How long to wait?

[sdafforn71]

Normally I am pretty cool about waiting to hear back from people. The last message he sent was on the 11th stating that he will send the minis out the next day. He has not been on since the 12th, and I sent a message on the 18th. His rating is an eight. He is suppose to send first. This is the 21st and nothing so far, I understand life comes up. But, I have had several offers on Bartertown and Locally and have had to decline since I was in a deal.

How much longer should I wait? Normally I have no problems waiting. But....I don't know, maybe it's me.
Thanks
shane

[3eland]

If you have some other alternative to contacting him like email or phone number I would use that (or see if he has a Facebook or MySpace or something), if not then I, personally, would take it as he is no longer wanting to complete the deal as nothing has arrived and he has not bothered to make contact. Sure he may have life issues or might be out of power or internet or something, however I believe that once you make a trade agreement you should keep the other party in the loop whether it means going to a friend's house or public library (they have free internet for those who have never gone) to log on and keep the other party informed. If the package does arrive after you have traded with another person and he STILL hasn't logged on or contacted you in any way then I would just choose the return to sender option, you shouldn't have to pass up possible deals because one person decided to drop off the earth. However I don't know if that would warrant a BTR against you from him though if you decided to do that, when in doubt ask a Mod.

Mind you this is solely my opinion, which is heavily bias as I am not the most patient person when it comes to making trade agreements and waiting on people hoping they will eventually do what they say lol. I like paying the same day I agree to a deal (whether it be online eBay, here or any other website) or ship the next day unless previously discussed with the other party. I can understand life and work prohibits paying or shipping quickly but communication is what is needed the most; the lack of it irritates me.

Hopefully all works out well and good luck!

[Imaginos]

After no contact for a week - especially when he was supposed to already ship something, I would send another PM to him advising that if I didn't hear a response back within 48 hours, that I would consider the trade cancelled and would be posting a backout report. Both of these steps are important so you have some defense in case he comes back and tries to post a bad trader report on you.

[MagickalMemories]

Well, you haven't named him (Thanks for that, BTW), so I can't give member-specific advice.
In general, however, I would do the following:
1) Look in the BTR and backout forums. Does he have any open threads? That would probably be a red flag that the train isn't going to happen.
2) Did you receive his shipping address? Look him up on http://www.whitepages.com, to see if you can get a phone number. If you do, try calling him.
3) If you have the name and address, try looking him up by name (or email, if you have it) on Facebook. You can usually do a name search, then eliminate people based on their location. If you find someone you suspect to be him, send a message via Facebook.

PM an Admin to see if he's got any information that might be helpful. Sometimes, we know or have heard things enough to make us suspicious about people, even if they haven't been reported yet. For example, it might be that 3 other people have PMed us with the same question/issue you have about the same guy & asked us for advice. We could share that info with you.

Eric