Buyers Without Money. Please Stay Away

[Guest lorddaniel2006]

Some days in a row I don’t usually get any orders and that’s okay. During those days I may receive a couple of messages from potential buyers - and still, that’s okay. But recently, some guy wrote me that he’s got 3 iPhones from AT&T all out of contract and he was wondering how much and how long it would take. I told him $10 per phone and less than 24 hours. He went further on and on to ask more questions upon questions but still I kept cool. I answered and cleared all his doubts. Finally he tells me right now he doesn’t have any money in his card and that he’ll order in 2 weeks (TWO WEEKS??? WTF???). I replied him with every bit of passive aggressiveness I could muster, “Sure. No problem. I’ll be here all week.” I don’t know if this is a test of patience but whatever it is, it’s not funny. You may specify right from the onset that you just wanna make inquiries; don’t act all high and might like you got so much business to offer and in the end I get that! Not cool.

[zubairfb]

Well, this happens, may be he did not know that his card isnt c from the beginning…

[eoinfinnegan]

Welcome to the world of retailing/dealing with the general public.
Get used to people who take a lot of time and don’t necessarily order. That is their right. It is also your right to not answer. I suggest that after a certain point you send them a custom offer for the work and if they persist with questions, send a custom offer for “a consultation” where they may ask a certain number of questions. Value your time; if you don’t then neither will buyers.

[lokmanhossain]

Few day’s ago similar thing happened with me. After a long discussion about his project he told me that he has a problem in his credit card and After that I never found him online.

[miiila]

I find that often the time expended on interaction is in reverse proportionality to the sum you’ll earn from the order, not the time to do the actual work, but everything around it. People who have the money, often don´t have the time to beat around the bush and vice versa.

And Eoin’s suggestion of a consultation custom offer seems like a good idea, one for a bit of fun even perhaps, though probably if one isn´t too desperate for orders it might be best to not even let the whole thing arrive at that point in the first place. 😉

The problem is of course, that you can´t know how it will turn out. Either way, hope the person indeed will order in 2 weeks, as now all their doubts are cleared, so maybe it will all end well.

But I have 1 or 2 open offers floating around like that too, I feel you (and hope I didn´t forget to put an expiration date on those ;)).