to send it anyway.   As the sender, once you decline to send a book, a few things come into play:

1).  If it was a Wish List book and there were mulitple people in line, your book automatically got moved on to the next wisher.  You really can't send it to the member you declined.

2). If your book was not a WL book, the offer has already been move on to the next person in FIFO (assuming there was more than one copy).  In this case, the member probably doesn't NEED you to send it, they will likely get another copy.

3).  If it WAS the only copy, the requestor cannot reach you anyway because the transaction is not listed in their TA.  What happens, then, is that they get this email saying, for example, "I dont' smoke, only my DH does and he smokes outside, if you still want the book, I can send it".   Great, thinks the requestor, that will be OK.  Except they   A). can't order that copy once it has been declined for RCs, the system is set up that way.   and    B). can't reach you, anyway,  because they have no way to do so.......there is no copy of the request in the TAs, which means no PM button for them to reach you.

So, while it is important for people w/ RCs to understand the implications (you might get declined on some books, etc) I think it is also important for the senders to understand how it works once you DO decline due to RCs.

Last time I got declined it told me, in the email, who it was, so I could go to the member directory and find that person.  Of course, if it was John D then it would be a fruitless search, but if it was Mitzi Q, well it may be a little easier, but yes, your post is right on!

If someone emails you, can't you just respond to the email?

I was referring to the PBS generated email that gets sent to you when a request gets declined.  Sorry, I should have been clearer.

The email comes from PBS not the declining PBS member. 

Also, if the declining member does not have a profile, you will not be able to find them in the Member Directory.  

I'm confused. The original message was about not declining books then offering to send them anyway. Why would that message come from PBS, not the sender?

When you decline a book, you put in a little message stating the reason you declined - like "book is not from a smoke free environment."  The requester doesn't know who declined, and the declining party doesn't know who the requester is because PBS sends the message.  Nice and clean.

But - some people, instead of stating a reason they declined, will use that little box to send a message to the requester.   "I dont' smoke, only my DH does and he smokes outside, if you still want the book, I can send it".  That  message can't be responded to.

Yes, if you feel the need to send a message like that, you need to ACCEPT, then PM and be ready to cancel if the requestor says no.  If you're not prepared to do this, you should just decline the request with no message.

Oh, I see. Thanks for the explanation.

Just a little bump!  This just happened to me and even if I could track the person down, it wouldn't matter because the book has already been offered to the next wisher.