SCAMMER ALERT! 2 FOR ONE SPECIAL

Your Paypal account should have an address associated with it, and same for the scammer. (It may require a "verified" Paypal account). Open another complaint, explain everything the same way you're doing here. I'm not sure if I'm following your story, are you saying that the package was mailed to the scammer's address from another address near the scammer's, around the same time as your transaction? You should try to get Paypal on the phone. Tracking numbers vary based on the location of the sender (and possibly the receiver too, but most definitely the sender). There is no way to mix up two different tracking numbers unless the scammer lives near you.

 

Thanks, both to you and to Fedare, I did call paypal and when I mentioned the situation with the tracking being entirely off he reopened the issue and they are now looking into it. Fingers crossed, it seems to me it's obvious something fishy is going on and I hope paypal will see the same. I can only advice people opening an issue like this is to escalate it to paypal directly and not let the scammer respond to your issue by doing this, as this disables you from counter-arguing to whatever the scammer provides to back themselves up

 

If everyone who got scammed would contact Paypal, this person would be permanently banned from having a Paypal account, and possibly facing criminal charges. If you're embarrassed about the contents of the package, you can just say it's a sculpture (the contents of the package may never even be discussed) or sci-fi collectables, part of a Halloween costume, etc etc.

 

they weren't using their own paypal account, how can you ban a person that you didn't have any of their personal information? Its like they are person A and they got person B to unknowingly pay person C for a toy that got shipped to person A so they made off with the toy and no traces.

 

They've been doing this for a couple of years now, and this 3-way scam seems like a new development. It should have been pursued a long time ago, if so it might not have gotten this far.

Also, it's possible they are doing this 3-way scam because they can't get a Paypal account any more.

If a scammer is using Paypal to cheat people, even indirectly, Paypal will want to know. Paypal may even be the appropriate party to press charges.

Is your point that nobody should contact Paypal to complain about being cheated via Paypal? LOL.

 

they weren't being cheated via paypal, people were just manipulated and i dont see how this is paypals fault at all honestly. How are they liable for two people agreeing to something. They agreed whether or not they knew what they were agreeing to, so they should have been extra certain which is why everyone is taking harder precautions now when buying and selling to be sure its the same address and everything is in line. The person A in the story has no ties to paypal at all and paypal cant track them or do anything because this issue had no ties to person A. How could paypal even press charges against someone we have 0 info on.

 

my point was how can you ban someone from paypal if theres no ties to the person at all to ban them and they didn't even use their own account?

Not sure how you jumped to this

 

https://dragon-hoard.com/threads/user-experience-feedback-thread.3853/

Since people liked the idea!!

 

It will be far more helpful and easier for all parties to list successful transaction partners in their signatures. Having a dedicated thread has good intentions, but it will inevitably grow too large for most users' patience (if they even have the patience to research their buyer/seller at all). It will never be stickied due to lack of moderation and will eventually be pushed several pages deep. Meanwhile, signatures will be visible on every post a user makes, requiring no effort on the buyer's behalf to research and increasing their confidence in purchasing from any particular seller.

This is the most successful way to accomplish what we're after, given the state of this forum. Most other buy/sell forums operate the same way. Signature verification allows for quick/easy vetting of legitimate transaction partners, while dedicated threads are better for more in-depth reviews of each individual transaction, should a buyer have the time/interest in further research.

 

It's not a bad idea, but if that list of good sellers grows, it's gonna crowd out existing sigs for those of us that have them (like me) and force them out entirely. Sig limits are there for a good reason...namely ease of readability on a forum. Having to scroll past a big block of text is a real pain to the browsing experience when a user posts multiple times in a thread and I personally feel that adding lists of usernames will either create big sig blocks or make existing ones too big. I would suggest a spoiler feature, but unless I totally missed it, I don't see that option.

 

There is a spoiler feature, actually! It's not at the top with bold/italics/whatever, but it's in the code. Just put [.spoiler]text[./spoiler] around your words (minus the periods).

However, I agree that a forum sticky would be ideal, and just a post would be better if that's all we can get. I mentioned it in the thread, but using ctrl+f and typing in the username will find you all the results about your specific seller or buyer on Windows at least. That way no one has to spend hours reading through.

 

You're a gem! Thank you!! <3

 

Your expectations for the average user are incredibly too high.

Please investigate real-world UX/UI statistics; companies spend millions of dollars designing ads and webpages to get just 5% of users to click a link. For each user willing to search out a review thread, ctrl-f through a dozen pages, or use the search feature, there are dozens who won't bother or even be aware the thread even exists. Without moderation, a dedicated thread(s) will provide a very short-term solution for only the most diligent users.

Be realistic. Few users have even made a single transaction. Of that small percentage, the amount who've made enough buys/sells to require over one signature line is trivial.

 

Apples and oranges. There's a difference between an established company and an unofficial marketplace of anonymous regular-joes selling. The former you can feel safe to buy from, most of the time, the latter is a lot more of a gamble. You have no idea if somebody from Wisconsin is behind the computer screen.

Besides, lack of due dilligance just increases your chances to get scammed and we shouldn't encourage that kinda behaviour. If the other 20+ users are that naive then sure, it's their prerogative, but at the same time scams and "who cares" attitude just makes any marketplace look uninviting and shady af. That leads to fewer sales. Also, the regular marketplaces carry seller/buyer reviews and grades. Especially those marketplaces in darkweb grade their users for obvious reasons. Finding out whether the seller is trusted should be expected behaviour and something instilled through the culture of this forum. So why not.

(Also the average is less than 5%... a lot less. Try 0.05% on average.)

 

I did not disagree or encourage less due diligence. I'm pointing out that, given the status of this forum, review threads are not as helpful as one would think. As previously stated, having both threads for in-depth review and transaction partners within signatures for quick vetting would be better than either one alone.

Also, this isn't ethics class; we're not debating how things "should" be. It'd be great if every buyer did research, but the statistics are out there, and only a tiny fraction of users will do more than bare minimum to ensure a transaction goes smoothly. Demanding buyers do extensive research as "expected behavior" and being part of board "culture" is completely unrealistic. This is a community centered around fantasy sex toys; the majority just want to get off, not socialize about this stuff.

FWIW, my experience with online sales is more than many users here have been alive (including deep web, was in top 30 sellers for some road and highly reviewed by Avengers). My alt here had over 300 sales last year (vast majority of sales were brand new accounts who dgaf about the community or "culture"). Haven't logged in for six months and still gets 3-5 messages each day, even though all my threads and profile information say I'm sold out (i.e. people don't read). If you'd prefer be coy and argue over insignificant specifics like a few percent(which only galvanizes my original point even further that you're trying to argue), then I'll go spend my time elsewhere.

 

It's a short-term bandaid solution to an ongoing and persistent issue. I'm happy to see it going well on it's first day but rest assured, if it's not pinned/stickied by moderation, it will be forgotten in a few weeks or months...

Just like the countless other previous attempts at review threads.

I hate to see everyone's effort and good intentions go to waste ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

I guess I feel like why does it matter? Yes, people may forget about it, it may be hard to find eventually, it may lose traction, etc, but given the state of this forum, there aren't too many options to try. And I feel like it doesn't hurt to try it, and that even if the thread (or signatures) save a few people from getting scammed, then it was worth it.

It doesn't take much time to add to the thread, or update a signature under a spoiler. There are always going to be people who don't care and who sadly may get scammed anyways, but hopefully the efforts will save at least one person. It may even deter future scammers.

No harm in being optimistic, trying new things, and hoping it works out. I still would recommend that all buyers and sellers take responsibility and follow smart buying / selling guidelines, but the thread and signature idea is a nice try with the tools this forum provides (which we all know isn't a lot).

 

I didn't argue over "insignificant specifics like a few percent". You used that in your argument and I used it as a sidenote. At no point was it in anyway part of my main message.

I did not at any point say that I thought you are encouraging less deliberation.

Also, I have no idea what the statistics say for this forum so I'm really am not able to say one way or another about that. And I will not even start guessing. But do you know? Or are you basing them on your intuition?

At no point did I say that I DEMAND buyers to be part of a board culture. What I meant was that the behaviour of old users does not exist in a vacuum. As a new user you check out the format from the posts of other users. Monkey see, monkey do.

You seem to be reading into something that isn't in my post. So, what's with the attitude? Also, none of your credentials matter as I have no way to verify who you are. I could be a goat shierer living in the Alps and you wouldn't know better... Instead of countering any of my points in a respective manner you just attacked them with snide remarks about "ethics class" and name dropping.