Windows not activated - laptop in China

Bought a Mecer laptop for my sister who was leaving to China from a dealer on bidorbuy. When my sister got to China, we discovered that Windows was not activated. The dealer contacted Mustek who informed me that we needed to reset the PC as the key was embedded in the BIOS. I did that, still did not work. Then I did a clean install which also did not work. A technician at Mustek connected to the laptop via teamviewer who also was not able to activate Windows. It seems that a Windows 10 key was not embedded in the BIOS. Their solution is that I send back the laptop all the way from China at great cost, instead of supplying me with a different key. I don't expect items to be faulty out of the box and Mustek should be doing more to fix the problem.