What’s a Dealer to Do? (Dealer War Story No. 1) The above cartoon humorously illustrates an exchange many dealers encounter at almost every coin show or coin shop. This customer/dealer interaction is only one type of scenario that I refer to as a dealer “war story.” In the legal field, we used the phrase “war story” to describe dramatic or contentious courtroom experiences or particularly frustrating or funny situations with clients or opposing counsel, etc. I also found this apt definition on the internet: A recounting of a memorable personal experience, especially one involving challenge, hardship, danger, or other interesting features. I know many of you collectors have had uncomfortable or unpleasant experiences when buying coins from a dealer at a show or at your local coin shop. Sometimes it makes you question whether you should continue in this hobby since these experiences can bring frustrations and even anger that you might feel are just not worth it. Well, of course, let me say that I personally love coins and wouldn’t want to have to give them up, even for the (thankfully) far-and-few-between unpleasant people I encounter as a dealer – both collectors and other dealers! So I’d like to relate some stories about my experiences with a few disagreeable customers that will perhaps let you to see things from the other side of the table and at the same time allow me an opportunity to “vent” just a little and perhaps even elicit a little sympathy! When dealing with all my customers, I always keep in mind that I am offering a service to collectors and my goal is to maintain good relations by making sure they are satisfied with the coins they buy from me. And when I encounter a difficult customer, no matter how strongly I may want to tell them how I feel about their bad behavior, I bite my tongue and try to behave professionally and courteously at all times. However, there have been times when I seriously wanted to let lose a few unlady-like explicatives, lock up my cases, take my coins, and just go home! Or when dealing with someone by email, I have had to step away from my computer, go get a glass of wine, turn on some good ol rock and roll, and deal with the situation tomorrow when hopefully it won’t irk me so much. By the way, don’t worry, I will not disclose names and certain details so as to maintain anonymity. So here’s my first "war" story – I’ll call this one: “Mr. Impatient” Let me begin with a little historical background. Mr. Impatient had bought some coins from me over the past couple years with no issues at all. Then one day I happened to win a coin he was selling on an Ebay auction. I promptly sent my PayPal payment, received the coin a short time later, no problem. A couple days after I received the coin, Mr. Impatient sent me a message through Ebay asking me to leave feedback. I responded that I would be happy to do so, however, I explained that it was my practice to leave feedback in bulk a couple times a month and that it might take a week or two, but I would get to it. Two days later out of the blue, he sent me another message informing me that, since I wouldn’t leave him immediate feedback, he had “blocked” me as a bidder on his future auctions. “Wow,” I thought, “this guy was pretty impatient and in my opinion was ‘cutting off his nose to spite his face.’” I could understand blocking a bidder because they didn’t send payment, or took too long to send payment, but I’d never heard of someone blocking a bidder just because they wouldn’t leave prompt feedback. “Oh well,” I said to myself, “he’s not the kind of guy I’d want to continue doing business with any way if that’s all it took to get him peeved.” Ok, fast forward a year later. Mr. Impatient saw a coin on my website he wanted to buy and emailed me asking for my best price. Well, I am taken aback to hear from this guy. If it was me, and I felt strongly enough to actually bar someone from bidding on my coins, you can bet I wouldn’t want to do any kind of business with that person. But I thought, hey, let bygones be bygones, and decided to forget about the past incident and I gave him a reduced price for the coin. He agreed to buy it, but then began asking for “extras” like wanting a larger photo of the coin, could I send the coin to Rick Snow to Photo Seal, and a couple other “requests.” I emailed him that he could enlarge and copy the photo off my website, and I also offered as a friendly courtesy, that since I would be seeing Rick at an upcoming show, I could hand the coin to Rick at the show, thereby saving Mr. Impatient the to/from shipping costs, however, he’d still have to pay Rick’s $15 Photo Seal fee. He said ok and mailed a check. In the meantime, since Mr. Impatient knew who had taken the picture of my coin (I’ll call him “Mr. Photo Guy”), Mr. Impatient contacted him directly and asked Mr. Photo Guy to send him a larger image (even though Mr. Photo Guy did accommodate Mr. Impatient, I personally thought this was out of line since Mr. Impatient was asking Mr. Photo Guy (behind my back) to spend his time editing the photo to suit Mr. Impatient without even offering to compensate Mr. Photo Guy). “Hmmm,” I thought, as a little warning bell began to ring and I started to feel I should have declined to deal with this guy from the beginning. Shortly after that, Mr. Impatient decided he didn’t want to wait for me to take the coin to Rick but instead requested that I mail it directly to him. Well, Mr. Photo Guy still had the coin in his possession and was going to bring it to the same show Rick and I were attending, so now I had to ask Mr. Photo Guy if he would ship the coin to Mr. Impatient for me and I would reimburse him. “No problem,” Mr. Photo Guy said so I gave him the address and he shipped the coin by insured first class to Mr. Impatient for me. I then contacted Mr. Impatient to advise him that Mr. Photo Guy would be shipping the coin to him directly. A week later (on a Friday), Mr. Impatient (who lived across the country) emailed me that he had not yet received the coin. I was in my car driving to a coin show at the time I received his message on my Blackberry (my son read it to me), so I had to contact Mr. Photo Guy and ask him if he would respond to Mr. Impatient’s email with the shipping date and tracking information, which he promptly did letting Mr. Impatient know that no tracking information was available at that time. The next day (Saturday) while I’m at the show, I got a very rude and condescending email from Mr. Impatient questioning my professional reputation, asking why I did not respond to him personally about the coin’s whereabouts, that even though Mr. Photo Guy contacted him, why didn’t I care enough about his concerns to reply myself, etc. “Wow,” I thought, “This guy really did have some issues.” Ok, I’ll admit that I probably could have replied directly to Mr. Impatient letting him know Mr. Photo Guy would follow up with shipping status, but since I was driving at the time I thought asking Mr. Photo Guy to respond was the most expeditious way of handling his request. So I bit my tongue, swallowed the unlady-like words I wanted to type, and responded professionally explaining to him that I was driving at the time I received his message, Mr. Photo Guy had the information, that the post office was pretty slow lately, that I was sure the coin would arrive within a couple days, but that the coin was insured and he should try and be a little patient. He replied the next day, without any apology for his nasty email, stating that he would wait and be hopeful. I was later informed the coin finally arrived two days later on Monday. The icing on the cake of this story is that I later learned (not from Mr. Impatient, but from a third party) that on the SAME day Mr. Impatient sent me his ranting email (Saturday), he had received a pink slip from the post office letting him know they tried to deliver the coin but that no one was home, and they would try again on Monday! “OMG!” is all I could say when I learned this. After all the hubbub trying to track the coin -- the emails, my phone calls with Mr. Photo Guy, all of the worrying about the coin, etc. -- why didn’t Mr. Impatient send me (and Mr. Photo Guy) a message letting us know that the coin was waiting for him at HIS post office – not to mention an kind apology would have been appreciated! And the story doesn’t quite end here. After Mr. Impatient got the coin, he sent me an email letting me know he was quite pleased with it but also wanted his $15 Photo Seal fee returned. (I had planned to use it to reimburse Mr. Photo Guy for the shipping fee.) Again, I was shaking my head that, after all this guy put me and Mr. Photo Guy through, he wasn’t through “badgering” me. Of course, I could have simply just refunded him the $15 and avoided all further conflict and put an end to the whole deal, but I was finished bending over backwards and couldn’t let this pass. So I sent him an email reminding him that I had to reimburse Mr. Photo Guy for shipping the coin to him. He responding saying that he didn’t feel he had to pay any shipping fee since he felt the original (reduced) price I quoted him for the coin should have included the shipping fee. I reminded him that my website clearly states the buyer pays for all shipping costs, and besides, we had never even gotten to the point of discussing the amount of the shipping since I had (graciously I thought) offered to hand carry the coin to Rick. He said that I should do whatever I felt was fair, so I did! After paying Mr. Photo Guy what I owed him, I refunded Mr. Impatient a few dollars and, for my own sanity, I promptly ceased all further communication with him. Geese, some people…..
I don't get that at all sir. She clearly states these are stories of the bad kind, the types of situations she regrets happens from time to time. I have never met Charmy but get the distinct impression she is a dealer who goes out of her way to please customers. I could write some stories and you may equally feel that collectors hate dealers as well.
They love their customers. Customers who don't haggle or return coins, of course. This just in -- you are making a profit and must do something to earn it. Act like it, and don't bite the hand that feeds you, because to read stories like (without telling the other side of the story nearly as often) this suggests you don't like what you're doing because you have to "put up with" bad customers. Respectfully...Mike
lol, there is a reason retail clients pay more for coins than wholesale buyers, and it is because we have interactions like this. The bother of it isn't this issue, nor is the frustration the issue, but rather the amount of time consumed by many retail clients. Dealers have to factor the amount of hand-holding required into the price of the coin because the time expended is time not spent selling other coins.
CoinGeezer, why is it that I get the feeling you do not like coin dealers? And where does it say that I hate my customers?! Seriously, if I didn't like the majority of my customers, I wouldn't enjoy what I'm doing, which anyone who knows me will tell you that I not only ENJOY being a coin dealer, but I LOVE it. However, as in any business, there are ALWAYS difficult people we have to deal with, so this story is about just one of those people. I think it puts things into perspective to see some of what happens behind the table. Leadfoot, I'm not sure where you're hostility is coming from, but I do work very hard to please my customers - and earn a living. And I absolutely realize that dealing with the very small percentage of difficult people is part of my job, so no worries that I am not "earning" what I receive in profits. As I said, retelling a story like this just lets everyone see a little more of "how the world goes round" in the little world of a coin dealer.
Here are her post from the last three shows that I could find. One of the things that always stands out to me is the pictures she takes and posts of forum members. She obviously takes the time to get to know who her customers are or this wouldn't be possible. Doesn't sound like she hates them to me... http://www.cointalk.com/content/60-charmy-s-june-2012-long-beach-show-report-w-lots-pics.html http://www.cointalk.com/t206255/ http://www.cointalk.com/t204604/
I have met Charmy, and, in fact, got to observe her at The Worlds Fair of Money in Boston 2010. I was one of the volunteers from the BNS that did all the support work for the convention. I was in charge of Page Program. My work area was in close proximity to her table and over the course of the week I was able to observe that not only was she a lady and a proffesional with every person she interacted with but she was one of the few dealers in the entire show that consistantly was willing to treat the children in attendance with the same respect she showed the adults. Some of the teenage girls that were in the Page program stated that they hadn't really thought about actual coin collecting (they were there because their parents were there) until they saw Charmy on the other side of the table. Two years later my son still speaks fondly of the nice lady that treated him special at the show. In my opinion Charmy is a real class act and anyone that doesn't get to know her is missing out. Just my two cents in defense of someone who doesn't need defending Richard
Ziggy, thank you so much for your wonderful comments - I had no idea about the girls or that your son even remembered me! That was really nice to hear and actually made my eyes water! I do try to go out of my way to help kids, and especially the girls, to make them feel more comfortable in the hopes that they will enjoy coins as much as I do. As I posted on the etiquette thread, I don't mean to come across here, or anywhere, as not liking this business or my customers, because the exact opposite is true. By posting these stories and the etiquette suggestions on the other thread, I am only trying to make the coin show experience a more positive one. This dealer war story is just one of the very few difficult customers I have encountered - it is definitely not the norm. But I thought it was so over-the-top that it was almost comical. At the time, it was very frustrating, but it sure helped increase my stamina for patience! So yes, there are good and "bad" people on both sides of the table, and in every profession. Believe me, I know, because I worked for lawyers as a paralegal for 35 years before I became a full time coin dealer. I worked for some of the most wonderful ethical lawyers on the planet, but I also worked for some of the meanest, crudest, and unethical ones as well - which didn't last long because I wouldn't/couldn't put up with having to deal with them day in and day out, so I would move on. Luckily, in my experience, they were a lot fewer than the good ones!
Please note: My prior post to this thread was not directed at Charmy, but rather a reaction to reading similar posts to this over the years. Charmy's a wonderfully nice dealer who I've done business with in the past, and would do so without hesitation again in the future. Just wanted to be clear and not leave any mistaken impressions.
More necro-posting. For the record, how charmy dealt with this customer shows true professionalism. At no point did she feel the need to "letting the customer know what he did was an insult". Great cartoon. Even dilbert didn't need to "letting the customer know what he did was an insult".
that cartoon sounds like people i have dealt with on craigslist. Ill tell a short story i had some 90% silver coins listed some half dollars i think at what ever the going rate was at the time two people called and said i was breaking federal law by selling them, they both stated that you can not sell a coin for more than face value like a dime for a dime etc.. So i said well how do the online dealers do it then like Apmex provident etc.. they said those people have a special permit or license from the government that allows them to do it and individuals are not allowed and i could go to prison i just laughed and hung up.. These were 2 different phone calls from different area codes
