This message is directed primarily at other group buy organizers, some of whom I'll probably PM about it, but I noticed something odd when double checking my Paypal account to make sure everyone had paid up... It seems that either I missed the notification that
a member who I won't name publicly but there has already been some controversy over had cancelled his invoice or I didn't get one at all... leading to today where I ran a search in Paypal for all cancelled invoices and found his was cancelled, but his order was still in my form. It would have resulted in my shipping of keycaps to him for free while having never been the wiser unless I double checked in that specific way. It could be a glitch in my email or Paypal, or it could have been intentional, who knows. All I know is that I didn't get a PM from him either notifying me that he was cancelling it, or a PM asking me to do it. The following would be good practice for all group buy organizers and participants:
Organizers:
1) Double check who has paid by running a search among the invoices for that group buy date range and make sure all of the names under the cancelled status aren't still in your spreadsheet.
2) Potentially go through your paid list and cross reference... that's time consuming though
3) Some invoices will show as paid but the payment didn't go through (insufficient funds or cancelled payment via the money source,) so you have to actually click on the invoice number and look at the transaction details to see whether it did or not... that's very time consuming but if you have a discrepancy in what your balance should be and what it is, that's the only way to be sure.
Participants:
1) Its always good form to notify the organizer every time you do something, whether it be paying, modifying, or cancelling your order, or if you need to arrange delayed or alternative payment. Payment notifications in particular should be posted in the thread to keep it active, while others should be done by PM.
2) Don't just cancel your invoice and assume the organizer will figure it out... odds are he or she has a billion other notifications spamming them and there is a good chance they'll miss it.
3) There have always been ways to scam, but cancelling your payment or otherwise deceptively trying to get free keys will eventually lead to you getting caught, its always been nothing more than a matter of time.
Fortunately just about everyone on here is 100% on the level and stuff like that doesn't happen often, and I'm not accusing any individual here of doing so. You're all gentleman and scholars unless proven otherwise.
Cheers,
Dave
PS: I thought about posting this as a PSA somewhere but couldn't decide where, if a Mod has a good idea for it feel free!
