Insulting Offers

[VictoriaG]

I posted a new article for sale. Within 2 days, one of the customers offered $3 for full rights (this is less than 10% of the suggested use price, and less than 5% of the suggested full rights price). I refused it immediately. Since then, he has been going to all my unsold articles and offering me $3 for full rights. I don't think he's serious; I think he is trying to harrass me.

Is there anything that can be done, besides choosing the option, no bids on my articles? Is it possible to ban a customer? I'm certain that he has annoyed other authors.

[MelissaNott]

That stinks! Some other authors were just complaining about a $3 bandit yesterday. I don't think you're the only one, at least. Good luck!

[MelissaNott]

Here's the link, Victoria:

http://www.constant-content.com/forum/v ... fer#p59348

Sorry if it doesn't hyperlink. Sometimes my computer doesn't do that. (It's a lazy computer )

[JoyRCalderwood]

No I just got 3 offers for $3. The rules say no less than $7. This is probably one of those offshore guys that wants to resell, or someone waiting for us to hit the accept button by mistake and give it away.

[Zabrina]

I just got sixteen offers from this guy, and I'm watching my inbox for more. What a pain.

[JordanRichardson]

I've been having the exact same thing. I haven't written anything for this site for quite a long while and suddenly "georgeed" wants full rights on articles that I have priced at over $50. Can something be done about this annoyance?

UPDATE: Just as I'm typing this, "georgeed" comes in with a $3 bid for full rights on a long article of mine that I have posted for $85 full rights. What a jerk.

[scottallan]

I got one of these $3 offers and now the article is sitting in "Waiting" status even though I refused the offer more than a week ago. Is this normal? I don't like the fact that no one else can buy my article while I wait for this to get sorted out.

[VictoriaG]

Yes the creep is georged. And I would recommend all who write not to give into such jerks. In order to encourage all the writers here, this month I sold an article for $80 - one which has been available for 5 months.

[scottallan]

Ok, disregard my question - turns out the article was in the process of being purchased for full rights. Score!

It's hard to imagine someone agreeing to these $3 offers, though I did see a $3 sale on the 'recently purchased' page this morning.

[juliaamos]

Lol, scottallen. I had the same thing happen; after I read your message, I saw that the article was "waiting." I thought that it was for the $3 offer, but it turned out to be a customer purchasing for full rights =) So not so bad after all!

[SatuR]

I'm so happy I found this thread, the same guy has been offering me $3 for a number of articles, all between 400 and 800 words. I keep rejecting the offers. I only checked the offer box as another buyer asked for those holistic therapy articles and asked the writers to make sure they accept offers. I was hoping to sell a few old articles for around $10 (usage rights) but all I've been getting are $3 offers from that creep. I hope nobody accepts them! No more offers for me, I think.

[michaelsmoker]

The Recently Sold Content listing has shown a number of full rights purchases for $3 recently. I have been lucky enough not to receive an offer from this bandit and have my articles get taken out of circulation while I decline the offer. But some writers must feel desperate enough to give away copyright for what amounts to $1.95 per article (minus paypal fees), because such sales have been made. I have to say I pity them.

Michael

[aprilk10]

So....I just got "georged!" How pathetic...as if I would accept a $3 offer on a $100 article! He obviously has no life and too much time on his hamds! My question: when someone makes an offer on an order, it doesn't disappear from view does it? I viewed my content page and it doesn't have it in "waiting" status. Also, I logged out and viewed my page and the article is there. So I am thinking that just because a "customer" makes an offer, it doesn't "hold it hostage!" Perhaps we should all just ignore the offers until he goes away. I removed the checks on "Best offer" articles. We shouldn't have to do that...but I don't want to be annoyed by this idiot! The only real offer I ever got on an article anyway came from a client who sent me an email to make an offer.

[OceanLady]

Same problem here - and no way to contact him to tell him to just stop... heck, even just being able to block him altogether would be great. He offered $3 on like 5 of my articles yesterday, same thing on 3 more today, you'd think he'd get the idea after I rejected the others.

There should be some generic rule in place... maybe if you're offering on full rights, you can't offer less than 50% of the listed price or something.

[michaelsmoker]

I'm not sure if clients are allowed to contact you outside CC's normal channels in order to make offers. If the client wanted to ask you whether you'd accept the offer before s/he made it within the CC mechanism, that would probably be okay.

I don't want to disable the best offer feature on my articles because it could mean a sale that's worth my while from someone who can't afford to pay the listed price but really needs and would appreciate the article. If the articles don't get taken offline while an offer is pending, then just ignoring the bandit is probably a good idea.

Michael