Buyer Beware!

Alexc,When you buy something,ask for a tracking #. If you sell something,give a tracking#. Just recently,there were two chances to buy things I was interested in. Neither seller had feedback,and neither would cod.So,I didn't buy.I would rather wait for the conditions to be optimum.

Sober1, I don't think you have a legitimate grip. I recently sold some equipment on Audiogon. I priced the items for a quick sale and as a result I got a number of inquiries. As a seller, all that I am ethically required to do is to clearly state the terms of my sale and beyond that I can sell, or not sell MY equipment to anyone who wants to buy them. In a private sale, just because you are quick to reply and are willing to pay the purchase price doesn't gaurantee you anything. The Audiogon selling process is more of a lottery than it might appear. You might not think this is fair, but your suggested solutions won't eliminate what I've described.

I can also add that after dealing with a couple of flakes and problem people. I tend to wait until I have a few replies, then I give more of a 'first pick' to people who have a good reputation on audiogon or who seem a little more straitforward. I can sell to anyone I want to too and I think it's a good practice to give preference to those who deserve it.

Well, Monday has come and gone w/out a reply from the person I purchased the cables from. Of course, the cables have not arrived. I will therefore contact Audiogon staff tonight to ask them to follow up and eventually release the address and phone number of the seller for follow up. Though I really hate to do this, I have been very patient and circumspect thus far. The seller goes by the name of jwest on Audiogon, and his name is (?) Jason west. The transaction was for a 6 foot pair of Audioquest Dragon speaker cables, and he deleted the advert the day after I sent him payment via PayPal. This in and of itsef is of course not unusual, but failure to reply to e-mail right after confirming receipt of payment is. He did say there were other prospective buyers, so if by chance you were one of them, please get in touch with me. Mr. West, if you are listening, I truly hope this is a misunderatanding and will be more than happy to apologize on this forum.

To share my story and some lessons learned, a few months ago I purchased an ARC 100.2 from an individual at an excellent price ($1300). Normally I would opt for COD, but since it was such a good deal I talked to the guy on the phone and agreed to send money first. The seller confirmed the receipt of the cashier's check, but mentioned that he's going on vacation soon, and he might not send the amp until he comes back. Well, I thought it's a little fishy, but maybe just bad timing. I pushed for the seller to ship the amp before the vacation, and after a few emails it was finally shipped with tracking #. So now I'm happy that I didn't get screwed--or so I thought at the time. Many days later the package arrived, and when the delivery person came I knew something was wrong because the package was not big enough to contain the 100.2, and surely was too light. It turned out to be an old Sumo preamp from who knows when. To make a long story short, I tracked him down in his home city and filed with the local police station. It turned out that he's ripped off about 30 people using the same scheme, and the police is hot on his trail. Eventually he was caught and put behind bars, but I never did get my money back unless I can file a class action suit against him. Some tips from me: try to do COD if possible, but there will be seller who refuse to do COD because they've been burnt that way. If the deal is very good, try calling and ask about the unit. I did just that, but I didn't ask important questions. The questions to ask are--describe the unit and what is the serial number. If the seller is a fake he might not have the unit and cannot describe it. If he doesn't have a serial number then definitely don't go for it. Once you get the serial number, you can usually check it with the manufacturer to verify some information on the equipment. We all get lucky once in a while on a deal-of-the lifetime, but don't think you can get lucky all the time :). If it's a really good deal, act fast, but be careful.