Rise of trade issues, what the fuck?
 

Ok, I've been sitting on this for a couple of months now but now I'm just too pissed to do so anymore.

I've been registered here for 7 years and I was lurking a few more before that. Never has there been so many issues posted up than in 2011.

We used to get a few a year, but now we seem to get a few a month. Just right now there are around few a month.

As a seller I have no issues with dealing with new people, but unfortunately, as of now, I will no longer buy from people with less than a year on their join date and at least a few successful high value deals in their feedback.

Still, even then, this is only a stop gap solution and doesn't address the core issue.

Over the next days I'll look into all the incidents I can get my hands on and try to distill something useful.

Still, every solution I can think of either violates user privacy to an extent or has other undesirable effects. Besides, I don't think anyone here is register friendly.

Right now, my better suggestions would be to restrict posting privileges of newer users, a sponsor system and an escrow system.

I would also appreciate it if people who have had a previous transaction go south pm me the case info, mainly resolution methods and results. You are more than welcome to PM me this info or post it here, just remember to clear any personal info if you post it publicly.

If you know of a case not on the following list, please send me a link to the thread.

Discuss.

By order of thread creation date:

2011
August 13th 128871
July 25th 127890
July 25th 127897
July 22nd 127785
June 23rd 126443

2010
October 7th 112129
August 29th 110062
August 23rd 109712
April 10th 102065
April 1st 101460

2009
September 30th 91110
August 18th 88146

2008

2007

2006
Janurary 30th 20444

2005

2004

2003 and previous


Search terms covered:
Trade issue
Trade issues
Trade dispute

There's a reason I will now only buy shit from a reputable ASC dealer. I'd say 75% of the private buys I've done through the classifieds have been fucked in some way or another. They range from the seller not thoroughly inspecting an item before sending it to me and thus it's not 100% as described, to sellers knowingly shipping me physically broken guns. My favorite was a gun that had the entire front RIS epoxied onto the body. That one spent a day in a machine shop being fixed.

All of these transactions are more than a year old though. I wonder if people are just a) reporting it more, b) we just have more inventory moving through ASC classifieds and thus the rate of problems has gone up, or c) people are in fact scamming more.

It would be interesting, though probably not possible, to see if the trade dispute amount vs. "sold" item amount has remained consistent or if it is in fact going up.

It's also of interest to note (at least for myself) than in the last year or two the quality of people at airsoft games has declined significantly... it's the main reason I barely play anymore. Coincidence?

yeah I carry those sentiments... end of last month I made 6 purchases... I only received tracking numbers on Half of them

currently I am chasing 2 people for tracking numbers for purchases that should be here by now...

it's kinda sad how many people think "yeah I shipped it" suffices after they have your money in their hands and you sit there wondering WTF is going on.

if you don't ship right away cause life got in the way, fine, we're all people , we all understand .. I've never blown up at someone that had something come up and had to take a few more days to ship... but show me the same damn curtisy and gimme the proof you didn't walk away with my cash.


Edit: I've been saved the increase in the bullshit appearing of non satisfactory "like brand new" things being sold by just buying broken guns to begin with LOL

I think it's moreso the "randoms" that make the trade issues. Sure once in a while it will be a fairly reputable member (ie. the whole thing with Lerch who was even in the CF.... AFAIK the 2 people he owes money/items to still haven't gotten their stuff) but for the most part they're usually just "randoms" that get AV'ed and don't really do anything much in the local scene.

I would maybe propose implementing some sort of system where the potential member would have to attend say 2 or 3 games before being able to be AV'ed? Maybe moving to something like the UK system so that players would have to have "proof" of them being players who are serious and plus you meet people and they can vouch or at least have better contact info in case a trade does go south (ie. just had a baby and needs to deal with other things first, or got movement orders and is getting a friend/family member to complete trade).

I knew there was a reason why I took the time to learn SPSS lol.

I'll be able to do the analytics correctly once I know I got enough raw data. I'll also try to pull some numbers from the feedback system, but I'll need staff support on this. Still trying to figure out if it's worth it because people are spineless and don't provide negative feedback on sour deals.

So I guess this brings us to the first thing to fix...

LEAVE FUCKING NEGATIVE OR NEUTRAL FEEDBACK IF YOU FEEL THE TRADE HAS GONE BAD, YOU ARE PROTECTED FROM RETALIATION BY ASC RULES.

I've had nothing but good deals since 2002 here on ASC; heck I even ship items before I receive payment so I can bill for exact postage, assuming a user has good feedback.

I'm seeing a lot of the problems being new players dealing with each other, and issues arise due to poor communications or players selling broken gear. Also way too many new players who get av'd and have a tiny hiccup in a transaction are too quick on the draw when it comes to posting their dirty laundry in the General section ie:

"Ultra Noob screwed me, won't answer emails, tracking number doesn't work"

Only after about ten posts does the author then admit that it's only been two days since they sent the money, and the seller was just at the cottage for the weekend....

No. It's all about SAS, it's like an all in one, although I do like Minitab and SPSS for the "point and click"/intuitive interface. (I learned SPSS first since I took "social science statistics" at uni first).

Would love to see the data for sure.

Yes some of them seem petty but honestly if your going to sell somthing you should have the mindset of the next guy as well. Things like:

What would I expect out of a deal? Do I want a tracking number or just to be told its shipped?

Would solve alot of this crap.

Though there are some people that do need to realize that 48hrs to ship is common. People work weird hours and have messy lives. I dont get off till well after the post office is close and to be able to get to one before work would take me well over 2 hours out of my way of an already long day (love my wife very much for shipping my stuff out :D).

Little bit of fore thought on both side would end most of this crap.

I never needed more horsepower than SPSS, though for this I don't really see more than a short Excel-fu session ahead.

The numbers of nubby players trying to passed on broken shitty guns as lightly used are increasing THAT is totally a new level of bullshit. Players quality declining? well that ship has been dropping off it's cargo since clearsoft become more available to kiddies, call me an old fart or a miserable fucking elitist but all this bullshit can be managed if we had been a bit more stringent on who we let into our hobby. All this bullshit didn't exist back when I started playing in 89. crying about being shot pointblank, hot gun, full auto, and the rest of that bullcrap that occurs in the games today it rarely exist when it does showed up we simply stomped it so fucking hard that the offending party moved on to more passive shooting hobby such as paintball or nerfgun. New players should shut the fuck up, play more and troll less airsoft isn't something you can learn from being behind a monitor.

Well, tracking the threads all over the place brings me to my second request, a trade dispute sub-forum. Right now there are no clear place to make disputes so they appear all over.

i think a trade dispute forum is a great idea, i personally would put it in the restricted age section, and if not solved then have it moved to the general.

id like to say we should have volenteers to help out with long distant trade diputes. stocko is currently doing this for me. im not saying a lynching party, but a group of guys in major areas willing to go to the homes of the accused and sort things out face to face.

its easy to ignore a pm, not so easy to ignore people at your door!

Holy shit, are you people that new to internet deals..
Just like the game/ engagement ask questions, if you dont know ASK
Help Is here
Pm anyone here

To justify myself I'm a eBay member since 1999
All positive

Ha! Mine is from 98 but I traded hockey and MTG cards all the way back from 93. On Compuserve.

So yeah :D