The thing about selling stuff on the Internet, with payment on collection, is that you have to meet the sort of people who buy things on the Internet.
And they appear to be, without exception, utter fucking loons.
I eventually sold my old washing machine for seventy five pounds, and the successful bidder arranged to pick it up one evening via an email written with such broken English that I could not decide if they were an immigrant or a product of the comprehensive school system.
The morning of the collection they phoned to confirm my address. It was only because I have seen that documentary Cultural Learnings of America for make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan that I recognised his accent. It took every ounce of restraint not to end the call with a rousing, “Yegshemash!”
He arrived a little earlier than expected that evening and I opened the front door of my first floor flat to a beaming five foot nothing, seven stone Borat. On his own. To collect a washing machine.
I showed him to the kitchen and briefly explained how to fit the washing machine (just about the only skill I picked up after being raised by a professional plumber).
“So. It’s all yours then.” I concluded, tapping the top of the machine.
He looked at me, and back at the machine, then back at me.
This was not going to end well, I could tell.
“Could you….help me please?”
I did not yet have my cash, so I had little choice but to help the dwarf Kazakhstani carry a washing machine down a flight of stairs. Well, I say help, but that would imply an element of lifting on his part. Washing machines are heavy. Particularly when you are bearing the weight pretty much alone.
We finally reached his ten year old Ford Escort and it became clear he had not emptied the car or made space for the washing machine. I have no idea how big he thought it would be, but it seemed the only uncluttered space was inside his glove box.
After a further ten minutes of to-ing and fro-ing and chuckle brother-esque manoeuvring we finally loaded the machine into his car and he pulled out his wallet to pay me.
Which he did in full.
With FIVE POUND NOTES.
Now, I understand that back in Kazakhstan each of those notes would probably buy a family home, but that is no excuse. Unfortunately I had no choice but to accept this form of payment.
From this point forward, all my subsequent eBay auctions will explicitly dictate a maximum of one single five pound note. And a buyer able to fight their way out of a wet paper bag.
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Keef · February 20, 2008 at 9:12 am
He probably had no idea what to expect, A washing machine in Kazakstan is most likely a plastic bowl and a pair of bare feet.
Ww sold a dining room display cabinet on eBay, about 7ft wide, 6ft high, 2ft deep made of solid mahogany with a glass front, it weighed a ton. The guy who bought it turned up in a 4×4 but rather than put it in the back he wanted to put it on the roofrack.
It took me, him, my son and my neighbour (who was dumb enough to come out of his front door at the wrong moment) to lift it up onto the roof rack.
He seemed confident though that he was going to lift it off on his own and I found myself wondering if I could be held liable if he ended up crushing himself to death underneath it.
Pete · February 20, 2008 at 9:13 am
Hey, don’t knock five pound notes. I’d happily swap your fivers for my tenners.
The thing is, you can always get hold of a ten pound note by just going to a cash machine. But what do you do when you need a fiver in a hurry?
James · February 20, 2008 at 9:27 am
1. We need your eBay ID – do you think your readers don’t need to know what you’re selling?
2. Read the lunacy I encountered last year when trying to buy a TV on eBay:
http://jamesspratt.org/blog/2007/10/01/warning-leaving-negative-feedback-on-ebay/
Thankfully, I am not dead yet, but it was on the cards.
Vikki · February 20, 2008 at 9:37 am
James – That is unbelievable (yet scarily funny) Did you take it further with eBay?
Billyo · February 20, 2008 at 10:07 am
Five pound notes are great. Never any problems with Taxi and Bus Drivers taking sharp intakes of breath when you bull out a tenner.
Keef · February 20, 2008 at 10:07 am
Wow James, your own personal nutter, I’m impressed
Admin comment by Mr Angry · February 20, 2008 at 10:28 am
Keef – Yes, I am also worried that he will never be able to install at his end and I will get the blame…
Pete – swap them on a 1:1 ratio? Deal.
James – These items have been an gone I’m afraid, I rarely blog ‘real time’… and having read that post, my only advice is that you really should stop posting pictures of your penis on the Internet.
Vikki – I agree, it deserves some sort of follow-up post.
Billyo – I pay all service industry people with loose shrapnel. They love it.
Keef – I would like to see him extend his repertoire of insults though, don’t you think?
Lin · February 20, 2008 at 1:17 pm
Having never bought anything on Ebay I think I will stick to the shops.
gnarlyswine · February 20, 2008 at 1:43 pm
“From this point forward, all my subsequent eBay auctions will explicitly dictate a maximum of one single five pound note”
So everything you sell on ebay will have a buy it now option for a fiver?
please let me know when you are selling anything else, it would probably even be worth the international shipping – or Ill ask you to help carry it – across the Atlantic.
James · February 20, 2008 at 1:44 pm
@Vikki et al:
As a follow up…
I grassed them up to the powers that be at eBay. They suggested I informed the police, which I didn’t do. They suspended provisuals account, then for some reason unbeknown to me, reinstated it soon after. The guy contacted me asking to mutually withdraw the feedback which I also ignored. Just recently, so maybe 3 months down the line, I was sent another email by them asking to withdraw the feedback, which again I ignored.
The thing is, so they could deliver I obviously gave them my address, which is where my mrs and bambina are right this second.
xl · February 20, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Having seen the Borat film, it seems like the fellow would have made his wife carry the washing machine.
Melissaria · February 20, 2008 at 8:04 pm
You think that ebay attracts nutters? You’ve clearly never used Freecycle. This is where you list some old shit that’s not even worth attempting to sell, on the basis that giving it away is less effort than arranging for the council to collect it/taking it to the tip yourself. Invariably you receive 100 sob stories about housebound one-legged children, but decide, on the basis that the stories are probably all bollocks, to give it to the person who will collect and get out of your way soonest. For some reason, this person is almost always a huge, bald, tattooed individual in an enormous white van. And her husband.
Perhaps I need to try the Hampstead Freecycle group instead. I hear you can get a Aga and the contents of last season’s Boden catalogue for free on there…
Lesley Bonney · February 26, 2008 at 1:36 pm
Unbelieveable but at least he didn’t pay you with only a fiver…