Freecycle (Merged Thread)

ladypinkof66

Hi Everyone,
whoever has a decent working small/medium fridge and lcd tv with a
possibilty to deliver to **************, please respond.
Thanks.

This is in my local freecycle what a cheek or what ?

Should I say oh yes i have both of those items I can deliver them too and then take them back home again to my house :rotfl:

BrandNewDay

OK... I've changed my wording and been chosen for the two things I've asked for. I am still super polite, I make sure to use the words "please" and "Thank you" and instead of saying "I'd be very happy to take it off your hands, please" I now say "I would be very grateful to come pick that up at your convenience."

BTW, the woman I met yesterday (gave me a flat-bed scanner!) was also meeting someone else at the same place and time (lunch break in the car park at her job, I think.) It seemed that the other party was a no-show. That happens a lot, I think.

I only ever no-showed on someone once and it wasn't my fault. I emailed and said, "I see you live in the XYZ estate... they're doing all those roadworks down at the roundabout at the entrance. Does that effect how one gets into the estate?" and never heard back off them. The next day, I tried to get to them but couldn't figure out how. I drove past a couple of times (well, I was diverted past) and then gave up. Went home and emailed an apology, explaining my difficulty and never heard back from them.

milkybars

I admit I'm quite new to this freecycle lark but I am enjoying it.

While I agree some requests are greedy and undeserving. I wouldn't disregard a post or reply that was poorly spelt or had poor punctuation. English may not be their first language, maybe they weren't as lucky to be educated to the extent of others. They may not even use a computer that often. Sometimes I believe that those who need it most can't always portray themselves the best.

Maybe I'll grow cynical after I've been freecycling for longer.;)

Also personal opinion but if I can't get any money from an item, I list it on freecycle... in which case I don't want it anymore so it is a form of asking someone to take it off my hands. That phrase doesn't bother me because in my case its 100% true!

molley

JimmyTheWig wrote: »

Oh, but the reason I replied was to ask if you found adtrader better than eBay - and if so for what reasons?

Clearly Ebay is better for getting to a wider audience .I have used both but most of what I use Adtrader for is stuff that has a low value but maybe also weighs a bit so buying it by post wouldn't be worth it so it is targetted at local folk who can collect and,of course doesn't have any fees .

JimmyTheWig

molley wrote: »

targetted at local folk who can collect and,of course doesn't have any fees .

I like the sound of that. Thanks. Will check it out some time...

brightonman123

local friday-ad 'general items' section sometimes has a few free items.

whoever posts the ad still has to pay for lineage, though!

Georgecarol

frugalpam wrote: »

Well done to the Mods on my local group, for posting this

Hi
There's something else available for free as well......manners.
I'm surprised at the amount of emails I'm getting in regards to this.
I had one lady tell me that out of over 20 emails, she had one that
was polite. A quick tip to members responding to
offers...... ..impoliteness doesn't get you anywhere. Emails saying
"I'll take it, where are you?", "I can pick it up after work
tomorrow, let me know", "I want it, I can come for it right away",
"Sounds nice, call me" and then add a mobile phone number in there
just to boost your phone bill, just don't cut it with anyone and you
will find yourself ending up with nothing.
This is not to say that we all want pleading emails either
"please, please, please", those are also a no-no as are mentioning
personal details for safety reasons. When offering or responding,
please do not say that you are a single mother alone, you are disabled
etc. Not only do they come under the umbrella of sob stories (unless
you are applying for a disability item), they are also a breach of the
personal safety rules. We would like to think the best of people, but
we really don't know who is sat out there in cyberspace reading our
messages. So when responding, a simple short email such as "my
daughter would love it", "I've wanted one for ages", "mine is broken
and I've been looking for a replacement" is sufficient. No long
stories about why are necessary at all and will just end up with you
getting nothing from the group. Don't forget the please or thank you
as well.
Our Freecycle motto is "be nice", so let's go for it. Thanks

:T :T :T

I just wanted to say that this was my admin that went out to my group. I have read quite a few of the complaints on here and they are very reasonable complaints.
We had a new owner that placed the rule that you had to place an offer before a wanted and that was changed right after he was removed as that is a breach of freecycle rules and can affect the charity status. We put a cap on the amount of wanteds and allow 4 a month, which we feel is reasonable as we had members joining after reading one-sided newspaper reports all about how they can rake in all kinds of free stuff. We did actually reject anything we considered a luxury item and then changed our minds for a couple of reasons. The first being, who are we to deem what is a luxury? What I consider a luxury, some others consider to be everday disposable items. The second being, why should we be the only ones that get to see how greedy some people can be? the way we look at it now, if you want to ask for a laptop that has an 80 gig harddrive, runs Vista and has a good enough graphics card to play games on.....go ahead. then everyone can see what a Greedy Gerta you are and all this will do is to offend the decent members and get a name for yourself. We feel that the members are smart enough to decide for themselves who are greedy and who are needy, so why should we do this for them.
This isn't to say that wants are not a necessary part of freecycle. They remind us maybe of what we have stuck under the stairs or at the back of the cupboard that we don't have any intention of using anymore because Great Aunt Hildy gives the worst presents. They have become even more important these days with people losing their jobs and their houses. We all have to realise though, at the end of the day, this is a group that was started to save items from the landfill, so we do actually reject items that fail the landfill test. We are a busy group and deal with over 4,000 posts a month and though sad to say, it seems that has gone out of the window and is now a place to get cool free stuff, but we do our best to keep it running smoothly.
I have read that many people have complaints about their groups. The first place to deal with that would be the group owner. If it is a complaint about the group itself, then go to freecycle.org and lodge a complaint there. If you have had prior communication in regards to the issue, please keep it as you will need to provide that to your local GOA when it is dealt with.
Don't write the groups off though as I find ours runs pretty well problem free, we deal with complaints quickly, our admins always contain humour to deal with any issues because no one wants a preachy no-face sending you posts and we get good feedback. Hang in and see if things improve, maybe there are new people behind the scenes and things are being worked out. if not, then try the suggestions above. Sorry for the long post

Cardew

Georgecarol wrote: »

I just wanted to say that this was my admin that went out to my group. I have read quite a few of the complaints on here and they are very reasonable complaints.
We had a new owner that placed the rule that you had to place an offer before a wanted and that was changed right after he was removed as that is a breach of freecycle rules and can affect the charity status. We put a cap on the amount of wanteds and allow 4 a month, which we feel is reasonable as we had members joining after reading one-sided newspaper reports all about how they can rake in all kinds of free stuff. We did actually reject anything we considered a luxury item and then changed our minds for a couple of reasons. The first being, who are we to deem what is a luxury? What I consider a luxury, some others consider to be everday disposable items. The second being, why should we be the only ones that get to see how greedy some people can be? the way we look at it now, if you want to ask for a laptop that has an 80 gig harddrive, runs Vista and has a good enough graphics card to play games on.....go ahead. then everyone can see what a Greedy Gerta you are and all this will do is to offend the decent members and get a name for yourself. We feel that the members are smart enough to decide for themselves who are greedy and who are needy, so why should we do this for them.
This isn't to say that wants are not a necessary part of freecycle. They remind us maybe of what we have stuck under the stairs or at the back of the cupboard that we don't have any intention of using anymore because Great Aunt Hildy gives the worst presents. They have become even more important these days with people losing their jobs and their houses. We all have to realise though, at the end of the day, this is a group that was started to save items from the landfill, so we do actually reject items that fail the landfill test. We are a busy group and deal with over 4,000 posts a month and though sad to say, it seems that has gone out of the window and is now a place to get cool free stuff, but we do our best to keep it running smoothly.
I have read that many people have complaints about their groups. The first place to deal with that would be the group owner. If it is a complaint about the group itself, then go to freecycle.org and lodge a complaint there. If you have had prior communication in regards to the issue, please keep it as you will need to provide that to your local GOA when it is dealt with.
Don't write the groups off though as I find ours runs pretty well problem free, we deal with complaints quickly, our admins always contain humour to deal with any issues because no one wants a preachy no-face sending you posts and we get good feedback. Hang in and see if things improve, maybe there are new people behind the scenes and things are being worked out. if not, then try the suggestions above. Sorry for the long post

Is it not possible to have sections in the digest?

'Offered', 'taken', 'received', 'wanted', and 'you must be joking!

Georgecarol

^^^^^Unfortunately, I don't create the yahoo programs LMAO:rotfl:

hula-hoops

That sums it up nicely, Georgecarol.

I have just realised the logic in allowing people to post 'wanted' after 'wanted' - for even the most excessive things. If these weren't posted, how would I know what kind of people I am dealing with when I wade through the dozens of replies to an offered?

But a recent post on our group made me seethe:

Hi all, does anyone have a chocolate brown/tan bed throw or quilt? Now
the nights are getting colder i would like a bit of extra warmth at
night, without having to put the heating on during the night!! What
with the way the world is going, i am trying to reduce the bills. I
would be very gratefull of a bed throw or quilted throw, if anyone has
a spare one? Double or kingsize if possible.

If all she needs is something to keep her warm at night, what does it matter what colour it is? And as for this latest craze of referring to everything that is dark brown as 'chocolate' - grrrr! It's p**p brown, deal with it.