Fake Buyers - Sad But True

[Shileah]

DaWanda truly is a nice and easy way to present and sell your crafted items and also to buy unique, innovative and with love made things. One rather unpleasant thing about it is though that it is obviously quite easy for people to just fake a purchase for whatever reasons.

My very first sale on DaWanda went totally down the drain and if it hadn't been that during the time this whole thing took I had other, successful sales, I would perhaps had left DaWanda again. It all started in the early days of February when finally - after more than two months of my membership at DaWanda without selling anything - someone bought one of my bags. It turned out to be a young woman from Slovenia who seemed to be crazy about my retro bag. I was soooo happy! As I custom make most of the messenger bags when they are ordered, I started crafting the bag right away. She didn't want the magnetic pin closures I offered for a small extra fee, which dissapointed me a bit at that time as those pins had just arrived and I was eager to use them.

However, the first problems already arose regarding payment. She insisted on pay on delivery, which normally would not be the problem (otherwise I wouldn't offer it), but I was unable to find any company neither from Switzerland nor Germany that was accepted to deliver with pay on delivery in Slovenia. I spent hours on the phone trying to find one, but in vain. In the end, she agreed on payment via bank transfer but asked me for some more time as she needed to save the money to pay for it.

Although I wasn't too happy about that, of course I accepted as I had no other potential buyers for the bag at that moment anyway. I just asked her to tell me in case she lost interest in the bag.

Weeks went by and I asked her from time to time whether she still wanted the bag. It was always the same; yes, she wanted it, but still needs the money/still needs to ask her grandmother for some money (oh yes, that sounds trustworthy)... after more than five weeks she all of a sudden asked me whether there was a way to close the bag and I reminded her that she didn't want the magnetic pin and that I would have known that before as it is almost impossible to include it afterwards without completely re-opening the bag (which would be as much work as making it completely new, if not even more). "Oh, well then we have a problem now" was her reaction. This really made me mad - although I tried not to make her notice that too much, after all, she still was some kind of a customer; in the end she agreed on still buying it and would do so now soon.
After seven weeks of waiting I checked her account on DaWanda as I hadn't got any sign of life from her since then. What did I have to see? In the meantime, she had been happily shopping at other shops and obviously also paid quickly (as one of the ratings clearly stated).

That really made my day... leaving me waiting for nearly two months because of not having the money, but shopping sprees the same time? I contacted her again, giving a one week deadline to buy and pay the bag, otherwise I would understand that she does not want to buy the bag anymore.
No response.
Meanwhile I found another DaWanda shop owner who also had an item on sale reserved for her. I contacted her as I thought it would be wiser to give a little warning and was still surprised to find out in the answer that this owner had exactly the same problems as I had with this buyer. Even more so, it was a custom made shirt which is of course much harder to sell to someone else than a bag! We both agreed that we would write a feedback mail to DaWanda to inform them about this buyer.

Yesterday evening the deadline ran off and as I had already expected, the buyer did neither buy nor contact me. In the end I changed the item description from a "reserved for" to a "free for all" item, but a bad feeling remains. I informed DaWanda about it and also was a bit nasty by leaving a comment on the buyers' personal page, stating that it was sad to see that she left me waiting for two months to buy the custom made bag and then didn't even response to the mail I've sent her (and of course not buying as promised).
The surprise was that shortly after this comment, I got a mail from her, widely excusing, saying that she had problems with online banking and credit cards system and whatsoever and she was hoping that I wouldn't bee too mad. The comment, of course, was deleted.

How pathetic. Considered true, why didn't she react on my last mail? Why didn't she inform me about that before? And how could she then pay others?

Don't get me wrong - I fully believe that even the most honourable buyer can always have problems with internet connection, illness, whatever and I am the last person to not understanding and respecting that. But seeing that she told me she needs to get the money and even ask her grandmother about a little monetary help and shopping at several other DaWanda members on the same time really was too much.

The question is for me now: Is there anything we or DaWanda can do about it?
There is no easy and fast answer to that. Sure, a blacklist could help. But how would you judge about who is put on that list? I am pretty sure that DaWanda has in its backend systems some kind of closed blacklist for members that have been marked for some false play. But that doesn't help the "normal" members. An open blacklist which all sellers have access to sounds nice on the first thought, but there are always people who take advantage of things like this and perhaps put buyers in there just because they didn't get the full five stars. And even if there is a possibility to make sure that only real "black sheep" appear on such a list - where do you set the mark from "little mistake that can happen" to "absolute no go"?

So all those members that demand such a blacklist system in the forums: It sounds like a good idea in the first run, but thought about it more intensively shows the problems that such a list would bring.

A different idea could be that it would be made possible for sellers to also rate buyers in case the purchase did not come to an end. Of course, here it would also need to be made sure on a technical basis that no fake ratings can be made.

However, I am sure that DaWanda is aware of those problems as - at least in the German ones - in the forums more and more people write about problems with fake buyers. And it surely is not in the interest of the platform that people - sellers as well as purchasers - lose their faith in the project. After all, it still is a great and easy way to present your craftings to a wide range of people!

[Shileah]

Catherine, I think this is a mistery everybody wonders about... for bags it is even worse on the categories page. Some people (mostly those sellers who already are rather successful) always have something on the first or at least second page, others nearly never come up. If I ever was on the first page of the sewed bags, I never was there for a longer time, a few hours - not days or weeks as others... I've written a feedback mail to DaWanda to ask about it and all I got was "we know about this issue and are working on it" - I just wonder if they can arrange fast changing for the starting page, why doesn't that work for categories...
I stopped making myself a head about that, it only frustrates...

[Duffy Designs]

They don't even show the newest things listed under your category unless you specifically ask for the newest. I think they list them according to how many hits they get , which is self perpetuating. Why not have the newest listings as the usual thing to do?

[Catherine]

I'm really sorry to hear about your fake buyer!! That's really upsetting!! I've been on with Dawanda for a month now without a sale which is pretty depressing. I think it's really hard to sell full stop!!! I also don't understand why some people seem to always have the front page for new items and mine never appear anywhere near the front page.

[Shileah]

You're welcome!
Ah, good that you also sell somewhere else. So at least then you know that it is just something related to DaWanda and people like your work! Happy to hear that :)

[Duffy Designs]

Shileah, thank you so much for your offer of help! I think you are right about the reasons for not selling...I just don't have a lot of time to be doing this since I have several other means of selling my work. If I change my mind, though, I'll know who to contact! Thank you again.

[Shileah]

Oh :( that is so sad to hear. You shouldn't give up, your jewelery is so sweet! Perhaps it needs a bit more of "advertisment" - try dropping a line from time to time in the forums to get people's attention! It surely is rather hard in the jewelery segment as there are a lot of other shops (same with bags, I had to notice...) and with some shops, you really ask yourself how they can offer things so cheap (also - same with bags...).

I can imagine that European people are a bit "scared" to buy from the U.S. as they then have to pay taxes and stuff (which also applies for Switzerland, so I am in the same position) and this automatically increases the costs. So especially at rather costy items as jewelery they somehow don't dare buying it, although they like it.

Do you offer your items in other languages as well or only in English? If so, I could help you with translating to German for a few items. Perhaps that would help? At least it is worth a try, I think!

[Duffy Designs]

It's been 4 months for me with no sales and very few views! I am about to write it off. If they start charging in June, I will write it off. Hate to be negative, but it's true.

[Saras Texture Crafts]

Mysterious Cats... don't worry yet, the site is still new so we are still waiting for people to find us! I am hoping that with our work here we can promote movement in our shops. I am working on ways to promote this site too, so hang on in there!
Sara x

[Shileah]

Yes, I can still sell it and hope that it will find a new buyer :)

Ohh... keep your head up! It sometimes takes ages until you finally sell something. It took me about two months and that was the faked purchase^^ - in the end, after some time whilst still thinking the faker would buy in the end, I had a good sale.

I am too a bit wondering why some people sell so much and others so little. And some shop owners always have something at a front position in the categories.. mostly those owners, who already are quite successful. They seem to add "older" articles as new ones from time to time; of course I could do that as well but honestly, I don't feel like it.

One thing that may help is being active in the forums, although I often don't find anything where I could add a helpful comment. Just keep on looking :)

Sad to hear that your shop wasn't mentioned... :( that is not really fair I think.

[MysteriousCats]

So sorry to hear that... :(
At least you did not lose your bag, I mean you can still sell it, can't you?
I don't know if it's the kind of news I want to hear I am so frustrated with DaWanda.
First of all, I am over a month now and absolutely no movement. Secondly, I am so happy that my cupcake made it to the logo of the April treasures but... nowhere is mentioned my shop :(
After all, wasn't that supposed to promote your shop? I contacted DaWanda but not successfully.