I’ve made an edit and highlighted what I was attempting to communicate.
It seems that all one needs to do in the UK is a gentle bit of liaising and a product is no longer available for sale in the UK. If only the ACCC was so accommodating?
As a logical conclusion that would also require Ebay to block that product in the UK Marketplace?
Alternately ZDNet is overly optimistic concerning the outcome.
P.S.
I do like the sellers excuse for not marking the rating on the product. Both the seller and you as the buyer are agreeing to potential commit an offence by mailing or carrying the 9000Ah battery on an aircraft! Must make some feel proud to be able to outwit the system.
Australians can lodge complaint with eBay directly. I am not sure how the UK version of the ACCC would block advertising on eBay, without directing Ebay to remove such advertisements. It appears that the UK success on blocking such advertisements are limited as they are still available on the global market place. … same outcome would result if one lodging a complaint with the ACCC and it took action against ‘Australian’ listed sellers (which may not be Australian). While making a request is possible, getting the desired outcome one wants necessarily isn’t.
National Trading Standards cannot help members of the public with specific complaints or advice about goods, services or specific businesses
which sounds very reminiscent of the ACCC.
It appears they might list products/services on their scam watch pages…like the Australian government does as well. Looks like they may have powers no different to our own ACCC.
The author of the original article was making a point. No doubt he knew before he placed the order that there is no such thing as a battery of that capacity that is anywhere near ‘pocketable’.
A question: why are these things rated in mAh instead of Ah? The genuine products are around the 5,000 to 30,000 mAh range, why don’t we say 5 - 30 Ah?
We could.
Note that the rechargable batteries in mobile phones, digital cameras etc follow the mAh convention. A change to Ah would likely cause more confusion for the 90+% of the population who don’t know or are not interested in the conversion.
Comment:
Convention has been to rate standard rechargable and primary cells in mAh. A wild guess is it eliminates the decimal point which some in the USA have an aversion to, (manufacturing industry not consumers). I’ve a couple of old books somewhere that talk about keeping things simple in manufacture to minimise the possibility of mistakes when the USA ramped up industrial capacity. The British also went down the same path. Number drills, wire gauges etc.
Edit - added note.
It would be a great consumer service if standard AA, C, D cells (alkaline and manganese dioxide zinc) were all labelled with a minimum C100 capacity rating. Perhaps C10 for heavy duty. Shonky as, how it is now!
My best guess (it is an educated guess not a random one) is marketing. Larger numbers are more impressive and because most electronics are rated in mAh it could sometimes be for consistency.
Some of us use m or cm for comparatively shorter distances while many are more comfortable seeing everything in mm.
These small batteries are designed to deliver current not in amps but milliamps, so it seems to me to be consistent to rate their capacity in milliamp hours.
On the other hand large batteries like for car starter motors are designed to deliver current of perhaps a hundred amps or more, so capacity in amp hours makes more sense.
[edit] I meant 27000 mAH here
For the next round I think it would be useful for both buying guide and reviews to cover: airline compatibility (usually max 27mAH afaik) & how airlines refer to Wh & most products refer to mAH - difference & conversion between the two - or links to info on same AND low current compatibility. Which products can charge bluetooth buds, smartwatches and “hearing aids” in my case. These devices have very low current pull & so if a product does not have low current or trickle charge type feature - they will shutdown & not charge the device.
Note Qantas and the other airlines provide guides on their requirements.
WH (Watt hours) measures the energy storage capacity of a battery and is the universally accepted measure.
mAH (milli Amp hours) or AH (Amp hours) is not a measure of the energy stored.
It’s best to look for a Watt Hour rating on any battery power bank product as this is what the inspecting staff will be looking for. Many of the products promoted appear to deliberately evade providing the WH capacity.
Note:
It is possible to estimate the WH capacity of a power bank by multiplying the AH or mAH capacity by the nominal cell voltage. It may not be reliable. Many power banks now market using the output power - Watt rating. It too is not a measure of the stored energy. I’ll leave this for the Choice staff to respond given, the reviews provided by Choice reveal that what is written or interpreted from the specs on a power bank is not always reliable.
My observation of the older Sony products we use is the AH ratings are for the internal battery pack. Other products appear to measure the AH capacity at the rated USB output voltage, while some appear to deliberately mislead by overstating the capacity. If there is any uncertainty or ambiguity it would be understandable a non technical airline or airport staffer might just say no. I suspect from regular flight experience pre Covid the basic screening procedure is based on only looking specifically at physically larger battery products or travellers with a number of such devices in the scanning tray. The larger and heavier a power bank or battery the more energy it can store.
“Note Qantas and the other airlines provide guides on their requirements” agreed, though my point I guess is more they are not necessarily layman friendly esp for those less technically minded I would think. So an elegant overview might be useful to the masses with some points as you & some prior posts have made in this thread. Mind you some quick searching seem to indicate to me that anything at or less than 27mAH labelled on the device would be fine.
Your point though re “looking specifically at physically larger battery products or travellers with a number of such devices in the scanning tray” is what I would also guess as the general rule of thumb & common sense, mind you I have personally found that at airport security, common sense does not always prevail
It is highly unlikely that one will have a powerbank battery which will exceed the maximum allowed for by an airline. The ones that exceed are usually large special professional batteries style batteries or those for larger devices such as power tools or mobility aids. Even larger style battery packs used in laptops (bigger than most powerbank batteries) are under the limit for travelling.
CASA sets the Australian framework for flying with batteries and has information on their website…
What is interesting to note is that:
Don’t carry spare batteries in your checked luggage, no matter what size they are.
This is because any sized battery which can contact conductive materials can short resulting in a fire.
Batteries wouldn’t be allowed in cabin luggage could be purchased. While one may still be able to fly with them, it is agreed that possibly Choice (@DenisGallagher) should make a note on their review about CASA requirements if one plans to fly with one.
Both the Qantas requirements I posted and the CASA requirements by @phb provide the most reliable advice.
It may be wise to revisit the source that is suggesting a max of 27mAh as it is not a value consistent with the advice from either of the two sources linked previously. It’s indicative of a very low powered battery such as one might be used in a heating aid.
Typical power banks and rechargable batteries provide storage capacities of 10’s of Watt hours. The CASA requirements linked offered advice on determining the Wh rating of a battery is not provided, where the battery voltage and Ah or mAh ratings are specified. Note there are other requirements that must be met depending on the type of battery (chemistry) and voltage.
Ha ha - ahh yeh, just realised from your post I am missing a few zeroes - 27"000" mAH LOL & the one I purchased myself is the pretty standard 20000. That 27000 is on a few sites I came across (sorry can’t be bothered checking again) that use a rule of thumb I think it was 3.7v to show 27000 mAH would be about 99WH (& under the airline’s 100WH). Soz if all that is totally inaccurate, I’ve moved on
Speaking of decimal points in the wrong place, does the X-Dragon External charger Portable LCD 5000000mAh reviewed by Choice here actually provide 12% of claimed capacity or 0.12%? Perhaps @DenisGallagher could advise.
Thanks to @someozi for finding some missing zeroes, it seems all was self evident. The best response remains unchanged. The Ah capacity of the pack is no assurance of approval. It also depends on the battery or output voltage the mAh or Ah rating relates to. The following previously linked offers both 3000mAh and 5000mAh on the product label, pic with link. Choose carefully.
Just an update in case anyone else does come across the thread looking into low current device recharging aka trickle charge features, to charge hearing aids, air pods, smartwatches etc…
I end up going for a VRURC 20000mAH (74wH) for $45 on Amazon au (got it $35 with a amz discount). It states trickle charge feature & I can attest it does indeed charge my Phonak aids on their own no problem. The only con I’ve found so far is the user manual gave no guidance on how to use trickle charge - toggled via long press of the power button (last digit of the LED revolves); plus dbl click power turns the pb off.
Is that necessary and how does it function?
Aside from the brand charging cable our smart wearables can charge from any USB port with 3 different brands across the family.
A bit of a bargain?
Amazon Aust were offering free shipping for first time customers at just $33.99
Especially when Cygnett and Belkin 20,000 mAh banks sit around the $80 or greater price point retail. Also heavier than the VRURC brand.
