Woman pays salesman $109 for 7.8kg Mao Shan Wang, gets 5kg of 'impostor' durians instead

A woman paid a salesman $109 for 7.8kg of Mao Shan Wang and Jinfeng durians but found out later that she was ripped off.

Not only did the three durians weigh only 5kg in total, the durians were not even Mao Shan Wang and Jinfeng quality at all.

The incident happened at the woman’s flat in Block 112 Jurong East Street 13 last Friday afternoon (Nov 17). 

The woman, Ms Chen, 66, had wanted to buy some durians for her younger brother who was visiting  from Australia that night, reports Lianhe Wanbao. 

Knowing that her brother was a durian fanatic, Ms Chen bought two Mao Shan Wang durians and another Wang Zhong Wang durian from a trusted supplier a day before his arrival. 

However, she was worried that they would not be fresh and decided to buy more durians from a salesman who had shown up at her doors the following day (Nov 17).

Ms Chen told Lianhe Wanbao that the salesman was guy, seemingly in his 30s. 

He allegedly told Ms Chen he had only five more durians in his inventory, and he needed to sell them before he could call it a day. 

The prices were cheap, and the man quoted each kilogram of Mao Shan Wang to cost $14, while each kilogram of Jinfeng cost $12. 

He pleaded for Ms Chen to get a few durians from him so he would be able to knock off from work early. 

Said Ms Chen: "Although I had gotten durians the day before, I decided to get two more Mao Shan Wang durians and a Jinfeng durian just to help him."

After taking down Ms Chen’s orders, the man left for a while and came back with another man, seeming in his 20s, carrying two bags of durians. 

According to Ms Chen’s observation, there were at least 10 durians inside the bags. The man then handed three durians over to Ms Chen and weighed them in front of her.

He told her that the durians weighed 7.8kg and would cost her $109. Ms Chen paid the money and was handed the durians. 

She added: "After carrying the durians into the house, I felt something was amiss. How were they so light?

"So I decided to place the durians on a weighing scale and found that they only weighed 5kg."

After doing some calculation, Ms Chen found that the man had charged her an extra $40. 

What’s more infuriating, she said, was that the durians were not Mao Shan Wang or Jinfeng durians. 

Ms Chen wanted to share her experience to warn the public about the durian salesmen.