Possible bad trader - BewareOfTom

[Satyros]

I have made a deal with user BewareOfTom for some Dungeons and Dragons books ( D&D 3.5 core books I , II , III and Draconomicon ) .

I was assured that for the agreed price ( including shipment ) I would receive the books .

I have sent the money we agreed upon . Yesterday .

It now seems that if I want the books to be sent I must send $40 more .

On top of that , after clicking on the link below ( which BewareOfTom provided initially - although I was assured that I would get the books from our private deal and that the auction would be dropped ) it seems that the auction is still going . I was also offered a refund , which I have already accepted .

Here's the link :

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/170790139488?ssP ... 1555.l2649

However , since I am being lied to , I officially suspect I am being scammed here .

All our pm's are already sent to MagicalMemories , but he seems to be offline and this is why I opened this thread .

I will accept any advice on how to proceed .

Thank you for your attention .

Stavros K.

[starslayer]

Have you read the rules here? You have to show your private messages. Were you clear on location? (Greece) The shipping charges might be an issue.

[Satyros]

I've already sent the private messages to two of the admins .

Perhaps I should ask for the thread to be deleted ?

Stavros K.

[porkuslime]

Yes, but you ALSO need to post them in this thread. SInce I was not one of the Admins PMed, I will hold off on locking and moving this thread for 24 hours.

Whom was PMed, other than MM?

[MagickalMemories]

Stavros,

I have not been online since yesterday afternoon. I see your PM's, but they arrived after 5pm, locally. Last night at home was a very busy night for me.

I find the auction part to be bothersome... even more so since he's got bids on them. It's bad form to have something available for auction AND sell it separately. If you get bids on the auction after accepting money from the private sale, you've essentially entered into 2 legally binding contracts for the same items (presuming he doesn't have multiples - which he should have told you about, if he did).

Please, post your PM's.


Eric

[Satyros]

Here are the pm's that I have sent to MagicalMemories . If you want the format to include date and time , let me know , that I may re-quote everything .

Subject: H: dnd 3.5 books, W: $$$

Hey, I have the corebooks (dmg 1, MM 1, and PHB 1) and the draconomicon all are in great shape (no bent pages, nothing ripped or torn, the character sheet and tear out ads are still in all the books!)

looking for cash, hoping for $30 each, or $75 for them all, plus shipping. Open to offers aswell

Hello ,

I'd be interested in buying all of your books if they are still available .

Could you please inform me of the postage costs to Greece ?

Do you accept PayPal ?

Just to be sure : we are talking about the 3.5 books and not the 3.0 ones , am I right ?

Thank you for your time .

Stavros K******s

well I put them them up on ebay

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/170790139488?ssP ... 1555.l2649

you could buy it now, or hope to win the auction , and I just put $20 for shipping, anyless I'll refund, anymore I'll cover

There's not a "buy it now" price in the auction .

In case my English have failed me : do you mean that I may get them right now from you for initial price posted in the thread - 75$ + 20$ shipping = 95 $ ?

How about the draconomicon ? Is it not included in the offer anymore ?

Stavros K******s

oh I forgot about that book (never put it in the auction :0)

and I set a but it now option and I see it....

I dunno, I could close the auction but for the 4 books I'd like $100 (including shipping, and for the fees for dropping an ad early)

sound good? So I'll be giving you the 3 corebooks and draconomicon for $100 shipped. and they are 100% the 3.5 edition, not 3.0

If you can guarantee that the condition of the books is mint and that they will be packed well enough to arrive in said condition I'd say we have a deal .

Do we have a deal ? Just to be sure , we are talking about u.s. dollars , yes ?

( I plan to sent the money on Tuesday or Wednesday - since Monday is a holiday here in Greece - through a friend's PayPal account . Is this ok with you ? If there's any problem with this you may send the books to his address , it is absolutely fine by me . Let me know how do you want to proceed on this .)

Hope we close the deal , thanks for your cooperation this far .

Let me if there's anything else you need from me .

Stavros K******s

Yes, I can say that their as good as you could get from a store (like they have been flipped through and used a few times, but no mustard stains like my friends books XD, and no rips or tears)

paypal is fine, and I can send to your address, and if you could pay before monday I could send them out on monday (when post office opens) so you get them sooner.

my paypal is: tom_in_dezzy77@hotmail.com

and dont worry, I'll pack them with alot of foam peanuts and bubblewrap .

ps: canadian dollars would be best, but I could take US if thats easier for you

Unfortunately , I 'll probably be able to send the money on Tuesday or Wednesday ( since I have to get in touch with the friend I mentioned earlier ) . If , however , this changes ( and I manage to get him to transfer the money earlier ) I'll let you know from here , is this ok ?

As for the money , I was talking about the money agreed upon ( I don't know if there are any differences in currency between the CAD and the USD so , I've assumed we were talking in USD ) .

*after having checked the rates*

I see that the USD and CAD are almost equal ( 0,997) , didn't know that ( thought tha USD was "stronger" ) , so it's not a problem at all to send the money in CAD .

I was just trying to figure out how much money I owe you for the deal .

It's official then , we have a deal , I won't back down , worry not .

Thanks again and check your inbox here in BT for any news .

Have a nice day .

Stavros K******s

Yup, still $100, just if I get canadian I dont have to pay to get it from american to canadian.

oh and when you pay me through paypal can you send it as a gift? if you do that neither of us pays any paypal fees, and I'll send the books as a gift also so there is a less of a chance customs would get at them

Yes , of course , I'll tell my friend ( since I will not send the money myself ) , thanks for the heads up !

Stavros K******s

On a totally unrelated note , your hometown stirs fond childhood memories of a favorite childhood comic hero ( I doubt though he was known in your side of the Atlantic ) .

Captain Mark and his Ontario Wolves

Cheers .

Stavros K******s

P.S. : What's your name by the way ?

Lol thats weird xD, and my name is Thomas McDonald

I'm having some second thoughts on the whole gift issue , let me elaborate a bit :

If I pay you as a "Gift" and something happens to the books while they're in transit, I've got nothing from PayPal to back me up, as I cannot file any claims. So, I'd be totally unprotected. I will pay as "gift" if you send first. Otherwise, I'll be happy to pay in advance, but I won't send it as a "gift" payment. Your references look good, but I still have to protect myself.

What are your thoughts on this ?

( If all goes well , I expect to transfer the funds tomorrow ) .

Have a nice day .

Stavros K******s

hmm, I guess you have a point there (didnt know how the protection things worked), could you send me like $104ish to cover the fee's on my end then? then you can send it as paying for item and get all the protection

Within the next 24 hours you will receive the agreed funds from ainigma_6@msn.com .

Please confirm that you received them as soon as you get them .

Please inform me again as soon as you ship the books .

My address is :

*irrelevant info deleted*

Thank you for your cooperation .

Stavros K******s

alright, no problem, any particular reason its gunna take 24 hours?

Friend has got to go to the bank tomorrow , he didn't make it today .

Is there a problem , any problem ?


Please let me know .

Stavros K******s

P.S. : ( I haven't checked but ) I'm assuming that the ebay auction has been withdrawn by now , after all we did agree on $5 more for its withdrawal , yes ?

well I didnt know about withdrawls so I just made a new account and bid like $2000 lol, so unless some else bids higher Ill win lol

and its alright, you just said you;d pay me today, so I expected it today

alright, well let me know but I found this out:

to ship its going to cost a MINIMUM of $60 for the slowest rate, and the only other rate is 7 days garunteed and thats $120.... so I'll refund you money, or you could pay another $40 for shipping.... just lemme know

I'll think on the matter and answer you in the next 48 hours . Please hold on to the books for now .

Stavros K******s

Please confirm you have received the $104 CAD I've sent you .

Stavros K******s

Yes, I can confirm that I have gotten the $104, and I can refund it (also they way your friend sent it, there was $4.36 taking off so I had a little over $99)

and I can refund it if you dont wanna pay the extra shipping (the whole amount), and sorry, I never really shipped anything this heavy out of canada before so I didnt know the costs very well

Excuse me for sending again a pm but it seems that the auction is still going , has 9 bids and the shipping to Greece is listed ( byh ebay ) as $30 .

Could you please explain why is this happening ?

I thought we had an agreement on this deal .

Stavros K******s

I have , lastly , sent this pm to which I have not received an answer , until now .

Yes, I can confirm that I have gotten the $104, and I can refund it (also they way your friend sent it, there was $4.36 taking off so I had a little over $99)

and I can refund it if you dont wanna pay the extra shipping (the whole amount), and sorry, I never really shipped anything this heavy out of canada before so I didnt know the costs very well

Given the circumstances I would expect no less than $104 CAD back to the PayPal account the money was sent from .

I should ask for an additional fee for PayPal charges , but $104 will be enough .

I expect the funds to be transfered immediately , please .

Thank you for your cooperation .

Stavros K******s

At this point , would it help to file a complaint ? What are my options in case BewareofTom disappears ?

Stavros K.

[MagickalMemories]

Actually, Stavros, you really are supposed to have the date/time stamp on it.
Has he refunded your money yet? If he has, then you don't really need any options but to "move on."

Eric

[Satyros]

I just found out that the money has been refunded so ( at least ) I wasn't scammed out of my hard earned cash .

I suppose we may close the thread now , however if you want me to I'll be happy to post date and time for all pm's . Let me know if it is still needed .

Moreover , I intend to leave a negative reference .

It's really bad etiquette to lie this way when trading and I am really disappointed with such shameless behavior .

At least I got my money back , so as far as I'm concerned this issue is resolved .

Let me know if you need anything from me ( addressing only the admins of course ) .

If not , lock this , thank you for your help and your patience .

Stavros K.

[Satyros]

Perhaps it should be moved to "deadbeats and backouts" ?

Stavros K.

[MagickalMemories]

Yes. This is a DB & BO thread.
For now, KEEP YOUR MESSAGES, but don't bother with the time stamps.
I'mm PM Tom and ask him to look at the thread. If he has any issues with the factual nature of any of the PM's you posted, we'll ask for the whole thing.

(Moving thread)


Eric

[BewareOfTom]

okay well this is my side:

1)I tried to sell the book here, no interest

2) I post some of them on ebay

3) after a few bids here and there, Satyros offered to buy them

4) unknowingly of the prices to ship to greece I estimated around $20, so with original price and shipping I said $100 ($4 more for paypal fees)

5) I go to ship and they tell me the SLOWEST RATE (no tracking either) would be $60, and the next higher up would be $120

6) I send him a message back asking if he could pay for the actual shippng (since selling the books for $40~ is what I didnt want)

after i got back from MY FIRST NIGHT SHIFT EVER, I got 2 pms, (asking for refund) so I did that as soon as I read the pm)

9) magic sent me a PM saying this happened.... so I dunno......

I dont see what went wrong, I say a price, learn shipping is VASTLY different than what I quoted him, ask him for more money to cover shipping, he says leave me 24 (or was it 48? IIRC it was 24....), and I refunded him so

[MagickalMemories]

I just wanted to give you the chance to refute the validity of anything he said here. That's all.

For future reference, you should always get an accurate price from the USPS on International Shipping before promising certain prices. I have learned (and relearned LOL) this the hard way.


Eric

[BewareOfTom]

yeah, I just dunno why he got all "hot an bothered" when I didnt know the correct shipping prices.... oh well, at least someone closer to me is buying them :/

[Satyros]

Well , I'm not going to get into a discussion here .

You may read again the pm's .

I particularly enjoyed this part :

well I didnt know about withdrawls so I just made a new account and bid like $2000 lol, so unless some else bids higher Ill win lol

and its alright, you just said you;d pay me today, so I expected it today

Which was obviously not true .

And let us remember that I have agreed to pay $5 more for you to cancel the auction .

Perhaps , I had a reason - after all - to be "hot and bothered" .

Anyway , better lack with your next trades with everyone else ( but me ) in the world .

Stavros K.

[BewareOfTom]

well the $5 was for paypal fees, and why would I even have to cancel the auction? I could have just told the buyer I went through somewhere else...