Bill Obston- Poor Business Conduct!

THIS THREAD IS IN RESPONSE TO THE TERRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE I RECEIVED FROM BILL OBSTON. (his ID is northlight)

Here is the ad I responded to: http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/pp_c...&cat=27&page=1

I e-mailed Bill in regard to the above listed ad. The price: SHIPPED FOR $200! I contacted Bill early Sunday morning to see if this pair of geckos was still available. He responded saying that they were and asked me to send a PayPay payment. I did so. Once the geckos were paid for, I considered them MINE. First come first serve right? He contacted me later that same day to tell that he refunded my money because he found a local buyer so he didn't have to ship. If he didn't want to ship, he shouldn't have listed the animals "SHIPPED FOR $200".
The status on the ad is now SOLD (Best Offer)...Go figure.
I tried contacting Bill twice on separate days following this incident to make him aware of my dissatisfaction. I was very polite and professional, yet never got any type of response from him.

In my opinion, this is evidence of Bill Obston's lack of professionalism and common courtesy. I would reccommend that anyone considering doing business with Bill Obston keep this thread in mind.

Below is the correspondence between Bill and I.

daniel vega <thegeckohut@yahoo.com> wrote:
Hi,
I would like to purchase this beautiful pair of cresteds your posted on fauna yesterday.
Please let me know if they are still available.
Do you accept PayPal?
I know you mentioned in your ad that you are trying to make room, but if you happen to see anything on my site that catches your eye, I would be more than happy to work a good trade. Check it out at www.thegeckohut.com
I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Bill Obston <powertopol@yahoo.com> wrote:
Hi Daniel, Yes the pair is still available. I do accept paypal and if you want, you can send payment of $200 to powertopol@yahoo.com. Sorry but I am not interested in trades at this time. Send me your address and let me know which day you would like me to ship. Thanks

daniel vega <thegeckohut@yahoo.com> wrote: Hi Bill,
i have sent the payment via PayPal. Please use this shipping address:
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (the address had been altered for obvious reasons)
Thank you for your time.

Will you be shipping tomorrow for Tuesday delivery?
Please contact me with tracking number for the shipment and ETA.
Thanks again.

daniel vega <thegeckohut@yahoo.com> wrote:
With all due respect, I believe since you told me those animals were available and I was the first to send the money, you should keep you end of the deal and follow through.
Please call me and I will be happy to re-issue the payment.
Thank you.

daniel vega <thegeckohut@yahoo.com> wrote:
Bill,
I feel that the choice you have made to sell the pair of cresteds to another party for the sake of convenience (not having to ship), is evidence of terribly poor business conduct. You told me the geckos were available. When I sent you the PayPal payment, the geckos were mine. If you didn't want to ship, you should not have advertised them "Shipped for $200". I am terribly disappointed in your conduct and hope you realize that the right thing to do is allow me to re-issue the payment and receive these geckos that should belong to me.
Thank you again for your time and I look forward to hearing from you soon.

OOPS! I left out Bill's last response..

Bill Obston <powertopol@yahoo.com> wrote:
Hi Daniel I have refunded your money since I found a local buyer and this way I can avoid having to ship. I apologize. Bill

Daniel, while I can understand your disappointment in not receiving the geckos, I am not sure if this is a thread worthy of the B.O.I.

You posted the e-mails, but not the header info that includes time and date, so I am unsure of how much time elapsed between when you asked if he accepted payPal, and when he refunded your payment. If it was over the course of several hours it is possible that the other person contacted him prior to him getting your payment.

I'm not defending his actions, but if he didn't have payment, then they weren't really sold. Trust me I have heard the "I'm sending payment today" line many times only to never see said payment ever arrive.

Also, I noticed that the seller was in Wisconsin and you are in California. It is hard for me to fault the seller for not wanting to ship out of Wisconsin if the temperatures are too low, the well being of the geckos should be the main concern of both parties.

As I said, I'm not defending the seller, it would be great if he came here and posted his side of the story, it could be that this was a case of poor communication, mixed in with some hurt feelings caused by you not receiving the geckos that you wanted and in your mind considered yours, since you paid for them and all. Have you notified him of the existence of this thread?

Clarification post here... Daniel, as I re-read my previous post, it comes across as if I was suggesting that you were somhow at fault. I want to clarify that that wasn't the intent of my original post, and I feel that your e-mails to the seller, as well as your post here were polite and professional. I am still curious about lhow much time elapsed between e-mails as well as hearing the other side of the story.

Originally Posted by thegeckohut

I contacted Bill early Sunday morning to see if this pair of geckos was still available. He responded saying that they were and asked me to send a PayPay payment. I did so. Once the geckos were paid for, I considered them MINE. First come first serve right? He contacted me later that same day to tell that he refunded my money because he found a local buyer so he didn't have to ship.

Sam unless I'm reading this wrong, I believe this all happened within the same day.

I don't think that it really qualifies as a "bad guy" post. More of an annoyance, in my opinion. Not having to ship is better for the animals. And he did immediately refund the money and give you an explanation of what happened. Communication and a prompt refund is a nice change of pace. I don't think you will have any problems finding other Crested Geckos

I can relate to this post, the last two weeks basically the same thing happened to me from two different sellers. It is pretty aggrevating and perhaps may not be worthy of a post here, but it will certainly will cause some people to become quite upset and in most instances ruin a potentially prosperous relationship. To me a deal is a deal, and there are certain considerations that should be given to a customer out of respect and courtesy! If I were now to be asked privatly to give my experiences with these individuals they would most certainly be spoken of in a negative light. Basically to me if you action cause your customers to get upset then it is obviously not the way to conduct yourself.

Originally Posted by Clearwater_Reptiles

Sam unless I'm reading this wrong, I believe this all happened within the same day.

I read it as being the same day as well, I was just curious as to how long it was between the first e-mail and when he got the e-mail saying money had been sent, not just when the e-mail was sent, but I'm wondering when he actually read the e-mail. Problem with only having one side of the story is that we can see how Daniel perceived things as happening, but have to guess on how the other party saw things, hopefully he was notified of the thread and will respond with his side of the story.

Originally Posted by Justin Mitcham

Basically to me if you action cause your customers to get upset then it is obviously not the way to conduct yourself.

What if you have 99 customers who are extremely happy and 1 upset customer? Should you change the "way you conduct yourself" to satisfy one customer at the risk of losing the other 99? Point I'm trying to make, since you brought this up, is that not every customer will be happy. Until both sides of the story are heard, I'm not sure that you can jump to any conclusions and decide that the seller did anything wrong.

Your right not every customer will be happy, and your are correct that we should see what the other party has to say.

But on the other hand if I were to put up an add that says 200.00 shipped, and someone emailed wanting to purchase this animal ,and I told them to send paypal, I would then give them a day or so to complete the transaction, not everyone lives on the PC. It really amounts to communication. If the seller prefers local pick up , they should of stated that in the ad.

What if you have 99 customers who are extremely happy and 1 upset customer? Should you change the "way you conduct yourself" to satisfy one customer at the risk of losing the other 99? Point I'm trying to make, since you brought this up, is that not every customer will be happy.

I don't see how being polite and giving a person adequate time to reply or pay is going to upset my other customers!! Everyone understands 1st come 1st serve, but to mislead a person to point of paying then backing out due to convenience is not polite, maybe the sellers right. I could understand the situation if a day or two past without further communication but not if it was just hours.
If you were at a show, was buying an animal from a dealer who agreed and had advertised to ship the animal to your residence, and before you got the cash out another person swooped in and the vendor allowed him to take the animal because he didn't have to ship, wouldn't that be considered rude? Yes it is his right and prerogative, but it is not good business in my mind.
Seems today some sellers are more interested in being paid then taking care of the customer..Not saying this is what happened but it does happen often.
Sometimes I get emails regarding an item I have listed, in reading the emails the 1st person who emailed me may say .."will you take a Money order?" Another may say "will you take paypal?" Should I then discriminate between the two simply because of the payment method, I could and it is my right to do so...or should I discriminate due to who wrote 1st?? Personally I believe the person who wrote 1st should take precedence unless I stated otherwise in my ad..Just seems the right way to do things to me...