was a scam, noone got any benefit from depositing the 5$ to UGREEN. The users just gifted them that money.

Please report on this.

Hi Mate
I have contacted the representative of UGREEN that I have been working with during the videos I have made so far on this for further clarification and will post that here when it arrives. Whilst I wait on that, I would also highlight that in the rules section of that page, it does state that refunds will come of that money regardless:

"4 - Your $5 deposit will be refunded at the conclusion of the Kickstarter campaign, regardless of whether you decide to back the project or not. Please be aware that due to the high volume of deposits received, refunds may take approximately 10 to 90 days after the campaign concludes, depending on circumstances."

That said, I would definitely agree that the messaging of the whole 'deposit' thing has been poor, the utility of it on the KS GUI is borderline non-existent and the rigidity of the whole deposit and later refund does seem a bit...umm...thin. Realistically I am willing to get that a few hundred users would have gone for this deposit system (I wasn't exactly flattering about it in my early videos as I remember either), so let's say 500 people went for it (I would bet less, but let's go for the goal here), so that would be $2500 in the balance... I can't see them risking a flood of cancelled orders during fundraising and the bad press they would garner for that sum. That said, never say never. I will put their response in the description below and if this becomes an escalated issue, you better believe I will make a video on it!!! (email me on robbie (at) nc ... I am talking to YOU, whoever is reading this in the future that wants to get an update on this if the posts here don't cover it). Have a great week!

"

[Robbie]

Just an update to the comment above, UGREEN got back to me after around 12 hours (time different China vs UK, gonna cut them some slack on that one) and they provided the following statement (not dissimilar to the one of their official updates on the Kickstarter page here - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/urg...ts/4062104 )

"We're deeply grateful for your support of the Ugreen NASync Series on Kickstarter. We've received numerous inquiries and concerns about the $5 deposit, and we understand your apprehensions. Allow us to clarify the deposit policy once more.

Our initial intent with the $5 discount was to guage interest early to help spread out manufacturing and to thank our early supporters with the best discount. Unfortunately because we are new to crowdfunding we did not realize that this would not work. Our kickstarter and marketing teams were not as aligned on this as they needed to be to realize the problem. We apologize for this and will strive to do better in the future.

When we recognized this issue, we found ourselves with only two options: either extend the 40% off to everyone or retract it entirely due to the structure of Kickstarter tiers. Despite the potential cost, we believed it was essential to honor our original commitment and provide everyone with the 40% discount.

If you wish to avail yourself of the 40% off super early bird price, you can place your order now. If you require our further response, we will certainly fulfill our promise and our team is currently working on a solution and will inform everyone as soon as possible. Thank you for your understanding and support." - Ugreen NASync Team

So, kind of a 50/50 reply. But further to this, there have been numerous comments and replies by UGREEN to enquiries in the comments section (no means to directly link to them, just the overall comments section here - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/urg...s/comments ) where UGREEN confirm that this $5 will be refunded. Overall, they definitely could have handled this better, but I wouldn't class this a scam tbh, just poor presentation.