QUESTION??
 

i have somebody who wants to trade me a lizard for a snake, each of us pay for our shipping. Im supposed to ship mine first, then he will ship his. I asked whats keeping him from just keeping my snake and not sending his lizard? He says he shares the same thoughts, but our emails should be enough to convict him if he were to try. I believe him to be honest, but still do not want to be taken advantage of.

"... you cannot call out who it was in this area..."
what?

I am saying you cannot say the name of the other party

Hi Michael. Whenever you do trades, it's always a risk you have to take. I generally look at how well known and what is the reputation of someone on the forums. If the other person has been here longer, has more positive transactions, and seems to be pretty active on the forums and is relatively well known that is the only situation in which I will send an animal off first. I've been here long enough that I can exercise seniority on a lot of trade agreements, so the other party typically ships first in trades with me. It gets harder if you're both new to the forums though. A lot of it comes down to how well you can type, believe it or not. If you type in texting-speak (e.g. lol, wtf, I C U, etc.) then chances are people are going to be pretty uncomfortable trading with you.

I've been pretty lucky and only had one truly negative transaction, although I've had a couple that were borderline. If you have any doubts, don't go through with it. Simple as that.

If only more people realized this. When the respective parties exist to one another as little more than text on a screen, context clues factor heavily into the decision-making process. I find "lol", and other cutesy internet speak exceptionally irritating, in general. However, I frown upon it even more so when someone is in a situation where it'd be smart to project some semblance of professionalism.

It comes down to risk vs reward. Is what you stand to gain worth the risk of losing what you already have?

If he made that statement, I'd personally see it as a red flag. A LOT of people likely thought the same thing, and found out the hard way that that's simply not the case, the vast majority of the time. If you decide to go through with the trade, just be aware that it'll likely be with no actual legal recourse, if/when things go bad.

Interesting....
In my world, the general rule is: the person that initiates the trade ships first. I don't initiate a lot of trades; but, when I do, I expect to ship first.

To the OP - how did this pending transaction come to be? Which one of you contacted the other and said, Hey, I'll trade you my ______ for your ______?

That's how I look at it.
If someone else initiates the trade, they ship first.
If I initiate the trade, I ship first.

You still need to decide if you want to proceed with the trade but I always went by the same "rule" as Harald mentioned.