Telephoto lens flop

I'm very impressed with Matilda Tertius, my new Sony smartphone camera. The picture quality is much better than anything I achieved with my little Fuji F31fd and compares very well indeed with my Canon SX500 bridge camera but only if I don't use the zoom facility. As I mentioned in an earlier post, Matilda doesn't have an optical zoom, so the more one zooms in on a subject, the poorer the picture quality becomes. Consequently, for my frequent countryside walks, I've been leaving the rather bulky Canon at home, snapping most photos with Matilda and taking along the Fuji, just in case it's needed.

One possible solution to my Two Camera problem would be a clip-on zoom lens. I had a look through Amazon's offerings but most were fixed magnification telephoto lenses. I particularly wanted a zoom lens, so that I could compose the shots properly. Just one seemed to fit the bill and it had some good reviews (4½ stars out of 5). Here's a typical comment:
I wasn't sure about this zooming lenses - now that I've tried it I can say it's great. It's really easy to build in your phone as it's just a clip. The zoom is great and it's ideal if you want to take pictures out in the nature. I will definitely bring it with me every time I go out for a hike...

Great! A fellow hiker likes it, so I placed my order, adding a few other odds and ends to get free postage.

What a disappointment! Despite its description, it was simply a fixed 12x magnification, variable focus telephoto lens. I conclude that its many review fans don't know the difference between a zoom lens and a telephoto.

However, having taken the trouble to get it, I decided to put it through its paces. Aligning it with Matilda's lens was fairly simple and once in position, the clip held it fairly firmly in place. At £15.50, I certainly wasn't expecting high quality results, but if there was some improvement on Matilda's digital zoom quality then it might be worth keeping.

I went down to Lydney Dock in search of a suitable subject, settling on the old lock keeper's house at the end of the Gloucester - Sharpness Canal, some 1½ miles away.

Here's the view, photographed using Matilda at normal magnification. Incidentally, I haven't photo-enhanced these, nor even corrected the lopsided horizon as I don't think any will make it into my photo collection. All I've done is to trim them in order to simplify comparison.

Now here's the zoomed-in view with the Canon bridge camera. Despite the somewhat misty conditions, it's nice and sharp and, importantly, everything is in focus.

And here it is with the Fuji.  Not quite as sharp but, to my mind, an acceptable result.

Finally, here is the result with the clip-on lens. I took some care to focus on the lock keeper's house, but see how blurred the leaning post is on the left and the notice board on the right. And see how distorted that yacht boom is.  No way was I going to keep this thing!

To Amazon's credit, there never is any problem in returning purchases to them. I gave my reason for returning as an inaccurate description – manifestly not a zoom lens – and was immediately sent a printable post-paid returns label. Two days later, and before the lens would have arrived at their warehouse, my account was credited in full. Other mail order companies could learn a lot from service like that.