This week I received a requested book and when I opened it, the entire perimeter of the cover was marked Advance Reader Copy - Unedited Edition - For Promotional Purposes Only over and over. I PM'd the sending member and told her that the book was unpostable originally because it was an ARC and then said that I was was respectfully requesting my credit back. She sent me a PM which the basic gist of it was that because of me she had lost her book and her credit . 

I PM'd back trying to explain why I asked for my credit (since I wouldn't be able to post it again and I did not like to read ARCs). I also tried to nicely explain that I understood how hard it was because I had accidentally sent an ARC to someone and it had been a financial and credit lose, but the credit rightly went back to the member. I offered to work something out with her to send the book back. I received a horrible reply about me "preaching" to her and basically accusing me of trying to get even more from her to mail the book back. 

This has stressed me so much; my stomach is in knots. I have not had to deal with this situation here before. When I messed up and sent an ARC, the member was so very gracious to me and the situation was remedied quickly and cleanly. So what happened here- did I word my original PM badly?? Should I have just not asked for the credit back even though it was an unpostable from a bookshelf? Could I have handled this better? If so, please help me so that I hopefully won't have to deal with this type of thing again. Do you guys just bite the bullet and not request your credit back in situations like this?  

Pat,

I'm so sorry this happened to you.  I really doubt it was anything you did.  Some people cannot admit a mistake and get nasty and defensive. You had every right to get your credit back.   I have generally dealt with nice people on this site, but the one nasty experience I had, like with this for you, left my stomach in knots.  Essentially the person accused me of staining the book and the sending her pictures.  After some perspective and dealing with many more nice people I feel better about things. 

I wouldn't waste my time going back and forth with this person.  I would just tell her that if she doesn't want to return your credit that you will mark it unresolevd and set a date.  If she returns it, mark it resolved and forget it and if she doesn't mark it unresolved, and post the book as a freebie unpostable. 
Take heart though, most people are not like this :)

Sorry you have to deal with this- even if this is a new member who is not familiar with the rules, the rudeness and accusations are unnecessary.  It is hard to say how this person took your original PM without knowing the exact wording, but you know, some people are just going to be defensive no matter how you phrase things.

Here is what I would do.  I would PM again and say "I'm sorry that you took my PM as preaching to you- that was not my intention at all, nor am I trying to get more than I deserve from you.  All I want is to help you understand the PBS posting guidelines, and that the book you sent is unpostable according to PBS rules.  Here is the text from the PBS Help Center regarding ARCs, as well as the rules regarding transactions involving unpostable books, which state that it is appropriate to request the credit back. (Paste HC text here.)  I would really like to resolve this issue with you.  As it stands now, the problem transaction is unresolved in the PBS system, and I will be sure to promptly mark the transaction as resolved upon the return of my credit.  If you'd like the book back, I will happily send it to you if you'd like to cover the postage with an additional credit, per PBS guidelines.  Please let me know if you'd like to do this.  I'd appreciate a response from you by (insert date here)."

If you get another nasty response after that, then I'd pretty much consider it a lost cause.  PBS won't force the sender to return your credit, but they will contact the sender if you notify them about nasty PMs.  It's worth it to give it another try though.  A lot of people are not aware that problem transactions can be marked resolved in the system, and once they find that out, they cooperate with credit returns in order not to have that unresolved transaction on their record.

Good luck!

Guilty people tend to get defensive and rude.  This person knows that sending that book was wrong, but she doesn't want to admit it.  Please try not to let it get to you.  There are many, many people more nice people than rude people on PBS.  I'm sorry that this has happened to you.

ETA: typo correction

The member did return my credit and I just hope I never, ever have to deal with a situation like this again here! I hate conflict like this.

Okay, there have been so many threads on here lately where people have explained bad behavior by saying the person is "new and didn't know" (notice I said explained not excused...rightly so, nobody has excused bad behavior)  Speaking as a "new member" and my first few transactions being very fresh in my mind, I have to say that is just crazy.   The basics of the site...don't post ARCs to your bookshelf, don't send things with any water damage, wrap your package well...are very well explained, very visible and hard to miss in the process of registering, posting books and accepting transactions.  So breaking the basic rules can't be explained by being "new".  Some other detailed rules and commonly accepted practices, like knowing where to post deals and where not to, waterproofing, outright "swapping"...those things take a little bit of effort and time to get up to speed on and can be explained and maybe even excused by a person being new.  But not the basics.  Breaking the basic rules is just flat out rudeness and taking advantage of a good thing.

I'm very sorry that this happened to you, and I hope the person who did it goes through ten requester cycles the next time they post a WL book!

P.S.  If I've been here long enough to post a rant on the "Questions about PBS" forum, can I stop being "new"?  Am I a grown up yet?  ;)

Pat, I'm sorry this happened to you.  As others have said, the very large majority of PBS members play by the rules, but some just don't - or they are just plain ignorant of the rules.

If you felt that this member was rude in her response to you, I would not hesitate to send a note to TPTB at PBS about it.  They should know.

As a side note, after receiving quite a long string of very nice mostly wishlisted books through PBS,  I recently received a book that had highlighting - bright pink highighting yet - on about 30 pages of the book.   The member refused to return my credit, saying the book had been basically new when she sent it.  But somehow I find it very hard to believe that anyone could miss that much pink highlighting in a book if they had even opened it. 

Sigh .. I just reported the problem unresolved and moved on.   All the other wonderful books I've received more than make up for it.

I am glad you stood your ground and got your credit back. I know it is hard, but these kind of members will just keep sending out unpostable books if they can get away with it by bullying the other member. If they have to return enough credits so that is it not profitable to do it, they will stop.

I'm sorry that had to happen to you, Pat, and I'm glad you did get your credit returned anyway. To deal with people is to deal with conflict, I think. I would rather have some conflict if I knew I was in the right than let the other person just get away with breaking rules. You will never be able to change other people's behavior, all you can do is control your own.

Cheryl

I'm sorry this happened to you.  It's hard to even fathom why this person sent out a book marked so obviously as an ARC in the first place...  Then to be so rude on top of that.  Three cheers for you for persevering and getting your credit back.

Christa- welcome to adulthood! :)

Some other detailed rules and commonly accepted practices, like knowing where to post deals and where not to, waterproofing, outright "swapping"...those things take a little bit of effort and time to get up to speed on and can be explained and maybe even excused by a person being new.  But not the basics.

Exactly.  Well said!  If people bothered to take the time to read the TOS before joining/posting, and if some would actually give a d@mn, this likely would not be an issue. 

arghh,  new member syndrone....TOS? ?

What you could do, I suppose, is post it in the BB on the ARC list, and if it gets ordered you could buddy that credit to her.  It's not likely to get ordered unless it's a WL book though.  And I don't know that I'd be in a big hurry to go to that effort after she was so snotty about the whole thing.  It seems obvious to me that she knew what she was doing when she posted it and that's probably why she's so defensive now.  Calling your inbox preaching is a pretty good indication of that; that's a defensive response.  I'm sorry it made you feel bad.  I definitely know that feeling.  I had one not too long ago and the sender was just evil about it.  I ordered a collectible edition of a book that was also available in an mmp edition - under a different ISBN# of course - and my sender sent the mmp.  I explained everything to her, including ways she could have accidentally listed her book under the wrong ISBN#, and she was defensive, rude and accusatory in response.  It was a system glitch, and of course it was my fault for expecting to get my credit back:P  I should have been happy to get the book at all, it was the same book, I could repost it, and blah-blah-blah.  I never did get my credit back, and I marked it unresolved and reported her to PBS.  I still have this stupid book on my PBS shelf, btw.  It left a bad taste in my mouth for days & days, but there was nothing to do but reorder it from someone else & move on.  It stinks and I hated it, because I make mistakes too, but I always jump right on the situation & make things right.  It's very upsetting when you run across people who think they are under no obligation to do the right thing, but the bright spot there is that there are too many other members who do, and they are the ones who make the occasional buttheads a little less annoying:P

Pat, what is the title of the ARC you received?  I love reading them for some odd reason ...