Some of us vendors had a policy for all buyers with 0 stats or under X amount of transactions to FE. A LOT of vendors had that requirements for new buyers. We've always had it for buyers under 5 transacations. Everyone on the new SR is a "new buyer". This rule does not make any sense and is going to open the flood gates of spammers!
DPR - respectfully request for you to find a solution to this.. I know myself (as well as dozens of other vendors) are not going to allow 0 transacation scammers to come and start their shenanigans.
and all sellers are new sellers. even if you had history on sr1.0, that's gone now. most of us buyers had history on sr1.0, i had £900 odd spent, in 50 odd transactions with no disputes or auto finalizes. we're all starting from fresh now. ans escrow protects us all.
Wrong. All sellers are not new sellers. NEW sellers are NEW sellers. Old sellers from SR1.0 are verified by DPR and his staff to be old sellers, so this is absolutely wrong.
There needs to be some kind of balance. Vendors who are verified, (and I wont say vendors who were top X % or whatever because that would be arrogant) spent a long time building these reputations, hence, how we were able to be verified vendors.
My vendor page says everyone with less then 5 successful transactions must FE, after that, they can stay in escrow for anything/everything. Am I to ditch this rule? Or simple not vend until people have 5 successful transcations? I spent over a year building a brand, and I built by in part by running my business a certain way.
If DPR could make a clarification on this specific matter, I'd be most grateful so that I (and several vendors I know) may amend my vendor page and/or explore alternatives in which we are not told we aren't allowed to set our own anti-scammer parameters.
and a lot of buyers who can't be verified, except by the vendors they frequented, were also well established on SR1. regardless, escrow is a protection for both the buyer and vendor, FE completely removes this protection for the buyer. that's not acceptable. you have the protection of escrow and the staff, but you want to take away buyers' protection? FE should never be allowed at all.
I also believe in the escrow system and that it is there to protect the buyers and vendors.
This service uses a 2 party trust system, a buyer must trust the vendor to actually send the package, that the item is of a pure quality, that the vendors packaging will get past customs and then not stand out when a postal worker is putting it into a PO Box or mailbox.
A vendor must trust in the buyer to provide the correct information that the package is sent to, to let the vendor have their money once the transaction was complete, to be honest with the vendor and those that the vendor serves in the quality of the product, if it was up to par in regards to stealth.
The escrow system is in place so that if either of the parties has scammed the other than it can be noticed and then either will get their money, asking people to FE is asking them to take an even bigger risk than what they already are and it leaves them unprotected if anything where to go wrong.
To those vendors that ask people to FE if they are in countries that are hard to get your packages into, guess what that really means ? You are not trying hard enough to have a method of packaging that works for
EVERY country. If your package can get into Australia which is known to be one of the hardest for some reason than it can get into any other country
If a vendor argues that someone is scamming them, they have less then five transactions with four of those being similar to the dispute that they are currently undergoing then it is obvious that they did not send the packaging or they did not put in enough effort to create a stealthy enough system.
I personally believe that the escrow system should be enforced and FE should not be offered but that would conflict with the message that SilkRoad provides in everyone having an opinion and option to do as they wish without harming others.
Any vendor worth their weight in gold will offer escrow to the entire world, with fair refund policy and have a method of packaging that works around the world.
As for people saying that verified vendors are not new to SilkRoad and should not have to follow the 30 transaction rule to start requesting FE, the buyers are right in saying that you are just as new as us, no one has a reputation and is starting from a fresh slate, because in the end how do the buyers know that because of the older site being taken down and vendors being busted that there isn't LE using the names and PGP of vendors that were once well known once percent supplier that is going to collect information and get paid to do or what about vendors that turn rouge at the drop of a hat and because they are allowed to FE people are scammed from certain countries.
Vendors asking buyers to FE are putting more risk into these vendors and they should not be trusted because it is a lot easier for them to run with your money, use your information as a bribe to getting your information or you keeping quiet about a scam, it keeps buyers out of a protection system that was put there to be used by all of use and FE only favors the vendor. Vendors that ask people to FE because they are from a certain country obviously need to take a break and have a look over their packaging methods because obviously they are not good enough. If your packaging is not good enough then how could you be trusted.
