bought a set of wheels and shifters off freeform5spot (aka bustafajones?) a while ago, advertised as being as new with an XT cassette, wheels arrived with a cheepo sram cassette. Shifters were the old m750 ones not the newer ones I believed I was paying for.

Now he did have two sets of shifters advertised, but surely its beyond reasnoble comprehension that i'd haggle up the value on the cheeper pair he'd only just advertised, not haggle down the expensive pair he'd been struggling to shift for a few weeks?

I dont think I'm unreasnoble in asking for an XT cassette and a refund for the difference between the price I paid and what he had advertised the cheeper set of shifters for.

How long and how many un-answered e-mails would you give it before thretening court action? Seem's a bit OTT for a £40 cassette and a £10 refund, but its the principle of you should get what you pay for? And it's not like he's the model seller on the classifides is it?

Just putting the kettle on…shall I switch the Burco on instead…it'll save constant refilling of the kettle?

I can't believe he's still posting on here, tbh.

Other than making threatening phopne calls to ton has he had communication with anyone else on here in the past few weeks?

he's lurking………………………….

within 2 minutes of posting that, I had the first e-mail from him in weeks!

let's hope this was what it took to get the situation sorted for you.

This is a cruel situation for anyone, I too have been at the 'misadventure' of a non communicating running off with my money seller! I would send one last email stating your intention (ie small claims) and give them reasonable time to reply (10 days) to make a suitable compromise. Then take it from there. It is very frustrating for non communication and simply implies in my opinion that they are guilty. Or just hijack every post going froward that he lists. Hope you find a resolution mate.

Send him a letter giving him 7 days to sort the matter out. After that start the Small Claims procedure. there is little doubt that you would win, and he also has to pay the court fees. That should shake him up.

I would also give him a deadline to sort it – a week or so and then go straight to court – but only if you have an address.

I would also post on every post he makes and why is he not banned?

he's not posted since I (and someone else) hounded him out of the classifides telling all the potential buyers whe were queing up to buy stuff what he'd been like, he's not posted since.

Fingers crossed, he's going to post them on Monday………..

Its £50 – is it really worth your effort and time for that little/much – and there is no certainty you'll win (or even if you do win, actually see your money).

Just notify the STW moderators of your problem and hope they will block his email address.

Put it down to experience and move on.

Principles are worth a lot more than £50!

It's a tough on eto decide what to do with. There has been quite enough complaints about this chap but the only thing we can do is to ban him from the forum ultimately.. However, the issue with that is by doing so we remove a means of communicating with him.

I'll drop him an email to make him aware of this thread.

Thoughts?

spoon

sorry for the delay. Cassette will be posted. No excuses, but what with loosing the most important person in my life to cancer plus continually mounting home and work pressures I have to admit I have been more than a little distracted. As for the shifers, it just came down to lack of communication, you didnt up bid yourself, it came out at sctach when you take into account postage.

Havent been hounded off here, due to reasons above I just cant seem to be as excited about much at the moment, even riding or this place.

As for the comment by wwwwass, I think you are refering to a call that ton recieved.

This is the email I got from ton:

cowardice
Fri, 12 February, 2010 16:19:02From: tony craig <thoss20@hotmail.co.uk>View Contact
To: freeformfivespot@yahoo.co.uk

——————————————————————————–

is a shamefull thing.
dont phone me threatening me
if you want to meet me no problem.

I had no idea what he was on about and replied as such (providing all my telephone numbers so he could cross check).

Doing my own digging, I found this on the forum:

http://www.singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/some-peoples-vgcover-on-classifieds

I think that ton got confused by wheelz and my own STW tag. Still to hear back from him to apologise.

You cant win them all and some folk should reaslise that life sometimes deals people a s**t hand and that, although waiting for something is annoying, its not the be all and end all.

That said: spoon – I apologise for the delay, you will get the cassette.

I did think "it's only £50" but then I've just bought a RM ETS-X frame for £50 of Mister P, now "it's only £50", should I not pay him and just expect it on arrive on my doorstep monday morning?

IMO the classifides on this forum exists purely based on trust, with people regularly handing over hundreds of pounds to strangers for goods they've only seen in photographs. 99% of the time it works out, just had a nailbiting weekend waiting to hear if the cannondale i sold had arrived safely, turns out RM had left it in the guys shed without a note so needless worry. I'd have felt like crap if it had gone missing even though I'd paid the extra to make sure it got there and was insured. In all my years buying/selling I've only had one thing returned to me as being not as described, it was a set of forks that must have been dropped on the adjuster in transit as they came back with the dial in the bottom of the box allong with a load of oil. Another guy sent me back a set of hope C2's for a refund, I refunded him and sold them on again to a guy reading the thread we were discussing it on!

Mark, feel free to drop me a line.

No need.. you is here innit 🙂

Let communication commence… which thinking about it seems to be at the root of the vast majority of classifieds disputes.. If buyers and sellers communicated more then most of the issues would vanish. personal tragedy is entirely understandable and almost everyone would be willing to wait if they heard about the circumstances.. But that's the point.. Unless they actually HEAR from the seller about the problems they face then the inevitable outcome will be threads like this.

If you have entered into an agreement with someone that has part completed by the transfer of money then the simple truth is that no matter what the circumstances you have an obligation to the other party that should at the very least encompass an open channel of communication.

Principles…

To quote Lord Justice Ward:

"The lesson is never learned that those who fight for their principles frequently end up paying for them."

Pulls up chair and reaches for coffee….

freeform5spot – if it wasn't you then you have my apologies for perpetuating an untruth.

no worries, was just a bit taken a back thats all!

ton – Member

personally, i think the bloke sounds like a complete c*ck, and deserves a good hiding.
imho obviously……….

And ton can't exactly say he was being Mr Ghandi.

How the sympathy swings….

So a serial bullshitter comes out with some predictable toffee about his circumstances and the mood changes…

In his pit of despair, he had enough energy and motivation to advertise the stuff and take the money, just lacking in completing the transaction.

It sounds just a little too convenient for me….

I must confess I swallowed tons line last week about being rung up and abused. I didn't notice the follow-up thread apologising for his mistake, but there you go.

Ton seems to be waving his righteous anger around a bit too much recently, and with little justification it seems. There's always two sides I suppose.

Except with Ti_Pin_man; he was just an idiot.

"How the sympathy swings"

In my case I apologised for repeating soemthing that, it turns out, may not be true not sure that's sympathy?

Is ton banned again – he'd normally have responded by now?

Small claims isn't worth it. Payment is very rarely enforced.

Personally, I'd ebay the bits I had, and buy the bits I wanted.

I had a tenner in his wife having a pretend miscarriage

Cancer, nice heart string pulling twist bustafa

can anybody give me an email address for this guy plesae?
I feel £400 worse off :/

What’s he done now?

Peter Gratwick <freeformfivespot@yahoo.co.uk>

This is the one I had when I had the miss fortune to deal with the guy.

freeformfivespot@yahoo.co.uk, I don’t think he will reply that quickly if at all I feel £260 poorer at the minute.

well i dont know yet? i am just very worried. see my thread
http://www.singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/freeform5spot-have-i-been-scammed

thats the one peter gratwick.

just a note to say i’ve spoken to pete and all seems legit.
So apologies to him so long as all arrives okay.
Chris