ToTheFlames: Dr. Filthy returns

I’ve made at least a few long winded posts on G&S vs F&Family.

There is an old saying, ‘Money parts the best of friends’.

How that applies here is simple…… ‘Most’ of the people on this Forum ‘aren’t friends’ in the first place.

But, unfortunately like Kyle, you chat with another person for an hour or so, and you sort of feel like they get a ‘Pass’ in the add a friend to your life category.

When it comes to getting the wrong and of a deal, the biggest offenders are sometimes the ones that are easy to communicate with.

You ever heard the term, ‘Con Man’?

That is an abbreviated version of the full term, ‘Confidence Man’.

A Confidence Man is a person that talks such a good game, he just seems to compel the other person to feel comfortable. When the intended victim falls in to the flow of comfort zone, they feel compelled to reciprocate by showing that they can be nice too.

Goods and Services…. Period. If…… if the person ‘is’ a true friend or family member, close enough that you can reach their neck with both hands if they drop the Ball, by all means…. F&F. That is what PayPal intended. To give loyal users a break when dealing with Friends and Family. They never intended that service to be an avenue to skirt their money moving services.

PayPal charges fees because that is what their Business model is. They make it convenient to move money, and it costs to do it. They are not a Non Profit, with a mailing address down the street from Santa’s Village.

You want to be generous…simple enough… G&S and you are willing to pay the fees. More generous…? Once you get your amazingly priced deal in the Mail, you can gift them some money anytime… Dear Dr. Filthy, thanks for the great price and shipping the yo-yo in a timely manner. I am sending you this extra money to help offset the amount you paid for shipping’. <simple

I feel bad for you Kyle. But ‘we’ meaning all of us, should not have to put up with these ‘Flakes’.

You Pay… they Play…. They don’t play, they Pay…

Deal goes south? F&F…. You pay

Deal goes south? G&S… They Pay.

G&S should be the standard.

F&F should be the exception.

Remember rule one in life… All problems start at the beginning. We study history so we don’t repeat the mistakes from the past. Identify the problem. Identify the corrective measure. Apply the necessary solution.

Merry Christmas.

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i had deals with him here and on facebook. had good deal then walked out. only dealt with him on facebook once, had different name and everything. i regret that deal cause i have a motion parallel thats locked for eternity cause of how bad that cig smell is.

gonna second yoyodoc firm stance. G&S, period.

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I was able to get rid of the smell by scrubbing them with a toothbrush and dish detergent with warm water. Hope it helps.

You speak the truth doc, I got conned, and let my guard down. In the end it’s on me for not using g&s with someone I barely know.

The kind, giving nature of these boards left me with a sense of security that they prey upon.

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I have friends here….

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So sorry to hear about this BS @SlowThrow
I’ve done several trades with Flames before and come out unscathed. However, that means I’ve got a residential address I can share. @admins can we do something to report or block an address? I realize it’s personal info, but this scam crap can’t continue. Kyle and admins, please reach out if there’s anything that can be done with this info.

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I tried to buy a holy yogurt from him a few weeks ago and he had initially been very responsive. I sent the payment and everything seemed good but he refunded it without prompting then ghosted me after saying he didnt know why it refunded. Thankfully got my money back but it was definitely sketchy.

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I really like this idea!

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Verified traders would be neat but collecting PII is a rough business and expensive as you have to comply with a bunch of different rules especially for UK folks that fall under GDPR

I wonder if there’s a way to use data from a public source and cross reference without storing the data. I imagine there is but I don’t have the programming skills to work something like that.

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What @Isaac said, but, also VPNs not only exist, but are easily accessible.

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That is my fear as well.

Please don’t make my mistake, USE G&S, vet your sellers, don’t take a nice chat and good attitude on good faith. Your don’t really know the members here, except for possibly a few. There are many of us who will go above and beyond, there are a couple members who reached out to me privately about this, and it’s one of the many reasons I love this place.

Just be careful out there with your money.

I made a bunch of mistakes with this transaction in hindsight, that’s why I posted the messages. Not just to expose them, but also myself for my foolish errors to help others not make the same mistake.

I was too loose with how much I could spend I think, i let them talk me out of a throw I was going to purchase from another seller to buy his Loadout because I trusted them on nothing but vibes. I panic agreed to buy the G2 because he listed it while we were negotiating and I didn’t want to miss the good price. I wasn’t pushy on shipping, I didn’t look at their account age, I only briefly checked their post history to see if they were cool, I myself offered up to use f&f because I was in a good mood, I gave them too many benefits of the doubt. I didn’t want to offend them because “they were sick” so I gave him an extra week on sending my refund before reaching out. I let ignored messages slide. I am generally good natured, and laid back, and the Bad Doctor took full advantage, save for $10 of my budget. At least I got my first package, but it’s hard to look at these throws without thinking of getting burnt.

And also that terrible odor. I mean, I smoke a ton of weed, used to smoke a pack a day when I smoked cigarettes 10years ago, but even I was offended by how cig smokey these things were. I almost threw out the extra strings he sent. As soon as the mailman handed me the box and I brought it inside I had a nagging feeling this is what was about to play out.

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@AndreBoulay I think that forum policy should be updated to require G&S to prevent scamming like this in the future. It sucks, but so does getting scammed. I feel violated.

An IP ban won’t stop him, and other scammers await us in the future. I don’t want the BST to disappear, I think this may be the safest route.

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Hell yeah.

Yall be safe with Filthy, but remember people aren’t bad forever. I’ve gotten some smoke ridden packages from him in the past, but he has burnt personal friends of mine.

I just know when maybe addiction or emotional issues are happening, you feel like its you vs. the world.

Hopefully everyone gets made whole.

Filth…its not to late brother to make all this go away.

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This is true, we are not only our worst faults, we are human. I went into this just hoping to hear that he is okay and I don’t need to worry, but silence speaks volumes as well. I always want to see the best in people, even if they aren’t doing their best to show it themselves.

Also, he has a history of repeating this scheme.

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we’ve had his personal address for years: I dont understand how Andre is supposed to police this as quickly as he scams.

His photos are always recognizable to me. You know we all have our own way to photo a yoyo. His is very easy to pick up.

Yall just be careful.

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On mine he photographed them on a white throw blanket, as vargabond he posted pics of them on a wooden desk (also another reason I posted dms, so his pics can be used for the future) Also I am not claiming this is Andre’s responsibility to police bad sellers like this, it’s in buyer to vet. Normalizing G&S for all sales is just like a baseline protection.

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I just had a nice embarrassing conversation about this whole situation with my wife.

Man do I feel foolish :sob::dotted_line_face:

I don’t think I’ll be doing much “b”ing here in the BST for the near future, just some “s”ing and hopefully “T”ing lol.

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And @Captrogers

I think the first, easiest thing we can do is to enforce a minimum time amount of time on the forum before you can buy and/or sell from the BST. This won’t stop all scammers, but it would reduce the ones looking for low hanging fruit.

I especially wouldn’t mind verified traders, but I’m not sure it has to be a huge rigamaroll. I think crowdsourcing this would be good. Buyers / sellers, after sending/receiving, can vote on a special tag that is ever present (or maybe if you’re just in the BST threads). Alternatively, using your path wouldn’t be a bad idea, but make it opt in but not mandatory. Seller’s would still have the option of choosing those without, but would have an obtuse header or banner that states that this seller is not verified.

Additionally, we can have forever posts that accumulate evidence to spot repeated scammers / ban evaders and post either a summary or link in the header/banner mentioned moments ago.

In fairness, there’s a lot of things that can be done, some easier than others, but BST is run like a free market, which, I’m all for, but above all, I’d prefer a little regulation rather than none at all

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you shouldnt at all. you were wronged. I’m going to message him tonight. I’m not saying i will get a response but i will try

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it’s been thrown out there several times, you can’t force the bst to use g&s. there are people that are trusted friends like another individual mentioned, but how are you going to enforce it? that job policing bst transactions is far too large of a task to take on, especially with what the mods already do. trust and g&s are how you build relationships. it takes a while to build a true relationship, in person and online. you can’t manage away bad apples, individuals have to police themselves, be responsible and use g&s. save friends and family for what it is for.

now… i know there is a seller’s risk using g&s, and i’ve seen folks mention it several times. if the item isn’t as described for every minuscule detail (i guess this more prevalent in, photo, instrument and electronics hobbies), the buyer can file a complaint and get a refund… as a bad apple. as far as yoyos go and the handful of dollars it costs to be sure you won’t be a victim, i would say it’s worth it.

there are some folks that argue for ff because the tax man will get us. while in our hobby it doesn’t seem fair as we’ve already been taxed on these items if bought new, and not many folks keep a record of their transactions to demonstrate they are not a profitable business. especially if they have dozens of yoyos crossing their hands. so, we can form a grassroots organization to lobby congress to give the small-time hobbyists a break, or we can kinda work with the system we have, as imperfect as it is… and build some relationships and make some friends.

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I didn’t think of the flip side of it like that, very good points!

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