Has anyone else gotten any kind of response from this guy? I PMed him for a status update on Thursday, and he was on today, so I can only assume that he's ignoring me. He also closed the original sales thread when folks started talking about the obscenely long time that it was taking for things to arrive. Between this and Sk8ngame, it's looking like two consecutive deals where I've gotten burned. And that makes me feel all kinds of warm and fuzzy about dealing on the 'Realms.

benparry has had troubles with things like this about a year or 2 ago but he made good and then some on the deal.

I made a deal with him a while back when the package got lost, so he ended up re-sending the same stuff. I don't think you'll get burned, but it might take a while before the deal is completed.

Same goes to me. He takes a bit longer than expected but just be patient. He'll come through.

I bought a HoT map off him, but I am still waiting for the map. It has been two months now but I am giving him a little longer. I hope he gets me the map.

I'm in the same boat as you. It took him almost two weeks to reply and tell me that he had sent the figs. And I still haven't gotten them. I know international shipping usually takes longer, but this is bordering on absurdity.

So I've PMed Benparry multiple times asking about the status of the sale and he just ignores me. Should I just give him time? It's been about three weeks already..

If it was a paypal payment I would make a claim and try to get my money back. Then you should send a pm signifying this and let the person know that it will get escalated if you are not contacted.

-*filler *-

He's shipping from the UK. It does take some time to get here. If you are nervous, open a dispute on paypal. If the package comes in, close the dispute. If it doesn't come in within the time limit on papyal, get the money back.

Alrite benparry got around to answering my PMs. I don't think he's a bad trader and will hold out for the clix, hopefully they will come in soon.

Thanks all

I got anxious with him recently too with a purchase that was spanning the 2-3 week mark to arrive. Part of it was that I was requesting a tracking# that I paid for and he wouldn't reply with it (but eventually did).

He's just busy/lazy about responding to PMs and shipping promptly, but he does come through in the end.

I even discussed with him opening a paypal dispute and he was very understanding. I didn't have to in the long run, though, because the items arrived.

From experience, he's one of the laziest traders here on the Realms... up there with Mike_Houghton (sp?).

Bought a chase Sinestro Corps Batman from him and paid via Paypal. He responded after payment saying it was sent.

About 2 weeks later I followed up asking for an update and the tracking number. He said he had sent, and to be patient. Totally ignored the request for the tracking number.

The next week I pretty much hounded him via PM's... which he ignored until I said that I'd be filing a dispute with Paypal. Suddenly he turned on the 'woe me' routine... The story went like this:

He didn't actually send himself, he gave a $100.00 chase figure to a friend at his work (in the mail room) to send the package (irresponsible). Since then, he had been laid off from the place where he sent the figure from. He claimed that he had to sneak back into the building and get the package (which was miraculously undelivered and still sitting in the mail room). He finally recovered it, then sent and provided the tracking number.

Got the box about 1 1/2 weeks after it left the UK. It was traveling to Pennsylvania, so I urge those of you making excuses that 'it takes longer to ship a package from the UK' to please stop. It doesn't take 1 month or 2. Don't make excuses for him.

Although the situation ended with me getting what I paid for, I'll never trade with him again. I believe I left neutral because of all of the headache he caused.

A big problem with traders like Ben and Mike is that even when folks need to hound these users to send after a month or two, for some reason they leave positive feedback just because they finally got the figures and want to be done with it. Please don't. You are doing the rest of the community a disservice by doing so.

As a matter of refreshment:

http://www.hcrealms.com/forum/showthread.php?t=251883

W.I.T. was having issues with him at the time as well, so in order for Ben to 'make good on his online reputation' (which he is super nervous about tarnishing) he sent W.I.T. a carp ton of stuff so that W.I.T. would post a thread about how Ben came through and then some for his trade. However, he did nothing for me but cause me a month of anxiety and grief.

Look at the bottom of the thread above, and you'll see other similar threads from other users.

Know what, reading back through that thread has got me fired up that the mods (Quebster specifically) actually defend this type of behavior by closing the threads and preventing anyone else from posting.

Quebster saw the thread W.I.T posted (about how Ben sent extra figures to make up for dragging him along for 2 months) and I guess that's all he needed to do to get his rep back and bury the thread, which is all Ben wanted to begin with.

Making up for one trade SHOULD NOT negate all of the other bad trades that this guy had at the time, and that's basically what Quebster did with that thread. Bury it, and forget about it. *Oh, and he also changed the thread title, so his name wasn't searchable with the word 'scam' in it*

What we really need is a new rep system. Something like a stop light system;

all positive rep= green light
even 1 neutral or negative= yellow light
2 or more negative within a 30 day period= red light

And we need the mods to stop protecting the scammers (lojo, etc) and lazy traders.