Thread: **Buy & Sell Rules and More - Read Before Using Buy & Sell**

Mandatory Reading for All Buy and Sell Users:

(If you don't read and follow these rules and procedures, you will lose Buy and Sell privileges)

- Buy, Sell, & Trade Rules and Disclosure

- How to Close a Listing (Mark as Completed)

- Leaving Feedback After a Transaction


Suggested Reading:

- Guide to Describing and Pricing Items for Sale

Disclosure

Buy, sell, and trade at your own risk.

This site is not affiliated with anyone buying or selling on the board.

We are not liable for any misrepresentation, fraud or spam posted here. Always verify the seller's reputation on other photography boards and/or auction sites. Remember that personal/gift payments via PayPal offer no buyer protection whatsoever.

We offer this board for member use. However, we do not actively patrol this board for fraud, and we are not responsible for arbitrating any disputes which arise.

None of the transactions made on this board are representative of SeriousCompacts.

We reserve the right to immediately remove any post in this section for any reason. We reserve the right to exclude any person(s) from use of this forum for any reason. No guarantee is made with regards to provision of services in this Buy and Sell area.

Rules

If your post does not follow these rules, it will be deleted without explanation and may result in permanent loss of access to the Buy and Sell forum without further warning or explanation.

The Buy, Sell, and Trade board has grown very active. The moderators are volunteers and do not have the time to private message members about every issue in the marketplace.

Please take care to follow the rules below so that we can continue to offer this service and avoid having to delete posts which you've taken time and effort to create.


1) "For Sale" listings must include an asking price for every item being sold.

Any FS or FS/FT listings without an asking price will be deleted without comment or opportunity to amend. Giving an astronomical price and adding "or best offer" does not satisfy this requirement.

Note: FT, WTB and Ebay threads do not have to include a price.


2) No discussion of price is allowed in the replies to a listing.

The only exception to this is that you are allowed to say the equivalent of "Great price!" if someone gives a particularly good selling price.

You may not in any other way comment on or discuss price in a reply to any listing.

All comments about price must take place by private message (PM) or email.

You need at least one post in the main forum (outside of Buy and Sell) to be able to PM, and this post should not be "I am posting so I can PM" or equivalent. If you are unable to PM, an alternative is to post a reply in the thread with your email address asking to be contacted that way.

Examples of comments which are not allowed:

"You realize that B&H sells that lens brand new for $500, right?" (Seller asking $600)

"I'm unable to send a PM. Would you accept $300 shipped?" (Seller asking $300 plus $15 shipping)

"Good luck with that " (WTB listing offering low amount for expensive item)


3) No off-topic discussion in Buy & Sell.

For example, don't ask why someone is selling an item. You can PM with such questions, but they don't belong in the thread.


4) No auctions may be carried out within our marketplace.


5) Photography-related transactions only.

Computers and tablets are used to edit/view photos and therefore may be bought/sold here.


6) No commercial vendor sales.

Commercial dealers interested in advertising on the site should contact me directly by PM or the "Contact Us" link at the bottom of the page.


7) You can only start a new topic/thread every 8 hours. No redundant listings.

If you are selling or seeking more than one item, we encourage you to combine them in a single listing. No single item should be listed in more than one open thread at any given time. See below for procedure to close a thread.


8) Don't leave feedback unless you have had a transaction.

We have a feedback system so you can leave feedback after a transaction. Leaving feedback before a transaction (eg, negative feedback because the price is too high or the seller won't ship to your location) is not allowed.


9) Don't use a lot of caps in your thread title.

Don't overuse capitalization to get your classifieds listing noticed. Your thread will be deleted without comment or opportunity to amend.


10) Don't make a new post to say "Sold" or "Found" when your transaction has been completed. Just mark it as completed.

Posting to say that a transaction is finished serves no purpose and bumps your thread unnecessarily to the top of the list where active listings belong. Instead, follow our protocol for marking the thread as completed. If you want to specify something like "Sold to [member name]", edit one or more of your existing posts in the thread instead of making a new one. This must be done prior to marking as completed, which closes the thread permanently.


11) Don't ask moderators to open, close, delete or change thread titles.

You can edit your title and body of your ad for 72 hours. After that it is permanent. Moderators do not have the time to make these edits for you. You can add a post to your original thread indicating any necessary update (eg, change in asking price), or you can mark your thread as completed and start a new one.


12) Don't post under more than one user name.

Some people have chosen to post under multiple registered accounts/user names in order to bump their own posts, comment on how good their own prices are, or even to give themselves feedback. This abuse of the forum will result in a permanent ban.

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Please don't go back and edit your post to remove the price after an item has sold.

Leaving your price in the post makes it a valuable resource so people can go back and see what the asking price was at that time. It doesn't necessarily mean you sold for that price or that the value is the same now as it was then, but it is a resource that someone might benefit from. We don't require that you leave this information intact, but we appreciate when you do so.


Note to sellers: PayPal reserves the right to hold payments (see PayPal Holds FAQ).

Make sure you understand these terms before you decide to accept payment via PayPal. If you specify payment by PayPal, then a PayPal Hold is not an acceptable reason for failing to ship an item for which the buyer has sent payment.

After the transaction

If you have have started a thread in the Buy & Sell forum and have subsequently satisfied the purpose of your thread,

Then as the person who started the thread (no one other than the thread starter can do this), please click on the "Thread Tools" menu at the top of the thread and choose "Mark Thread as Completed" (see screenshot below).

Note: This will change the thread prefix to "COMPLETED" and irreversibly close the thread.

Please do not post a separate reply to say "Sold" or "Found". The fact that the thread is marked completed indicates that all transactions have occurred. Posting "Sold" bumps the completed thread needlessly to the top of the forum and pushes down items that are actually still for sale.

Thanks for helping to keep our Buy & Sell forum useful and organized!

Example of the same system at Mu-43.com:

Leaving Feedback

After making a transaction via our forums, please consider leaving feedback regarding the transaction experience. Sellers, buyers, and traders can leave feedback. If you did not sell, buy, or trade, do not leave feedback in our system!


To leave feedback for a person with whom you transacted:

1. Find a post by that person in the Buy/Sell forum. If they have not posted in Buy/Sell, you cannot leave them feedback.
2. In the top section of that post, to the far right of their user name, you will see "Feedback Score: X reviews" where "X" is the number of reviews they have received. Click on that number.
3. Click on the link that says "Submit Feedback for [member's user name]
4. Fill out the feedback form and click on "Submit Reply"

Important note:

• Please take care in leaving feedback. In particular, consider very carefully before leaving any negative feedback. If you leave someone negative feeback, they may decide to leave you negative feedback as well. All feedback is permanent.
• SeriousCompacts.com and its owner (me) are not responsible for the accuracy of any feedback, and it is not up to the moderators to decide whose feedback is correct. All transactions are at your own risk.

What follows below are some suggestions for sellers. These are mainly intended for new sellers and are not rules, only suggestions.


Describing items which you are selling:

• Carefully look over your item in good light before describing it as "perfect" or "like new".
• Avoid the use of the word "mint" (or variants like "minty") which ought to mean "perfect" but is often used by unscrupulous Ebay sellers to mean less than that.
• Don't describe your item as "new" if it has been opened, handled, or otherwise used. Instead, more accurately call it "like new in box" or "in perfect condition"
• Overdisclosure (pointing out the smallest flaws) won't harm your sales. Potential buyers don't usually care about tiny flaws (eg, "2mm faint scratch on LCD, visible only on close inspection in certain lighting"). On the contrary, such descriptions instill confidence in the seller.
• In the absence of providing a high level of detail about your gear's conditions, grade it conservatively. For example, even the most minor marks on a camera should be disclosed in specific detail if you are calling it "like new minus", whereas a buyer doesn't need such detailed description if you are calling it "good cosmetic condition with minor wear but nothing very noticeable".

Pricing an item for sale:

• Do a search on completed sales on Ebay as well as a search on the Fred Miranda Buy and Sell Forum to see what your item has been selling for recently. Note that people generally expect a somewhat better deal in a forum than they get on Ebay, both because of the community feel on the forum as well as because of the absence of selling fees on the board.
• Check what the major retailers in your region are selling the item for brand new. If the item is in stock at those retailers, you will not have much luck pricing at a same or higher level.
• For most items which are not in great demand (eg, out of stock everywhere), a reasonable price for used in excellent condition would be about 80% of current retail prices, inclusive of PayPal fees and shipping. Expensive or very highly regarded lenses may fetch somewhat more (up to 90% of retail), and out of stock/hard to find items will often sell for 100% the retail price or even more than that. With uncommon exceptions (eg, Panasonic 14-45mm lens), used kit lenses and lenses which have lesser reputations will fetch less than 80% of retail price, often significantly less.
• When possible, avoid "net to me" pricing, which indicates how much you wish to be paid not including any PayPal or shipping fees. This type of pricing doesn't give the buyer much of an idea how much they will need to spend, which is really what they need to know. Instead, estimate how much shipping will cost using online tools such as the USPS Shipping Calculator and count on being charged a 3% fee for payment by PayPal.
• Avoid requiring buyers to use PayPal Gift payment, which makes you look shady since it is a violation of PayPal policies and affords no protection to the buyer.

I might be blind Amin but I can't see where to leave feedback. I went to the thread where I sold my camera and don't see "Feedback Score" anywhere let alone next to the buyers name. Help!

Never mind, I found it through the buyers profile page! No I didn't lol, it won't let me leave Feedback. I get message saying "you do not have permission to access this page"

I just got the saw error- "You do not have permission to access this page."

Working on it...

Working now?

Working like a charm Amin, thanks!