Response Etiquette Question

Respond to them all.

 

IMO if you offer a trade and a BA responds you should communicate back to them.

 

Yes, all you have to say is, "I've already gotten this taken care of. Thanks!"

Copy, paste, repeat.

 

Maybe you couldn't this time, but also delete the post as soon as possible to avoid having to respond to so many people.

 

It's funny you mention this. I replied to 4-5 ISO:FT in the past few days. Got no reply to any of them. Offered their ISO...all were read...no reply.

Several go on my DNT list. It's funny how many of them end up on future Bad Trader threads...

 

Pretty frustrating how much I have run in to this lately. Instead of working with the first person that responds with their ISO, it feels like people are just collecting messages/offers and waiting to pick the best one.

 

Completely agree, it's almost a waste of time replying to majority of FT posts. I tend to only reply to specific post with ratios and none of this PM for ratio shit.

 

Hate it when people don't reply at all. Common courtesy. I'm sure lots of posts get plenty of offers, but do at least let everyone else know that you finished the trade

 

It seems like it's becoming more and more commonplace.

I'm not sure if it's people mining their inbox for the "best" offer or if people just give zero fucks about showing basic social interaction skills.

Either way, it's infuriating. If you can't spend the 15 seconds it takes to fire off a basic reply, then you probably don't have time to be trading in the first place.

 

All right, I've been wanting to ask this for a while but have been apprehensive about doing so for fear of scrutiny, but here we go:

I have a scenario. I put up an ISO:FT. I have three beers I'm ISO, one of which I specify as my main want. I get a BM from User #1 who can only cover one of my ISOs, not my main want, but can do multiples. 6 hours later, I get a BM from User #2 who can cover two of my ISOs, not my main want, and can also do multiples of the two they offer. 18 hours after the post is posted, I get a BM from User #3 who can cover all three of my wants. For the sake of argument, let's assume all three users are interested in everything I have FT. What is the proper thing to do? Do I immediately respond to the first two users as soon as I see the message and start negotiating simply because they got there first even though they can't fully complete my ISO? If I do that, and then user #3 brings my main want to the table along with everything else I'm ISO and I go with him/her, I feel like a dick for stringing along Users #1 and #2. But, apparently, if I look at User #1 and #2's messages and don't respond, or even worse it seems, I do respond with an honest "I'm going to see what else surfaces with my post, I'll let you know" then I'm a dick and an auctioneer in that situation too. Seems like I'm damned if I do and I'm damned if I don't. And, before people come on here saying "Stop trying to 'win' trades!" I'm not. I'm just trying to get what I specifically put in my ISO for what I specifically put in my FT, which is what I'm supposed to do, right? Am I expected to give User #1 first priority simply because they were the first to respond even though they can only supply me with one of my three wants and it's not even my main want? And, for the record, in the past I've handled the situation both ways: Silence at first until later letting the person know I got a better offer, as well as commencing negotiations immediately only to apologetically back out once a better offer surfaced. A couple of people have been slightly annoyed by it, but most of the time the user responds with "I understand man. Thanks for at least getting back to me." Which is usually how I feel when the same thing happens to me. Also, for the record, no matter how hardcore my inbox has exploded before, I always make sure to respond to each and every person.

I even feel kind of silly asking this question since I've been casually into the trading game for close to 4 years now and I should know what the right thing to do is. But I keep seeing people like fondyball20 post about how annoyed they are that users won't work with the first person to respond and I just don't feel like that necessarily means they should automatically be in. Am I wrong?

 

In your scenario, if I am user 1 or 2, I'm fine with you taking user 3's offer. Just get back to me
A) Right away: and say "I'm holding out for my main want"
or
B) After user #3's offer is accepted and let me know that I'm out of luck as he/she had your main want.

The moral of the thread is to communicate something. I prefer A and don't worry about "being strung along" as I didn't have the main ISO. At least I received communication.

If you are doing A or B or both, you are fine. Especially if you note main wants in your thread.

 

I appreciate the time you took to lay this scenario out. I think it's interesting to look at the grey areas within trading, because not everyone has the same perspective--the line between auctioning and negotiating can be a fine one. I bolded the line from your post that I think is key to the entire situation, as I think there is a difference between maximizing your trade (i.e., getting what you deem is the minimum acceptable return for your beer) and auctioning (i.e., trying to get someone to increase their offer based on the direct or implied threat of someone else offering something more).

In your proposed ISO:FT you very clearly laid out that you want X. Given that, I think it's fair to move forward operating with the goal of procuring X. It's not auctioning to try and get the thing you want for your beer, even though you still have the right to decide that you'll be satisfied with just Y and Z.

If I were in that situation, I would probably respond to the first two people with something to the effect of "thanks for the offer, but I really don't want to do a trade that doesn't involve X. I'll get back to you if anything changes".

I feel like that covers the bases: the two respondents get a common courtesy reply, but you get to make the trade that you want to make. And you haven't auctioned anything, because you were clear up front with what you wanted.

 

Awesome. That's what I figured, just wanted to make sure. Thanks @LambicPentameter and @WI-Beer-Man !

 

It's been stated already but it's all about solid communication...

"Thanks for reaching out to me. I'm holding out hopes I can land X so I'm going to give it a couple hours. If I end up trading for Y then you are my guy. I will follow up with you."

 

No response in 48 hours and I can see they've read the response = DNT, because if you can't communicate properly I don't want to trade with you in the first place.

 

That seems a little harsh. Sometimes people get side tracked and forget to respond after reading the message. If it happens multiple times then yeah, sure.

 

You had time to read the conversation? You had time to send a quick 5 second response to let me know you've received the message and are ready to communicate. Even if you let me know it'll happen ten days later, at least you let me know.