Saturday, December 6, 2014

DryEasy: Very Strong Deceit by Perversion and Concealment


We examined DryEasy  in our blog on this site dated June 26, 2013. Since this was some time ago, we thought that we should examine DryEasy again. About 18 months ago, we had concluded that DryEasy demonstrated
Strong Deceit by Perversion and Concealment.

So we went to their web site (www.bedwettingsolutions.com) to take a fresh look at what DryEasy had to say about itself.


We noticed that their web site had become more "flashy" and sales oriented than what we recall of their previous site. There is a fair amount of general information about bedwetting, which we are not passing judgment on in this blog. Our objective is to identify how completely and accurately the DryEasy and its manufacturer were identified, and complete information provided to the reader. As may be judged from the heading of this blog page, DryEasy failed quite miserably. We consider this failure to be even more severe than our original review from 2013, as we had pointed out to DryEasy many of the matters that we took issue with.

DryEasy took the "Easy" way out by deleting or avoiding some of the issues that we had raised. Others were ignored instead of being addressed. The only relevant information about the DryEasy alarm on their own web site was on their page with the header "Bedwetting Alarms."

Let us list our unanswered questions and our comments relating thereto:

1.            Who is the manufacturer? Who is the seller? What is their location and address? What is their telephone number?
We have a very strong aversion to parties who are marketing over the internet and not providing the buyer with adequate information about themselves. Complete information should be freely available, so that there can be greater confidence in the seller. Not knowing if the manufacturer and seller are the same or not, we are assuming that they are the same and shall refer to them as the seller.

We noticed that DryEasy was listed on Amazon.com, and telephoned Customer Service at Amazon to get the address and telephone number for the DryEasy seller. We were informed that Customer Service did not have this information and could not provide it. A possibly illegitimate seller on Amazon? This is very troubling for us, and should be very troubling to anyone considering purchasing the DryEasy anywhere. Perhaps the public, people considering purchasing the DryEasy alarm, should ask DryEasy to publish this information and make it freely available.

2.            What is the size and weight of the DryEasy alarm?

This would be of interest to any user. We promptly noticed that the sensor is 33" long (for the newer sensor) and 30" long (for the older sensor). The Product Details page did provide some additional dimensions. Amazingly, none of this information is provided on DryEasy's Amazon.com listing, which appears to be the most important U.S. listing for this seller.

We went to the site (sites, actually) that we consider to be by far the most complete for comparing bedwetting alarms: 




These appear to be identical in content, and are the most comprehensive sites for comparing the complete details of all (or most) bedwetting alarms, both wired (like the DryEasy) and wireless.

This site states that the DryEasy is 2.4"x2.3"x0.63". No weight is provided of the DryEasy alarm box by itself, but with batteries it is supposed to weigh 2.1 oz. No weight is provided for either sensor. These correspond closely to what is on DryEasy's web site. Kudos to these comparative sites.

3.            We had previously complained that DryEasy had given no practical measure to its claim of "extra loud sound," which is very deceiving. We found nothing about this on DryEasy's web site, but noticed that in their Amazon.com listing they stated:

"Support max. loudness of 85 db."
Loudness is a function of the amplitude (size) of the sound waves, and dissipates (becomes smaller) over distance. The loudness statement provided is meaningless. Can this 85 dB loudness be heard if the alarm is held attached to the ear, or what distance from the ear? Avoiding stating the distance at which the 85 dB loudness can be measured is a very convenient way of possibly misleading the naive reader. If the seller has adequate technical knowledge, he/she should understand the need to provide meaningful information instead of something that is deceitful and incomplete and can be misunderstood.

4.            So let us examine DryEasy's listing on Amazon.com:
Apart from matters mentioned earlier, we note that
a.            There is no Country of Origin. Apparently the DryEasy originates nowhere, or everywhere! If so, perhaps that should be claimed.

b.            Shipping Weight: 1.6 ounces. This is impossible as the alarm itself weighs more than that.

c.             Clicking on the seller DryEasy's name on Amazon.com takes us to a details page, which provides no information about DryEasy (as mentioned in 1. earlier).

d.            On this details page we note that the Shipping ETA to  a Continental U.S. Street address is 17 - 28 days. Surprise! The typical Amazon customer in the U.S. expects to receive purchased items in a few days . Does the average person buying this device on Amazon realize that it may take 3 to 4 weeks to receive it? Why does the seller not clearly state on Amazon that they are located in China (an assumption on our part) and shipping from China after the order is received. Consequently it will take several weeks for the buyer to receive the product from China. Attempting to keep this hidden unless the reader does some detective work on the Amazon site is very deceiving. 

5.            For other bedwetting alarms sold on Amazon.com, there is an "Answered Questions" section in which readers can ask about the product. We notice that this has disappeared for DryEasy, together with many other relevant facts about this device. We can only conclude that this is part of DryEasy's deception campaign on Amazon.

6.            DryEasy and its parent company are not registered with the FDA. By U.S. law, any bedwetting alarm sold in the U.S. and shipped from a U.S. location, and its related facility must be registered with the FDA. Any reader who wishes to check whether a bedwetting alarm and/or related facility is registered with the FDA in the U.S. can look at:

http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfrl/rl.cfm
and enter the Product Code  KPN  which is the FDA code for "alarm, conditioned response enuresis" which is a bedwetting alarm. A complete list of all registered parties and items will be shown from the FDA database. DryEasy and its parent company are not registered and listed. Consequently any buyer of the DryEasy buying it from a U.S. shipping source (including Amazon) is aiding and abetting in the violation of U.S. laws until and unless this item is properly registered with the FDA.
 

7.            DryEasy is currently listing for $24.90 on Amazon.com (+ $4.54 shipping with typical arrival 17 to 28 days after the order is placed). We have already expressed our feelings about this deception. Now we point out that on its web site DryEasy is offered at a price of US $49.95 . There is nothing wrong in DryEasy offering it on Amazon for approximately one-half of its normal sale price. But it does make us wonder about the viability of the DryEasy seller if he is selling it in the U.S. for one-half of its normal price.

It is appropriate to raise the issue of how the buyer/user will get warranty or other support from the DryEasy seller if the seller proves to be unresponsive, as the seller has carefully hidden his exact location (full street address) and telephone number so that the seller can be verified and contacted as needed. This, too, is suggestive of the seller wishing to hide his identity from buyers so that he cannot be contacted directly. Again, very deceiving in our opinion.

We believe that DryEasy's continuing behavior in providing incomplete product information and hiding from its public is very deceiving, and strongly recommend that the public be cautious about doing business with an unknown entity. 


Very Strong Deceit by Perversion and Concealment.

2 comments:

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