Keep the comments coming guys, I need the input to do a good re-write of the selling guidelines. As a clarification, as Chris said, the original intent of the rule about "no other offers" was to stop the backdoor PM deals that were going on back when I first had to implement these rules. It had become a real problem at that time. I was not thinking about selling on another web site or locally, and I still believe that you should be able to advertise your part on as many resources as you wish.. my only concern is seller's conduct in this venue. JW
Comment... Lose the word "guidelines", replace with the word "rules". The currently vague and gray areas have to become black or white, 0 or 1, yin or yang, on or off, what have you. In other words, get rid of potential issues that arise due to interpretation. Take interpretation out of it by being specific. Easy concept, Hell to implement. Devon
I wasn't going to post on here, but I feel my recent transaction probably helped spark this thread. Looking back, I could have handled the whole thing better. I was vague with my explanation on that thread, so maybe I should elaborate here. I posted 'in line" on an ad for a car. I believe I was 5th or 6th on the list. After not receiving an email, PM, or public response on the thread, I called the number and left a message. The guy returned my call not long after. I asked him a few questions about the car. After getting the details I needed, I asked where I was in order since he hadn't replied to the thread or even been online since. I figured most guys that showed interest had called him anyway since he stated he wasn't here that often and to just call him. He replied, "Nobody has made a commitment to look at or buy the car." He made no mention of sending CDs with pics in the mail to other guys that were interested (Who does that anyway? Can't pics just be emailed?). I figured he had at least spoke to the others since it really wasn't that hard for me to get him on the phone. I really didn't intend to jump the line. Although, as a potential buyer, I don't feel as though I should be the one to keep track of "who's up", either. Was I at fault? I think so. I should have gotten better information from him as to what was going on with the guys ahead of me. Combine that with the fact that the guy never checked his ad or posted updates turned the whole deal into a circus. I think the best place for his car on here was in the leads section like mentioned by others before. On the other end, I also think the "in line" rule is heavily abused. Go into any of the parts and cars for sale ads and you'll see just how often the first or second in line passes on the item. I understand things happen or shipping is too crazy expensive, but come on. If you're getting "in line" to think about it, you shouldn't be getting in line, period. It's called respect, a big part of what makes the people on this board special. All too often, deals get held up and real buyers end up going elsewhere. It happened on the car I bought. My apologies to everybody that was ahead of me on the car.
I've done this and had it done for me. I really don't see the problem? Every time I have done this, it was for a member here, even though I wrote "in line for a friend". The times it was done for me they wrote "in line for Guy Parquette". Point is, what's wrong with this if it's for a member that you know is looking for that part? I think it's called being nice and helping someone out...
Never liked the whole "in line" thing. I understand it's a privately owned board so the owner can enforce whatever rules he wants. I've sold a couple of small parts and bought the same, but don't think I would ever go through the hassle of selling or buying a car here. I haven't tried Ebay, but Craigslist is just as bad full of tire kickers who tend to waste a bunch of your time. I think the board rules work fine for parts, but honestly I've found the only decent format for selling a car to be an auction. That's how I've sold my last two "classic" cars. I don't think the haggling needed for a traditional car sale works very well when combined with the "in line" rule on this board as it simply takes too much time to complete the sale and for most of us time is money. But again it's a private forum and resource, so since I don't like that method I choose not to use it when looking to buy or sell a vehicle.
not hell .. quite easy and already stated I will repeat myself ... FIRST WORD IN POST IS EITHER SOLD or INTERESTED anything else can come after it .. anything before it disqualifies it
From time to time I have sold some regular (as in not especially hard to find) used parts here and it has frequently turned into a hassle. I often get people posting "Interested" and when this happens in the beginning of a for sale ad all it does is push the time for the sale back. I usually wait 1-2 days for the guy to respond then move to the next guy. There have been times where I have done this for 2 weeks until the part is sold, or I remove the post. Now there are a lot of people that are interested in parts, and we are all adults here, but my suggestion is if you are not seriously interested in something then don't post anything and let someone else that needs it step forward. There have been times that I spent so much time selling something that it wasn't worth it. This board is loosing many good parts sales to e-bay for just this reason, ie the dragging out of sales. Now I have always refused to do e-bay. I have always sold parts at a reasonable price, and made a lot of friends along the way. The idea of squeezing out the last dollar on a part, and making all your friends bid on it is not appealing to me. However, I can certainly see where it would get rid of a lot of hassle. Over the years through selling parts at over a thousand car shows (it used to be my job) I have met thousands of tire kickers. How about we get adult about all this and ask that only the people seriously interested about a part post on the ads here, and give them 1 day or less to complete the sale. If for some reason they cannot complete it, then it moves to the next person. This "interested" thing should go. Duane
The beauty is, you know this going in and fortunately there are other venues to sell in auction format and you still have the "leads" section to advertise here :TU:
Guy, you're right, it is very nice...if he's a member PM him..I give ya credit for taking care of friends but be the seller, and with the rules already in place, now i have to wait for someone i dont know, and every single time...it fell thru, and 3 days later...i'm wondering what happened and most of the people in line drop off...and lets be honest, most buys are impulse buys..give them 2 or 3 days and they go cold..i wanna sell it... when i list something....ive worked to sell it...im ready to sell it, 99% of the time its already boxed...i feel i dont have to wait for a non-member..because when it comes down to it..I'M always cheaper than anyone...always, i give deals on this board i would never give to locals or ebay...never..it's giving back...sometimes, i give weird stuff away, or if someone wants a bunch, 1/3 of the stuff i give to them if its trinkets..i give back..i may not donate money, but the member gets a GOOD deal from me AND...ive never really had a problem here as far as selling..i send you something, it isnt right, i will pay shipping both ways...IT SHOULDNT COST ANYONE MONEY TO DO BUSINESS WITH ME IF I DONT DESCRIBE IT RIGHT....
I think the majority of the time the policies are followed by most members, but agree the 48 hour rule is too long. Sellers get frustrated waiting on buyers so over time, the "cash is king" mentality has set in. I think the buyers that are only "interested" are a much bigger problem than the very few sellers that have broken the rules lately. Charging a fee for sellers won't fix the problem, it will only limit the amount of sellers. I say change the policy to 24 hours and give the seller a little more hope when people are lining up and let's see how it works. Or we can we just nominate Chris Scaling to be the Mod??? :laugh: but only halfway kidding! :TU:
I think as a seller you should be able to say along with your picture, price, and location the desired time an inline buyer needs to decide before moving on. 24 hours is plenty of time if you pm them a phone number. As for friends it should be members only and should be called out by name. It's great to help a friend but not everyone is doing it for a "friend" like they say they are. Let's not plead ignorance or start putting halos on our heads.
I think it weeds out the scammers for sure...one thing is, if they pay, they arent going to make their first post for part for sale and disappear..they are probably sticking around look thru the classifieds..how many are first post or less than 5...A BUNCH...whats that mean? I still like the idea of new members cant sell unless they have X amount of posts....i'm not sure where, but i belong there, and it keeps the riff raff out
Its with a K jimmy! Hmmm, I wonder why we had to start these rules JAMES:laugh::laugh: Ok I won't spill the beans. The statement Duane made is a huge on going problem, I have seen it here many time and also seen a lot on e-bay back when you could see who the other bidders were. Duane's statement: "How about we get adult about all this and ask that only the people seriously interested about a part post on the ads here, and give them 1 day or less to complete the sale. If for some reason they cannot complete it, then it moves to the next person" I will repeat this again, NO way am I going to almost EVER going to jump on a for sale thread and say I will take it unless I trust the person is on the same page as me when it comes to condition and even that can be tough because I have done it and got the part and seen things that were not mentioned in the thread. Or if you can see its a new part. IE: I bought a set of rods and pistons from a board member a long time ago and got these NEW rods and they had been stored in a damp climate with news paper wrapped around them. The rods were rusty and the pistons were white and to this day the board member has never returned a pm and I see he sold a set of "ported" heads for close to $3000 that when flow tested after the new owner got them the heads flowed waaaaay less then a set out of the box with nothing other then a valve job. So no one here is going to tell me how to spend my money by way of saying I can't ask for follow up/more pics/info before I send money. And I think this is not out of line because you can do the same thing on ebay, racing junk, news paper add etc etc. I think the 3rd party buying is also in there under the slowing down the sale subject and that is a fact. Why you are busy trying to track down you buddy to tell him about then set up a time to go look at the car together etc etc or to find out after you track him down that he found one at the swap meet. And its not always a board member that ends up with the car or parts either. I am speaking of the things I have seen first hand........ ---------- Post added at 11:58 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:49 AM ---------- You hit the nail right on the head! This is what I am talking about right here. V8buick has its inner circle going on and some of those people can buy part lots and move then around on v8buick with out even posting adds, these rules are hard to work with when selling some of the volume of parts they are trying to move. For a flipper I can see why some of these rules slow them down.... ---------- Post added at 12:02 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:58 AM ---------- Its often because that board has a rule for newbe's that they can control within the program they are using and you can't post pic's or try to buy or sell until you have made 5-10 post. Its common to see this now days.....
Once again, this "48 hour rule" is v8buick urban legend. No time constraints were ever imposed on sellers. 48hours was a "suggested" time frame for waiting to get in touch with a buyer. There is nothing in the current rules that prevents a seller from establishing his own time line for the sale.. If you want to sell an item quick, then say so... and limit the time from "interested" to "sold" to an hour or two.. or whatever. But it has been my experience in selling hundreds of thousands of dollars of Buick parts and work over the last decade, if you get too pushy, you will lose the sale often, especially on a big ticket item. Be interested in communication, make it a priority, but don't be pushy. That's exactly the motivation for me "suggesting" 48 hours before moving to the next in line. But there is no rule that would prevent you from going thru the "in line" list of buyers in hours... only common sense would prevent that. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Next question.. should there be some type of constraint on "getting in line".. which could be: 1.Some charge, which would eventually end up going to the seller, one way or the other. Good idea? If so, what amount? how to handle it, the board's paypal could do it, but we would pay the fees. Bad idea? Too much hassle? 2. Some time of limit on how many times you can "get in line", and penalties for exceeding that--- How many times, what penalty? JW
How do you enforce rule #3? "Work with the interested parties to complete the sale, in the order that they showed interest in your item." Key words are " in the order that they showed interest"
That rule was put in place in response to what was going on back then, which was this: Seller places an ad 1st buyer responds via pm 2nd buyer responds via PM, with a better offer 1st buyer never hears back from the seller. The idea was to work with one buyer at a time, till a deal was struck, or not, and then move to the next guy. But notice, in that rule, or any other, you will not see "You must wait 48 hours to move to the next buyer"... I have seen a lot of posts that make me think that the perception was exactly that.. wait two days to sell to someone else. That is simply not true. JW
Here is another one to look at. I have seen many times where someone goes on to another persons posted for sale add and says " if this one doesn't work out I have one to sell you" Or and this one has happened to me a bunch of times is: when you post that you are interested in a part on someone's thread, you start getting pm's from other board members saying they can sell you one for less money. I think that accounts for some people backing out also.......
