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Topic: Sender mixed up shipment of two WL books

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poohbritt avatar
Subject: Sender mixed up shipment of two WL books
Date Posted: 8/10/2008 12:17 PM ET
Member Since: 5/2/2008
Posts: 199
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This is probably easily resolved but...

I got a wishlisted book, finally! And for once my request of the book wasn't let to time out by the sender.  I received what was supposed to be WL book and it was a totally different book and in the book was a shipping invoice for another user. I did the RWAP thing and pm'ed the sender. And got nothing.

I took the name off of the invoice in the book and pm'ed that user and asked if they got my book and we made arrangements to ship the books to each other. I get one pm from the original sender basically telling me what I had already figured out, that she mixed up the books and the other user would ship to me. She completely ignored my polite, but insistant request that she give me and the other user a credit or PBS money for shipping the books.

Two more pm's later and about a week's worth of my impatience and I'm wondering how long do I wait, and when I'm done waiting...what am I supposed to do to get my credit for shipping a book that was not my responsibility?

Cattriona avatar
Member of the Month medalFriend of PBS-Gold medal
Date Posted: 8/10/2008 3:16 PM ET
Member Since: 7/7/2007
Posts: 4,815
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Brittany--

In the Help Center are several documents about what to do when receiving and sending the wrong book.  You and the other recipient may need to quote appropriate parts of policy to the sender to get your polite request across.

http://www.paperbackswap.com/help/help_item.php?id=230

 

Cheers,

Catt

Generic Profile avatar
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Date Posted: 8/10/2008 3:52 PM ET
Member Since: 8/23/2007
Posts: 26,510
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I don't think you're supposed to even mark it as received since you technically didn't get your book.  The wrong book button is for when you get the wrong binding or ISBN.  Now if you never get your book you're out a credit if the sender doesn't give you one.  The sender needs to give you and the other person a credit for sending the book off to the correct person. 

I've gotten the wrong book twice now and both times I just PM the sender and didn 't mark the book received until I actually had the book I ordered.  That way if the sender never responds or the book is bad I'm not out my credit. 

poohbritt avatar
Date Posted: 8/10/2008 5:11 PM ET
Member Since: 5/2/2008
Posts: 199
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I was hesitant to mark it recieved, but the help docs said to do so. In one my pm's to the sender, I quoted and linked to the help doc saying exactly what her responsibility was. Yet I'm still without a credit and a book. :(

pinkcypress avatar
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Date Posted: 8/10/2008 6:09 PM ET
Member Since: 7/23/2006
Posts: 15,931
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Since you didn't receive the book you requested, you should not have marked it received. 

I would try to pm the sender one more time, give them about a week to respond, and then if you don't hear anything, submit it to the pbs team.

In the meantime, if you and the other person send each other your books, at least you'll both end up with the book you wanted.  Hopefully the original sender will send you both a credit to cover mailing costs. 

melanied avatar
Standard Member medalMember of the Month medalBook Cover Image Group medalBook Data Correction Group medalTour Guide Leader medalBook Bazaar Coordinator medal
Date Posted: 8/10/2008 11:02 PM ET
Member Since: 8/16/2007
Posts: 15,234
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If you receive a book that was meant for another member, you do not mark it received first, but contact the sender to get the situation worked out. The sender should offer to compensate the person to send the book on and then give you the address to send it on (since you say the packing slip was there, you should have already had it). Then you wait for your book to arrive and mark it received at that time. This process is laid out in the Help Center.

I would send the book on to the correct sender and be done with it. The original sender may be waiting for confirmation that the books had actually been sent (not that she should, but just an idea). If she does not make it right, make sure to let her know you will be marking the RWP as not resolved, and then do so. Do check your credit archive before doing that in case she sent a credit without telling you.

JimiJam avatar
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Date Posted: 8/10/2008 11:29 PM ET
Member Since: 6/4/2007
Posts: 2,941
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The course of action that the Help Center suggests (from the perspective of the Sender, as this was found under "I sent a book to the wrong person!"):

  • You can ask the requestors to send the books to each other
    • You provide the addresses in PMs.
    • You should also offer them each a credit or postage for sending the book to the proper destination.
  • When the requestors get the books they requested, they can mark them received.
    • This means the sender "breaks even" on these transaction, but each book ends up with the person who requested it.

 

For the sake of clarification, on the issue of the purpose of the Wrong Book Button, In the Help Center, under "What if I mail the wrong book?" it states: 

  • You can simply offer to send the correct book, or
  • Refund the credit the requestor will give you when she or he marks the book "wrong book received"
  • When a book is marked "received, with a problem" (and in this case the receiver would choose "wrong book" from among the options), the sender does get credit for sending the book, even though it was the wrong one.
  • One of the options of correcting this error is for the sender to give the credit back to the requestor, using the Buddy List crediting feature.


The course of action is different for a Sender mixing up two requests.  However, the Wrong Book Button (as I've stated in previous threads) CAN be used for the receipt of a Wrong Book in the case of a single transaction gone wrong.