So I've been on the hunt for a batch of 128MB Micro SD cards (yes MB, not GB). Anyway, long story short, seller I got the last lot from has upped the price dramatically, so I start looking around.
Seems that the Aliexpress sellers are using the 128MB as a "loss-leader" primarily, so that their price in listings when you search for Micro SD is under a buck, a lot of them say either "limit 1 per ID" or want you to buy additional capacities otherwise they won't send it.
After some hunting I managed to find a couple that didn't have such limits stated but still a workable price, and put in my modest order (30 units FWIW). Now the fun starts. The seller says "oh no, we can't send, if you want to buy it, you'll have to pay extra shipping, hope you understand blah blah".
Ok, no problem, I request cancellation, "seller has changed the price".
"No friend, we did not change the price, I hope you can understand, it is limit one per ID not change price, please resume order and choose "other reasons" for cancel". (the item details do not mention any limit)
Hmmmm. Right. "you'll have to pay extra shipping", and "we did not change the price". No that's a price increase in my books, my guess is that there is a penalisation meted out by Aliexpress if a vendor changes prices, hence their insistence (multiple messages) that I should change the cancellation request to "other reasons".
I decide to just wait for the cancellation to be automatically approved when the vendor didn't respond.
Unfortunately the sneaky sneaky vendor pulled what in hindsight I should have seen coming, at almost the last moment before auto-cancelling, they rejected the cancellation, marked the order shipped, gave it a fake tracking number, and have now asked that I should dispute the order in 5 days and they will accept dispute..... hmm.
Of course, bit of an own goal for them, since once I've got my money back now I can place negative feedback, but it does mean it's going to take longer for that refund to come through now.