Secure Trading

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 25/03/2008 12:54:45

I am thinking of adding a secure trading option to the Trading Module here at the EOJ Manager. I am only wondering if you would use such a service. Therefore, this poll.

The idea of a secure trading option is that when you make of have received an offer via the trading module, you and your trading partner can choose to go for the secure trading option. This means that each of you sends the cards of the other to the closest middleman. When both middlemen have received the cards, they will send them to trading partners. If one of the middlemen does not receive the cards from a trade after a certain amount of time, the trade will be canceled and the cards that have already been received will be returned to the original owner.

The middle men will be chosen by me and are people that I trust.

However, there is a cost associated to this as the middlemen have to repack the cards and resend them (either to the trading partner or back to the original owner). This means packaging and shipping costs. As it is difficult to determine beforehand how much the packaging and shipping costs will be, the idea is that each trading partner pays a certain amount of money upfront (e.g. 15 euro). After the trade has been concluded the exact costs are known, so the money that has been paid that goes above the exact costs will then be refunded to the trading partners.

I am not sure yet what to do with the money of a person who did not submit his cards: refund them after the trade has been canceled or use that as kind of fine for not holding up to your end of the deal. What do you think?

So, what do you think of such a secure trading option? Would you use it for specific trades (it will be optional)? If so, how much would you be willing to pay in advance? Please also let me know your comments or suggestions to improve this.

Well i would if they are not on a trusted trader list. I am and i just did 2 more trades. But this is cool but who would be the middle man?

Anubis80 wrote:Well i would if they are not on a trusted trader list. I am and i just did 2 more trades. But this is cool but who would be the middle man?

My intention is to have a few middlemen: 2 in the US, 2 in the UK, 1 or 2 for the rest of Europe and depending on the amount of users in Asia and Australia, maybe one there. That way, we can keep the costs down as much as possible.

What is the clear benefit of this system? Right now how i'm looking at it is an additional cost. How are we to know that these 'middle' men can be trusted? The risk of loss is greater as well just because there is more of a chance for error, would it not place a large liability on these middle men? I'm still new to the site and haven't traded yet but I can understand why people might want to do a secure trade, but if a trader has a good rating why not just directly trade?

Doomcookie wrote:What is the clear benefit of this system? Right now how i'm looking at it is an additional cost. How are we to know that these 'middle' men can be trusted? The risk of loss is greater as well just because there is more of a chance for error, would it not place a large liability on these middle men? I'm still new to the site and haven't traded yet but I can understand why people might want to do a secure trade, but if a trader has a good rating why not just directly trade?

I agree that if you trust the person with whom you are going to trade, you do not need a middleman. But in situation where there is doubt about the other party, e.g. new user or a trader with a mixed reputation, you may want to have someone in between that can be trusted, so you know you will not be tricked out of your cards. Especially if you are trading ultra-rares or phantoms.

How can you trust the middlemen. Well, I hope that people trust me. And the people I chose as a middlemen are people I trust and who have a good trading reputation on this site already. Furthermore, with multiple middlemen, you can always choose the one you trust the most.

I got this idea, as I heard some people complaining about the fact that even trading with someone who has a good reputation is not secure, so I was looking for a way to improve that. This is what I came up with, and I am now trying to determine if it is worth the effort (mine and of the middlemen) to implement this or not.

No thanks. I'd be sure to only trade with trusted traders for the first few trades, when i'd have to send first. Once i got enough where the other trader had to send first, it'd pretty much be a no risk trade. I mean, if they don't send, report it and/or cancel the trade.

It is much like an 'insurance' on your trade, which isn't a bad thing. I can't argue against the aspect of having such a service. If you want to use it or not is your own call.
Why not instead of sending money and having to return it, you just figure the cost of shipping before you mail it? There is a link if using the usps, also flat rate shipping options are always available? Of course I wouldn't be asking questions if i wasn't slightly interested.

http://www.usps.com/tools/calculatepostage/welcome.htm?from=home&page=0061calculatepostage

If someone bails on a trade then their money should be used to send back the card of the person who did live up to their end of the deal.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 26/03/2008 10:15:17

There is of course also the option for people to use a secure posting service, such as one with a tracking number or where the recipient has to sign for the cards. This may in the end be cheaper than having to send it to a middleman and then repackaging it and send it on again.

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 20/04/2008 07:22:03

msetten wrote:There is of course also the option for people to use a secure posting service, such as one with a tracking number or where the recipient has to sign for the cards. This may in the end be cheaper than having to send it to a middleman and then repackaging it and send it on again.

Yeah - but you can still receive a wrong or damaged card (or an old Blockbuster membership card ...

).

Way too much complicated, costly, time consuming. I have two alternative sollution:

1. If the trade is between 2 trusted or equally rated member there is usually no problem and they can send cards to each other straight away. However, if one (or more) of the participants in the trade (and in theory there could be multi change between 3 or more players with direct shipping of the cards between final recepients instead of shipping each card two or more times) than those with lower (or negative) trade rating would need to send the cards first and only after the other (more) trusted party will recieve the cards in good order the card(s) will be shipped to them as well.

This way it's:

- Cheaper
- Fairly safe
- Minimum hassle
- The time delay is the same or less than with the middleman option

2. The maximally secure option would be to use a "deposit":

- before the cards would be sent out the value of deposit will be established (to cover the calue of the card(s) involved in the trade plus P&P)

- both (or at least the trader(s) with low(er) rating will pay the deposit to the "banker" (Mark or several trusted "bankers" in major countries) - preferably by PayPal, Moneybrookers etc.

- after succesfull trade will be reached the deposit will be refunded (using the refund option in PayPal or other pay method used).

- if one (or more) of the parties involved in the trade will not receive the card(s) and other party will not resolve this (or will not communicate in given period of time) it's deposit will be used to cover the costs of cards, P&P, fees etc. This could be than send by banker to other party or kept in in trader's "account" as the deposit for he future trade(s)

- alternativelly - an (uber-)active traders can decide to hold a "permanent" / long time deposit with banker (or one deposit could be used for several consequrntive trades without refunding in the meantime) as long as it's value will cover the trade.

- in additon - to keep the cost down the use of personal PayPal account and funding not from credit cards is preffered but it's surelly not that much of problem as far as the payment is expected to be refunded anyway so the fees will be charged in case of uncompleted trade only (and could be already included in calculation of the deposit itself).

- a small (admin) fee could be charged by banker to cover his / her additional costs and work involved. If Mark woud be / decide to be (one of the) banker(s) it might generate a bit of so needed income to run this site and I'm sure that most of us will not mind to donate some small amounts this way in exchange for a peace of mind / secure trade ...

- This way you'd also give a chance to new traders (or the ones with a negative feedback) to participe in the trades (and most of all to become trusted traders in a first place)

I know it's all a bit complicated in a first look but still much easier that multiply shipping of the cards where the increased risk of loss or damage in transit is involved!

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 05/11/2008 19:09:00

There is now a way to trade more securely. Our Prize Vault has the option to send in your cards for trade-in to use and to acquire cards you want from that vault using the credits we give you for the trade-ins. When making a trade-in you can even reserve specific cards to ensure that they are not acquired by others in the time it takes for your trade-in cards to arrive with our vault.

We hope that with this new way of trading cards, we can offer you a more secure way to complete your collection.

For all details regarding the Prize Vault, how to trade-in and reserve cards, please read the announcements posts at http://www.eojmanager.com/forum/forums/show/26.page