Rude people replying to ads.

[percheron67]

This morning I placed a number of posts on my local freecycle site. The replies so far have been really abrupt not to say rude. e.g. Is this still there?. No Hello or preamble at all and NO please or thankyou. Is it the norm nowadays. When I answer any ad I always say Hello, and ask politely certainly not forgetting Please and Thankyou.

I have decided that anyone who replies rudely will not be offered my items!

I don't use free cycle but the apps I do use have a button which sends an automatic 'is this still available?'. Often I say yes and never hear back. I take people much more seriously if they bother to actually type a message. I'm not so bothered about manners but I wish people would only message if actually interested.

It is often the norm these days, and I think people sometimes think of it as a conversation starter - especially if it's on Facebook so they're on Messenger. I wouldn't rule people out on first contact, but if they continue to be non-communicative and not give me information I've asked for then I stop replying.

Whenever I place an ad, for sale or for free, I always ask any messages to include their phone number and two times during the coming week when they'd be available to pick up. If they don't include this (or equivalent - e.g. an apology that they can't make this week but a suggestion for next week) then I ignore it.

I'm fed up with people not turning up or being communicative and find it a good filter for twerps, as well as getting the ball rolling on logistics.

I think it the way of the world these days, no pleasantries at all, too much SM and the like. God only knows what it'll be like in 50 years time.

When I place ads, I genuinely don't mind - perhaps the sender is in a hurry and wanted to get a quick message in as they were juggling kids, shopping and their phone.
Don't forget that other cultures and just some people are more direct in their interactions too and this doesn't mean that they are being rude.
If I have a lot of items to go, i find the directness more convenient, the message only pops up the first couple of lines on my phone before I have to open the app to check it. If they've been succinct enough I can quickly tell whether to respond immediately or wait till later!
I like the idea of asking people to post their availability or even answer a question in their opening message though @PerspicaciousGreen. It's a good test of engagement!

Some People are awful on free or cheap buying sites. I've had people just message things like "too expensive, I'll pay £X" or just "what's your address". People who just don't turn up or expect you to deliver a free item to their house as its too far for them to travel.

but I wish people would only message if actually interested.

That would work if everyone always took their items down when it went, but they don't, so as a buyer you often have to message lots of people to enquire.

I see the first two comms as being about establishing contact, nothing more. Hi available? Hi yes. I then expect subsequent messages to be more personable.

If I have the choice of responding to several enquiries, I always respond to the polite ones first because in my experience, they have a better chance of ending up with the pleasant removal of my item in a timely manner. I would only respond to a rude one if there was nobody else to offer it to!

I'm kind of the opposite. When I offer stuff on my local Facebook group, I ignore the ones that call me hun or put kisses at the end!

I get fed up with people asking if things are available then I never hear from them again. Or worse - asking if they can have something and then never arranging to pick up. If there are more than one person who want something and the first person doesn't get back to me in a reasonable amount of time then I offer it to the next person. And I too get annoyed by rudeness, but more so by unintelligible responses and textspeak. A recent example - somebody asked if something was still available, then where it was, so I gave the area but not the address, then responded 'send details pls'. Details of what!? Details of the item were in the post.... Nothing to add. Details of where to collect? Not until you have confirmed you want it. Just ask me what you actually want to know in real writing so that I can understand it!!!!! Ok - rant over 😁

Sad to say, I've stopped offering anything for free because of rudeness, time wasters and piss taking. I do raise an eyebrow at a prolonged conversation which is lacking in manners as you describe, although a brief initial enquiry doesn't bother me. But the people who reserve something then don't show up when they say, or even worse, the ones who say they want your free item then make a song and dance about not being able to collect - I'll have to wait til pay day and get a taxi, I've been ill, I'll come at the weekend, sorry I was busy, I'll come next week, then still never show etc etc. It's often (not always, I know) a campaign to get you to take it to them. I fell for it once. Not doing it again.

I keep being offered other things as a 'package' I wanted a cat but had to take a yoga mat, a size 10 corset and a VHS copy of Granchester

I don't mind so much the automated responses that places like gumtree setup for buyer, although I agree I find a lot blunt and quite rude, but what I cannot stand is no words just "?".

Either if I haven't responded quickly enough to a question or just a random "?".

To be honest it would piss me off slightly from a friend but from a stranger it makes me (possibly irrationally) annoyed!

It could just be a stock response. I had several messages saying 'do you still have this item?' And when I spoke to the person afterwards, they were really friendly. So it MAY be a stock response that facebook provided.

However @percheron67 I do agree that some people are a bit rude and useless. I was giving away - GIVING AWAY - some stuff some months back, (various items,) and I had around 7 or 8 people contact me. A couple of them wanted me to take it to them, even though it was FREE, and would have costed them £30-£40 to buy.

When I said they need to collect it, and it shouldn't be too much trouble, as it's only 2-3 miles from me, they said 'doesn't that work both ways? It's also only 2-3 miles for you to bring it.'

Instant block.

Also, I have had several people say they are coming to collect something, and not turn up. I wait all afternoon as they say they will come between one and five p.m, and they don't. At half five I message and say 'are you still coming?' Within half an hour they say 'oh sorry can't make it today, can I come tomorrow now?!'

So I waited for four fucking hours, and they couldn't be arsed to let me know they weren't coming. I have had this happen with five different people in the past half a year... and three of them didn't even bother letting me know they weren't coming, I had to contact THEM!

I gave them all a second chance. Two of them did actually come the next day, but the other 3 didn't come AGAIN! So I blocked them after that. Bastards.

@ShurelyNot

Sad to say, I've stopped offering anything for free because of rudeness, time wasters and piss taking. I do raise an eyebrow at a prolonged conversation which is lacking in manners as you describe, although a brief initial enquiry doesn't bother me. But the people who reserve something then don't show up when they say, or even worse, the ones who say they want your free item then make a song and dance about not being able to collect - I'll have to wait til pay day and get a taxi, I've been ill, I'll come at the weekend, sorry I was busy, I'll come next week, then still never show etc etc. It's often (not always, I know) a campaign to get you to take it to them. I fell for it once. Not doing it again.

Totally.

I used to be accomodating to rude buyers, but no more, not even on ebay. Let me down ONCE and that's it, good bye.

Had someone buy a huge old TV for £25 on ebay - item marked collection within 48h please. No message from them with purchase (Mon), so I ask when they'd like to pick up - "Oh Fri/Sat sometime" was the response. I said OK that's fine, but please confirm by Thurs lunchtime an eta. Nothing by Friday evening, so I relisted the item on FB, sold for same price within minutes, collected within an hour. Original guy finally rings me Sunday evening, "I want to pick up NOW!". I said sorry, it's not available any more. He messaged me for days - couldn't understand how it couldn't be available any more lol.

I've been quite lucky as most people on my local freecycle site seem to be quite polite. Although there is one chap who keeps posting asking for free stuff and never says please. Just "need pram, must be pink and new, no marks. Send photos". Then there are 20 comments all telling him to say please etc which can be quite amusing.

I think sellers can be just as rude, I've often enquired about items and got no response.

@littlepattilou

It could just be a stock response. I had several messages saying 'do you still have this item?' And when I spoke to the person afterwards, they were really friendly. So it MAY be a stock response that facebook provided.

However @percheron67 I do agree that some people are a bit rude and useless. I was giving away - GIVING AWAY - some stuff some months back, (various items,) and I had around 7 or 8 people contact me. A couple of them wanted me to take it to them, even though it was FREE, and would have costed them £30-£40 to buy.

When I said they need to collect it, and it shouldn't be too much trouble, as it's only 2-3 miles from me, they said 'doesn't that work both ways? It's also only 2-3 miles for you to bring it.'

Instant block.

Also, I have had several people say they are coming to collect something, and not turn up. I wait all afternoon as they say they will come between one and five p.m, and they don't. At half five I message and say 'are you still coming?' Within half an hour they say 'oh sorry can't make it today, can I come tomorrow now?!'

So I waited for four fucking hours, and they couldn't be arsed to let me know they weren't coming. I have had this happen with five different people in the past half a year... and three of them didn't even bother letting me know they weren't coming, I had to contact THEM!

I gave them all a second chance. Two of them did actually come the next day, but the other 3 didn't come AGAIN! So I blocked them after that. Bastards.

I've learned never to wait. Sometimes you're dealing with dealers who'll arrange to pick up 20 items in a single day at the same time, and they'll just drive around in a van slowly collecting them all.

If the time matters, then give people a window - they say sometime around 11 - you say, OK, but need to be here before 11:45 because I'm going out at 12. If they contact you before or around 11 to apologise and try to rearrange - OK - one more chance. But if they ring up 3h later, sorry, no 2nd chance as the chances are they'll just mess me around again.

That's fairly normal. I don't really see it as rude. I do get pissed off with time wasters though - people arrange to come round to view and never show. Or come around and then offer and insulting low price. I had someone offer me £15 for a washing machine less than a year old before!

I think I will do the same as you @bookworm1632 You may be right about the people just picking up loads of (free) stuff!

It’s normal and I hate it.

It’s even creeping into “professional life”.

I recently had to go for a blood test and the nurse never said a word to me. Not to even ask name/dob or to prepare me for the needle etc. After she took my blood and I had put my coat back on I stood there waiting while she returned to her computer and she stared at me like I had two heads and said “ermmm. You can go now...”. That was the first thing she said.

Not sure if lockdown has made it worse but I am finding more and more that basic manners both when communicating online and in person seem to have flown out the window and people seem to forget they are communicating with other humans not robots.

Yeh I’ve found people to be really rude on free sites, I don’t use olio but heard it was a app for giving away free food, I had a McDonald’s order delivered to me with completely the wrong items that I don’t eat, I was refunded through Uber eats but I thought it would be a shame to just chuck it so advertised it straight away still fresh on olio (it was probably the best thing on there since all the adds were random things like 3 rotten looking carrots and an old kiwi) a man arranged to collect it and just never showed up, no apology didn’t even message to cancel I binned it in the end and decided to never bother giving away free things again!

@BatleyTownswomensGuild

That's fairly normal. I don't really see it as rude. I do get pissed off with time wasters though - people arrange to come round to view and never show. Or come around and then offer and insulting low price. I had someone offer me £15 for a washing machine less than a year old before!

That's shocking. £15 for a one year old washing machine!

Cheeky fuckers everywhere!

One of my friends sells stuff ans she’s recently been complaining of this,.

The rudest I saw was on a local face book someone kindly offered something for free snd someone posted, tagging in a different member saying “hey Susan grab this for me” without even responding to the poster offering it, saying “please could I have it”.. just a message to someone else to “grab it”.

I’ve also noticed a lot of them clearly have alerts set up so race to ask for anything offered for free, so unless they have a house full of random junk they are doing it to resell it.

Which would be fine if they let people who might need it snd want it have a chance, but it’s literally like seven seconds after it’s offered they are first in thr queue, same people each time.

@NameChangedForThisFeb21

It’s normal and I hate it.

It’s even creeping into “professional life”.

I recently had to go for a blood test and the nurse never said a word to me. Not to even ask name/dob or to prepare me for the needle etc. After she took my blood and I had put my coat back on I stood there waiting while she returned to her computer and she stared at me like I had two heads and said “ermmm. You can go now...”. That was the first thing she said.

Not sure if lockdown has made it worse but I am finding more and more that basic manners both when communicating online and in person seem to have flown out the window and people seem to forget they are communicating with other humans not robots.

That's so weird! Rude, and weird! She could have said 'hello' at least.

That's so weird! Rude, and weird! She could have said 'hello' at least.

It was a very weird experience. Especially when she was putting the tourniquet on and placing my arm on a pillow etc and then sticking the needle in. So robotic.