Hi everyone!

I've been in a member since October and lately I've been considering doing the whole Box O Books thing.  I've read everything I can find in the help docs and I think I understand the process.  I was wondering if those of you who are "boxers" could give me some insight and or tips. I'd appreciate it.

TIA!!!

Cassandra 

Jump right in.

You will likely get flooded with requests for the first few days (as long as your account shows up on the "new bob members" list.  Don't worry, it will settle down, but it can be a bit overwhelming.

If you get a request and don't find anything you want, don't feel bad about refusing.  Just write a pleasant little note saying "I didn't find anything I was interested in at this time" and move on.  Don't be offended if other people reject your offers.

If you get a request and find fewer books you are interested in, just send a note asking them to either reduce their request or, if you wish, you can offer them a multple books per credit deal on the remander (postage is presumably already covered by the BOB trade, so you already have some savings there).

You will probably have a box or two go missing over time.  If you think of your books as being valuable, you should probably not trade too many in a box so this doesn't upset you too much.  How to deal with it is up to you, but it is best to be kind and polite about it.  Not everyone is.

There is no particular time limit for how long people have to mail your box once the offer is received, and deals don't automatically get marked lost after 30 days.  I try to handle sending mine in the same timeframe as credit orders.  I try not to pay much attention to what the other party does - some people will wait to receive before they send, and some people get quite upset at that.  Paying no attention to it makes for a more peaceful life.  I generally figure that as long as the books arrive within a minimum of 45 days, I'm pretty happy, and I often wait much longer before following up on an apparently missing BOX.  If you feel the box probably was mailed but is lost in the mail, you can file a missing mail report at https://postalinspectors.uspis.gov/forms/MLNtRcvd.aspx

Sometimes when a box never arrives, when you check the sender is no longer a member.  Boxes in process are not automatically removed when a member is removed from the site, you have to contact the site to have it removed.  If you are really annoyed at this, you can file a mail fraud report at https://postalinspectors.uspis.gov/forms/MailFraudComplaint.aspx .  Whether it will ever come to anything is another matter.  

Despite all this info on things going wrong, 99% of the time BOB works out very well and I'm quite happy with it.  I'm just taking a break...

I would start off with small trades personally. You'll get quite a few offers when you first sign up.  I only have 50 books posted and when I signed up I was getting BOB offers for like 19 books.  I couldn't find anything I wanted on their shelf.  If you have a lot of books you posted but didn't like because they were free or cheap or something-I would recommend you maybe do a deal for them first or donate them or something. Because your BOB offers will be from people who most likely have similar books. So if you have a lot of romance but don't like romance that'll probably be want you get offered.  Not always but that's a problem I had.  I'm not big on the series romances and I had a lot posted and that's what a lot of my offers had on their shelves.  I had bought them super cheap and decided they weren't for me.  I like the longer ones for the most part. 

ETA: I don't usually wait until they've mailed theirs before I mail mine. But I usually wait until it shows that they've printed the address.  Then I know it's probably going out soon.  If I know it's going to be a week before I can mail it off, I usually pm the other person to let them know. 

I don't usually wait until they've mailed theirs before I mail mine. But I usually wait until it shows that they've printed the address.  Then I know it's probably going out soon.

This gave me a giggle! I can see both members waiting in perpetuitiy for the other to print the label. :)

Well I don't wait a long time.  If I have other books to mail and they have printed the label yet than I'll mail mine anyway. But if I see it sit for a few days as unprinted, I'm not in such a hurry to rush mine to the PO. I usually access the address right away so mine shows as being printed.  So they know I'm getting ready to mail mine out.

Thank you all for your help.  If I do BoB I'm sure I'll be back with questions!