Looking for advice . . . think someone scammed me for basically worthless chips (2 Viewers)

Brookston

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EDITED: After reading the responses I started looking into this person more, and the threads they are posting in, and realized that they are in the middle of doing a lot of stuff for a lot of people on this forum, and I'm guessing they just didn't see or have time to respond to me. Thanks everyone who responded, and especially for the PMs trying to guess who it is, no-one guessed correctly, but that was some fun reading.

A while back I posted to the classifieds looking for someone with a complete set of color samples to help me identify the colors of some chips I have. They agreed to help, and I sent off a box containing 34 random chips. The plan was they would identify the colors of those chips for me, and then send the box back to me. I included a return shipping label in the box to make it easy.

They were sent Oct 25th and according to the tracking arrived on the 28th. Now more than a month later I have yet to hear anything back from this person. I've asked for an update three times in the last month and have been ignored.

This is a well known member of the community as far as I can tell, with a 100% feedback score. I've checked on their profile page and they are on the forum at least once a day and making posts so I know they have received my instant messages.

It seems like such a small number of chips to steal, and all different colors to boot. Should I try to publicly shame them by revealing their name to everybody? It's not like I'm especially attached to the chips I sent, although a few of them were number 100 of a full rack, so I'm stuck with 99 chips of some of the colors.

What would you do?
 
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It’s possible, although unlikely, that their PMs aren’t working properly. I know that’s happened to others. If you know someone that often seems to transact with that person, you could keep it private and try involving that third party. Otherwise, posting a thread and assuming positive intent could work.
 
If you've been messaging this person for a month, I see no issue with going public. IMO, it's bad form, whether it's for $20 worth of stuff, or $2000 worth of stuff. Maybe there's a good explanation, maybe you'll get your stuff back, maybe they'll be revealed as someone who may be untrustworthy. Either way, it's not bad for the community.
 
It’s possible, although unlikely, that their PMs aren’t working properly. I know that’s happened to others. If you know someone that often seems to transact with that person, you could keep it private and try involving that third party. Otherwise, posting a thread and assuming positive intent could work.
This seems like a good intermediate step.
 
although a few of them were number 100 of a full rack, so I'm stuck with 99 chips of some of the colors.

What would you do?

This says you really went out of your way to help a fellow member out.
After 3 attemps...and 1 month of non-communication...I think you are in your right to post this.
Give him/her 24h to receive feedback....should this member still not react while posting/visiting the forum, you could post who is involved.
 
This says you really went out of your way to help a fellow member out.
After 3 attemps...and 1 month of non-communication...I think you are in your right to post this.
Give him/her 24h to receive feedback....should this member still not react while posting/visiting the forum, you could post who is involved.
As I understand it, the other member actually agreed to help the OP buy getting identifying the colors of some of his chips. Now @Brookston is left with several racks of 99 chips, plus he's missing other chips.
 
As I understand it, the other member actually agreed to help the OP buy getting identifying the colors of some of his chips. Now @Brookston is left with several racks of 99 chips, plus he's missing other chips.
:banghead: sorry, I guess I worded it incorrectly...but that is what I was saying.
Breaking multiple racks is going out of your way to help someone out.
This should be followed up by the receiver to handle this favour with the uppermost respect
 
As a rather new member to this community, I’d definitely want to know if someone I’m potentially transacting with lacks communication/integrity, especially when almost 100% of purchases are based on trust.

If you know someone that often seems to transact with that person, you could keep it private and try involving that third party.

This seems to be the first step before doing anything else. Other folks who’ve made contact with that person may be able to help and reach out on your behalf.

Give him/her 24h to receive feedback....should this member still not react while posting/visiting the forum, you could post who is involved.

If all other communication paths fail, this. Post a thread on the situation with the persons name and give him/her an opportunity to get back to you publicly. Take it down immediately when it’s been resolved. Very well may be a misunderstanding but if every comm from you to the person has failed continuously for over a month, I feel the reaction’s warranted. Hate to be in this situation, but what if there was more at stake? Gl with everything.
 
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This is a well known member of the community as far as I can tell, with a 100% feedback score. I've checked on their profile page and they are on the forum at least once a day and making posts so I know they have received my instant messages.

What would you do?

Do you have any other means of contacting this person aside from PCF (email, phone, etc.)? If so, it would be advisable to make as many attempts as reasonably possible in the next week or so, and each time point to this thread and let this person know they're going to be named publicly if they don't respond by xxx date. Document all attempts. If nothing else, you could send a letter priority signature required to this person's physical address.

It's important that we don't assume guilt or ill intent here until this person has had ample opportunity to respond.

They were sent Oct 25th and according to the tracking arrived on the 28th.

By this do you mean you sent on Oct 25 and were subsequently delivered 3 days later? Or he sent them back and you never received them?

Did you have an agreement that the package would be returned by a certain date? Maybe this person is just not done with them yet?

If this were me, I would make all efforts to make this person aware that their name is going to be publicly released if this isn't resolved in the next week or so. Unfortunately in these transactions, the honor system is all we have and the court of public opinion is our only recourse. Hopefully it won't come to that and this can get resolved swiftly.
 
Thanks everyone for your input. I'm going to try to contact them a few different ways and see if I hear back.
 
Torches and pitchfork time??
We haven’t had one of those for a least a week.

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It’s possible, although unlikely, that their PMs aren’t working properly.

Thanks everyone for your input. I'm going to try to contact them a few different ways and see if I hear back.


Unless they are blocking PM's (which you'll know when you try to send a PM) or they have left the original PM and chose "Ignore future messages" by accident, they would not get anymore messages. Try starting a new PM if you haven't already just to eliminate that possibility.
 
I don't have a dog in this fight, but it sounds like there may have been a misunderstanding somewhere along the line in your arrangement. While not overly complicated, I can see how you or the other party could get confused about some aspect of the deal.

I'd try to reach out to them one more time and advise that lack of response this time will result in their first negative feedback. Maybe they'll see this thread and you two will work something out before it gets to that.

Fingers crossed. It makes me sad that it seems like there have been so many threads like this recently.
 
Wow... I guess I am just way too laid back. Did you pay for this service or are they doing you a solid by identifying the colors of 34 random chips (likely w/edgespots)? That is going to take some time to do, and from Halloween on, things start to get more crazy leading into the Holidays. While not replying to your PM's isn't polite, it's not worth getting worked up over at this point.

Unless there was an agreed upon date for completion, I would browse the classified and enjoy our hobby. There is absolutely zero chance that anyone that another chipper would call a "well known member" would trash their reputation over 34 chips.
 
Wow... I guess I am just way too laid back. Did you pay for this service or are they doing you a solid by identifying the colors of 34 random chips (likely w/edgespots)? That is going to take some time to do, and from Halloween on, things start to get more crazy leading into the Holidays. While not replying to your PM's isn't polite, it's not worth getting worked up over at this point.

Unless there was an agreed upon date for completion, I would browse the classified and enjoy our hobby. There is absolutely zero chance that anyone that another chipper would call a "well known member" would trash their reputation over 34 chips.
You're probably right, that's why I'm asking for advice and trying not to start any drama.
 
I’m going to guess that since they were doing you a favor they just didn’t prioritize it at the top of their to-do list. I believe some long time members have more patience and view projects as long term commitments with much more time involved than newer members who want things done quickly. Also the type of person to do random favors often is the type of person to may be over committing to helping people.

I am not excusing the lack of communication only trying to reassure and offer my belief that you will probably get this sorted.

I can think of at least one member who is very reliable and very helpful and does random acts of kindness who does great things for the community but gets absolutely flooded with PMs and can take a very long time to respond because of how the queue messages/projects.
 
Wow... I guess I am just way too laid back. Did you pay for this service or are they doing you a solid by identifying the colors of 34 random chips (likely w/edgespots)? That is going to take some time to do, and from Halloween on, things start to get more crazy leading into the Holidays. While not replying to your PM's isn't polite, it's not worth getting worked up over at this point.

Unless there was an agreed upon date for completion, I would browse the classified and enjoy our hobby. There is absolutely zero chance that anyone that another chipper would call a "well known member" would trash their reputation over 34 chips.

So, you’re okay with the lack of any response? I otherwise generally agree with you but how hard is it to send a quick “gonna take a bit” PM in response to an eager fellow chipper? It isn’t hard at all so this seems odd. By this I mean the lack of response, not your input.
 

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