How to deal with unhelpful merchants?

[Bob Botanical]

The huge majority of makers and sellers on SL go out of their way to be helpful.  But does anyone have any thoughts on how to deal effectively with the minority?  A case in point - a friend just bought a relatively expensive item for her club, when she opened the box it simply rezzed the item with no instructions, notecards, manual etc.  Despite her experience she was unable to get the thing working so IMed the maker for some help.  The reply was simply and word for word "cough, bs".  Despite a number of further polite requests for help no other reply was forthcoming.  She's left with a heap of junk, a rage of frustration and a couple of grand down. How can we weed out these folks?  Who has some novel suggestions?

 

[Luc Starsider]

My suggestion: Take your business elsewhere.

Not much you can do. It is entirely up to the person how they choose to treat their customers. If you don't get anywhere by being polite, then you're better off finding someone willing to provide the service level you require.

If the item is bought from the marketplace, at least you have the chance to leave a review.

- Luc -

[Pamela Galli]

I don't know what can be done, other than to post about it on a 3rd party site, but when you say "A couple of grand down" keep in mind you are talking about 10 bucks. True, for some people that is a lot  of money, but I know I probably fritter away or plain lose 10 bucks a week.  IOW, it is helpful to keep this in perspective when contemplating the magnitude of the problem.  I mean, we get people in here who are apoplectic because they forget that the 200 they lost was Lindens not dollars.

If we took a poll, I imagine there would be many of us who remember paying "a couple of grand" for something worthless (both here and RL) -- it is up to us to decide how much angst that is worth to us.

 

[Pamela Galli]

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Luc Starsider wrote:If you don't get anywhere by being polite,

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We usually don't hear both sides of the story here -- the OP mentions "polite requests" but we can't verify anything --  so when we hear of some outrageous reply such as quoted in the OP, we just think the merchant or customer must be deranged.  But I can tell you that many many people in SL do not understand that being rude, insulting, and threatening are least likely to get you what you want.  The only leverage any of us has here is being polite.

So in the case here, for all we know the customer somehow managed to lose or delete all the instructions and then IMed the merchant to scream at him about what an idiot he is.  Then the response makes more sense, doesn't it?

 

[Ilyra Chardin]

I've said this many times before - there is no governance of Marketplace. 

It's a bad situation about to be made even worse because with the new Direct Delivery option, anyone can be a merchant without needing to have land to set out a magic box.  And, as noted before by many, LL is pushing MP over in-world stores.

Today, with the magic boxes needed, there are merchants selling freebies for a cost, selling other people's work, selling inferior products, etc.  I should note that there are quite a number of reputable, good, quality merchants on MP, but the others do ruin it for the bulk of us. 

I've been burned, too. I've bought something only to find documentation written by the original creator (not the seller) where it clearly states that it is a "freebie" item that i just paid L$600 for.

Caveat Emptor.

[Luc Starsider]

You're absolutely right. I agree with you. In this particular case, we don't know what happened or what being polite actally means. I meant what I said it in a more *general* way in the sense that if someone feel they have been polite in their request, regardless of how it is actually perceived by whomever the request is directed at, there isn't much more to do than go somewhere else.

- Luc -

[Cinnamon Lohner]

Why do we need governance of the Marketplace?  Capitalizm is self-correcting.  Ask any Rod Paul supporter! :smileytongue:

--Cinn

[Rosemaery Lorefield]

Good point lol. Merchants have the same "how to deal with difficult customers" conversations just as often!

I have spent an entire day trying to fix a scripted item for someone, only to find out it was not the item causing a problem, but I wasn't annoyed because the person was very sweet and apologetic, and tipped well.

Would I spend that kind of time on someone who was rude? Not unless they could show beyond a doubt that my product was the problem, and not their user error.

I feel for the person who is out money, but the best thing to do is keep this in perspective and move on. Post a review if it was a marketplace purchase.

[Rosemaery Lorefield]

I'm not clear on how DD is going to make this worse? A magic box requires a single prim, and you can rent space in "box farms" for super cheap.

Merchants will either sell a good quality product or they won't, regardless of what the venue is or whether they own land. Just because a merchant cannot afford a large bit of land for a shop doesn't mean they aren't deserving enough to have a place in the market. I think it will be a good opportunity for a lot of people, speaking as someone who struggles with large land rental fees. 

[Pamela Galli]

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Rosemaery Lorefield wrote:

I'm not clear on how DD is going to make this worse? A magic box requires a single prim, and you can rent space in "box farms" for super cheap.

Merchants will either sell a good quality product or they won't, regardless of what the venue is or whether they own land. Just because a merchant cannot afford a large bit of land for a shop doesn't mean they aren't deserving enough to have a place in the market. I think it will be a good opportunity for a lot of people, speaking as someone who struggles with large land rental fees. 

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The difference is that even if you only rent enough land for one Magic Box, you must pay that rent at some point, which means you must either log in or pay through some website. An abandoned or deleted account is likely eventually to have its Magic Boxes deleted for non payment of rent or tier.

Without a Magic Box, then someone can delete his account entirely and his stuff will continue to sell on MP forever.

 

[Rosemaery Lorefield]

<<Without a Magic Box, then someone can delete his account entirely and his stuff will continue to sell on MP forever.>>

That wasn't the impression I'm getting from the DD thread. Hopefully there will be some requirement of an active account!

[Pamela Galli]

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Rosemaery Lorefield wrote:

<<

Without a Magic Box, then someone can delete his account entirely and his stuff will continue to sell on MP forever.>>

That wasn't the impression I'm getting from the DD thread. Hopefully there will be some requirement of an active account!

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Initially, since ppl will have to transfer their items, stale things will be eliminated, I assume.  Going forward, I know of no provision for preventing dead accounts from selling forever -- certainly we have proposed different solutions in JIRAs and I have heard nothing to that effect.

[Ilyra Chardin]

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Cinnamon Lohner wrote:

Why do we need governance of the Marketplace?  Capitalizm is self-correcting.  Ask any Rod Paul supporter! :smileytongue:

--Cinn

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hahaha

(I'm so tempted to say that I like some of what Ron Paul says, but...um...if I start expressing my political views we'd all be in trouble. :-P)

There is, however, a big difference between over-governance and NO governance, but I'm not holding my breath that anything will be done.

[Ilyra Chardin]

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Rosemaery Lorefield wrote:

I'm not clear on how DD is going to make this worse? A magic box requires a single prim, and you can rent space in "box farms" for super cheap.. 

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Well it's true that it's not all that difficult to find a place to rent to set out a magic box, but you have do at least that much.  DD allows everyone entry into MP without having to make any investment at all.   It's not as if we're in a good starting place right now.  

That's my 2 cents (L$5)

 

[Linda Brynner]

Well the method i use it is said to be against the Tos, however in my 6 years of experience i have discovered that it isn't at all. However the first you would see is a warning from some forummer here to state to delete the name.

The method? 

Just expose their SL account name and SL brand name here... job done.

And expose their sl name anywhere you can on forums, blogs, feedback possibilties, ratings, etc.

Against the Tos? Nope, just a myth kept up because many here at the forums are merchants. Controversial? Yes. What is against the Tos is to reveale info related to rl, but an sl name isn't that in fact.

So... a hard but only way to weed them out. It's how i do it

[Pamela Galli]

It has nothing to do with whether one is a merchant or not, unless you are laboring under the delusion that merchants are not victimized by copybotters, scammers, and abusive buyers, that the "unhelpfulness" is only from one direction, from merchants.  Oh I would love to call out the woman who said she did not get her furniture and then the rez notice script notifies me that she rezzed not only the replacement I sent her but the original.  Or what about the guy I discovered yesterday who had copybotted my textures? 

Oh yes, it would be just great if everyone followed your advice and the forums became a place where everyone could come to call out others by name -- not just merchants and customers, but everyone.  Your boyfriend cheat on you?  Here's the place to get even.

However, personal disputes, harrassment, and flaming do not belong in the official LL forum.

 

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