Sale fell through-was I reasonable?

[Rapidnick]

Firstly I want this to be anonymous. I do not wish to identify the seller or the item involved.
The situation is that an item has come up on the bbs which is of interest to me. Unfortunately the seller lives a very long way away and although in good standing as far as I know has a very small number of posts the vast bulk of which involve sales. I don't know him and neither do I know anyone who knows him.
I offered the full asking price provided that the seller sent me the goods first. The amount involved is substantial-we are not talking about a few pounds but a good number of hundreds of pounds. I promised that if the item was as described I would either send him a cheque or would pay the money directly into his bank account. As a matter of interest I have done this several times recently and the newbie sellers were happy to send the item first and of course they were paid without delay once the item was received.
I once lost a considerable amount of money on here-some of you know the circumstances-most of which is still outstanding and I will NOT be caught again. I would rather leave an item than take the risk. The seller as it seems to me is taking relatively little risk compared with the risk I would be taking sending him the money first.
Do you agree with what I did?

[JERICO]

That would be between you and seller, If I was the seller I would have laughed at you.

People can get stung both ways.

[Zico]

Yep.. Id do the same. You have nearly 7 thousand posts on here and all he has to do is check back your previous deals.. something you cant do with him. In his defence It may be hard for a newbie to come onto a forum and realise that conmen aren't tolerated, they simply dont last on here... so I can understand his reluctance also. One of these things.

[Cynergy]

Agree with where your coming from Nick but I would'nt send good's of that value out without payment first (unless it was you of course )

[Punchsteve]

I agree with what you requested. As a long term member of good standing, I think your request was a reasonable one.

However, I can't really blame the seller much for refusing either, as you are a perfect stranger to him, as are the people who would vouch for you. To be honest, when I was new here, I would not have agreed to it either.

Is there not anyone who lives nearby the seller who could act as a 'middleman' to inspect the rifle and pay the man then post it on to you Nick?

[delta1]

I would not send anything without prepayment to someone I did not know personally.

There are a few people on here I would be happy to trust with my house key, everyone else pays first.

[SuffolkRifle]

I can see where your point of view is from, and as it's several hundreds of £'s, personally, I think I would have tried to set up a face to face, half way or so.
I can also see the other guys point as well, they are being asked to send a valuable item off, with no guarantees of getting their money (I know you've been caught before and that you have loads of posts here, but they may have been caught as well, not necessarily on here, by somebody who had 'loads of posts') stalemate - see about meeting half way, petrol / travel costs would be a small percentage surely?

[GEOFF]

The only other way would be for you to find a member close to the seller that you trusted to view the items on your behalf and send him the money so he could post it on to you, if he saw any problems with item take photos and send them, its your call if you wish to purchase it after that.

[John Henry 1]

Exactly correct IMO, with a long standing and many posts as yours there is little risk to a seller, whilst there is a great deal of risk for the buyer, trading with a newbie. I have, on a couple of occasions done the same and have been virtually told to 'take a hike', no deal was done. Newbies have got to understand that there have been too many rip offs of late by new members trading on their first post, and have got to either deal face to face, send goods first or not sell. Many well established members can back their offer with other members that they have successfully traded with, newbies can't do that.

[DJP]

To be honest, I've often wondered about the logic of sales etiquette:

The usual is for the buyer to send the payment and then when it clears the seller (hopefully) sends the item.

But why is it considered more acceptable that way round? It appears that it's OK for the seller not to trust the buyer to send payment, yet the buyer is expected to trust the seller to send the goods.

That just doesn't stand up to logical scrutiny.

I'd suggest that there is a pecking order here. Simply put, the member with the longer standing is the lesser risk (if for no other reason than because a quick search will reveal what they're like to deal with), whereas a newbie is a relatively unknown quantity.

So no, I don't think that you've done wrong at all. Trust has to be earnt: You have and they ain't. End of.

[Shed tuner]

Agree with dave, it;s unbalancewd wither way.

I'd suggest asd you said.

By way of compromise, I might consider sending half payment first, seller sends good, then send balance - reduces one exposure.

However with a newbie and a big chunk of money, I'd as soon walk rather than risk it.

[JERICO]

When I was a newbie I did a couple of swaps on the classifieds, after a few days I contacted one of the members who I was doing a deal with to find out if he had posted said item, he replied no as he was waiting for what I had for sale to arrive.

As the seller I was waiting for payment and would not post until my item had arrived where as the other member was doing the same.

We sorted it out in the end what with E feedback and links to other forums.


As a newbie you do not know anyone from this forum, you may have a million post count but in the real world could be a conman, the same as the seller could be.

[GEOFF]

Not being funny but Bones was a well respected member and look what happen there
http://www.airgunbbs.com/forums/show...ighlight=bones

[Flannelmeister]

Well I'm pretty much a newbie here myself so am prepared to get flamed here but, like it or not, the established protocol on the net (largely because of a well known auction site) is you pays your money and then your goods get sent.

If you aren't happy with that then really you have to ask yourself if it is worth a bit of petrol and a day to meet up if it is a hard to get or valuable item.

The other avenue of course is to arrange a paypal payment so you can make a claim if it goes pear-shaped.

It is a difficult situation though.

[davy jones]

Not being funny but Bones was a well respected member and look what happen there
http://www.airgunbbs.com/forums/show...ighlight=bones

You make a point which may have long term consequences for us all. Nick, I think you were being reasonable asking for what you did, but consider this:

Newbie signs up to the forum with genuine good intentions. Doesn't know anyone here, and lists something for sale. Complete stranger asks out of the blue for him to go against standard web selling protocol and send his item away without payment.

I can understand why the chap might say no. It is a difficult one for sure, but as someone else said, if it is a big money deal, it may be worth meeting face to face.