Bambiboo3

[marmalade0997.livejournal.com]

WHO: https://www.furaffinity.net/user/bambiboo3/
WHAT: a tail in exchange for ~$60 of blind bag MLP figurines and some fur to use for the tail
WHEN: August 2012 ongoing
EXPLAIN:

• In August 2012, bambiboo3 posted a journal wanting to trade MLP merchandise for fursuit parts. I had a lot of blindbag ponies, so I decided to take her up (journal asking for trades)


• After I had gone over all the ponies I had available, we worked out how much the ponies were worth, how much her tails were worth, what I wanted my tail to look like (black and white with some spotty brown fur I would provide), and she said that the trade would be good


• I got her address, and the next day after verifying her address I shipped the ponies and fur off, with her telling me she'd let me know when everything arrived


• I didn't hear anything from her for a week, so I double checked she got everything safely with no response (I had done 2-3 day shipping)


• A few days after that note, I got a response asking what my tail looked like specifically, and I responded


• Towards the end of September she posted a journal saying that she was packing stuff up and moving, so I figured it would take her a bit to finish and ship my tail


• In the beginning of December, I shot her a note asking about my tail since I hadn't heard anything from her in a while


• A week later, I got a note saying it was finished and just needed to be stuffed, and that she would have it out in the next week so I gave her my address (the first time she said she would ship it)


• I still hadn't received it by the beginning of January, so I sent her a note seeing if she had shipped it


• A week later I still hadn't heard anything, so I sent her my address again in case something had happened, and got a reply back that she didn't get the first note asking about it, but would ship the tail out that week (the second time she said she would ship it)


• About two weeks after that note towards the end of January, I sent her another one seeing if she had sent it. She said she would send it out Monday or Tuesday (the third time she said she would ship it) and included a picture of the finished tail (far right)


• Towards the middle of February I saw she posted a journal saying she had shipped more things (didn't manage to snag a screen cap of it), and asked again if my tail had been shipped, two weeks later I got a reply saying she had sent it out but it got returned, and I sent her my address a third time with her saying she's send it again with tracking this time (the fourth time she said she would ship it)


• End of March, I still hadn't received anything, so I sent her another note seeing if it got shipped


• A week later with no response and getting irritated with the lack of communication and saying she had shipped things when she didn't, I sent her yet another note


• A week later in the beginning of April I sent her another note, irritated with my notes being read but not responded to, and still not having my half of the trade, this time getting a response saying she didn't see my last note, but had shipped it off that day (the fifth time she said she would ship it)


• When I asked for a tracking number, she said she didn't have one but would find me the receipt ID as proof


• A week later with no tail and no receipt ID as proof, I sent her another note


• A few days after that note, I got a reply saying that she wasn't able to get a tracking number because of how it was shipped (shipped through the USPS), and that it would take 2-4 weeks to get to me because of her being in Hawaii


• Going off of her latest ship date of April 3, it has been more than 8 weeks, plenty of time for it to get to me. I left a shout on her FA page asking what was going on, but she is currently on hiatus. The shout did help me get in contact with another customer of hers though who is having similar issues

I don't know what to do about this any more. She has said she's shipped off my half of the trade five times with no proof or anything being received. I see she has a few bewares up here already about her issues with shipping, and this just seems to follow the pattern.

Comments

[teekchan.livejournal.com]

Good luck getting this settled. I browsed her tag here and it seems like she has a track record for this.

[marmalade0997.livejournal.com]

Yup. This has kinda been my wake-up call to check for people being posted on here before doing trades. It's just a shame really, to have talent and then waste it by getting a bad reputation.

[dragonfoxdemon.livejournal.com]

Same Marmalade. She did this to me 3 years ago with a trade. I hope you get things settled.

[marmalade0997.livejournal.com]

Did you ever get your half of the trade at all?

[dragonfoxdemon.livejournal.com]

No. I was told it was mailed, but never received any responses when it did not arrive. Thinking back on it, I don't recall seeing an image of her half.

[ducttapeninja.livejournal.com]

I can't be the only one who's noticed from going through her past entries here that everyone who's dealt with her has gotten the "Oh I shipped it out, but it got sent back to me!" excuse. That doesn't happen unless there's some sort of address error or something similar with it, and... Considering the line of work she's chosen for herself, you'd think she'd have learned by now how to not get the package shipped back to her every time. :/

She really should not be in this business, at all. Period. From the looks of things, despite the fact that the quality of her suits seem to at least be actually wearable now, she doesn't seem to have changed at all.

I'm really sorry you had to go through with this, and hopefully she sees this and gets her backside in gear to resolve this properly.

[lord-aperture.livejournal.com]

USPS lists the tracking numbers on the receipts now, so if she had a gotten a tracking number it would be on the receipt. Plus I don't see how it being shipped effects it getting a number? They'll put a tracking number anything if you pay for.

[marmalade0997.livejournal.com]

That was what made me the most upset, because I know that tracking numbers are always given now. Unless the USPS in Hawaii (where she's shipping from) has some sort of super weird unique way of doing things there is no reason to not give a tracking number.

[growly.livejournal.com]

If it was shipped First Class, a tracking number has to be specially requested as an add-on. The tail in the photos looks kind of small and light, so it's feasible it could have qualified for First Class- however, tracking is less than $1 and it's bad practice to not get tracking on handmade items (especially when artist integrity is being called into question and the customer's had to wait for a long time).

It's more likely that she never shipped it, which is inexplicable, since the tail obviously exists... I don't get why someone wouldn't want to finish the transaction and get the tail out of their house?

[lord-aperture.livejournal.com]

Thats what I meant, typo cut off a word. But yeah If you pay the small fee any item can get a tracking number. So I don't see how the way it was shipped could have stopped it from getting a number like she is saying it was.

[marmalade0997.livejournal.com]

Somehow, with her history of how things get shipped, I doubt she'd get First Class shipping.

And the having it finished but not shipping it is what baffles me! It's not even that she never did my half of the trade, it's just that it hasn't been shipped. If she put the effort into completing something, why cause unnecessary issues at the very last step?

[growly.livejournal.com]

First-Class is actually the cheapest option, despite its name making it sound better than it is.

[marmalade0997.livejournal.com]

Yeesh, probably means that either way, probably no plans of getting me a tracking number, if it even was shipped in the first place.

Still is weird that she said she couldn't get a tracking number, not that she didn't pay for one.

[hootley.livejournal.com]

Hurf..
This is a real shame, honestly. :/
Around FC of last year, she and I had agreed on a trade for a partial fursuit in exchange for quite a few pieces of art ($1000 dollars worth).
Despite the fact that I would have liked my otter character done from her, she was very adamant on doing my main character, Hoot.She had told me that "she had far too many otters on her queue and did not have interest in doing any more and that she was REALLY wanting to do my bird". I was extremely ambivalent, as I was already picky about who I wanted to build my main character, but we came to a generous agreement: She would craft the foam for the head for free, show me the outcome, and if I did not like it, it was my call whether I would have liked to continue the trade or not. I was pretty happy with that agreement. The agreement also was that the partial would be done by FC.

Basically, the first red flag for me was that she hadn't.. gone with the agreement. She did not make the foam head first, she, for some reason, went ahead and made the tail first. Of course this did not give me that leeway that I was supposed to get with our prior plans. Nevertheless, the tail looked pretty great (despite the fact that I was now feeling more obligated to do the trade when I was indifferent) and she told me that she was going to ship it and that it would arrive a week prior to FC.
During my wait for the tail, I happened to stumble upon her tag on artist's beware and was literally dumbfounded by my findings. I wasn't sure if I had gotten myself into a messy situation or not. :/ The posts were rather old, too, so I basically gave her the benefit of the doubt and gave myself a little consensus and told myself that if the tail did not arrive on the date that she had told me it would, I would cancel the trade.

Sure enough, the tail did not arrive.
At that point, I figured the last thing I wanted to do was get myself into a mess. I told her I no longer wished to do the trade but would compensate her in some way for the tail or she could sell it. :/ I was being hooked up with a job and school was around the corner anyway (so I was questioning whether I was up for the task), but I was also INCREDIBLY worried over the fact that I was possibly going to be creating art in exchange for nothing. You can get money back, but you really can't take back the time you've put in making something - $1,000 dollars worth of art in particular, too.

With that being said, it's a huge huge shame that she's really slacking in shipping things off like this. Her crafting skills are absolutely phenomenal. I was really really giving her the benefit of the doubt around the time of said trade, but as much as I wanted to, I was just far, far too nervous to go with it, and this is exactly the reason why!

Best of luck in getting this resolved. ):

[marmalade0997.livejournal.com]

Urgh, that sounds awful. The stringing along seems to be a common theme in the posts here about her, sorry you had to get your hopes up on a suit like that.

[afiriplent.livejournal.com]

lol

[tonylope.livejournal.com]

wow

[slushienyappy.livejournal.com]

I had some trouble with her about 2 or so years ago myself :/.

Mine was for a fursuit head. The head turned out amazing but... By the time it arrived the excitement was pretty well gone. Went through a lot of lies and some guilt tripping.

I really hope you get your stuff :(. I'm so sorry this has happened to you..

[calicokitea.livejournal.com]

Wow. This isn't surprising--I inquired about the resin blanks she was selling once, and didn't hear a response. Sent another note, no response, and finally had to resort to commenting on her page and on the advertisement for me to get a response. By then, it had been a few weeks since she put up the ad, so I contacted others who HAD purchased a resin blank from her and they were waiting for it to be shipped. A few of the people I contacted were willing to respond, and they had the same issue--she wasn't responding to them, but was certainly reading their notes. I don't know if they ever received their items, but I noted her back retracting my interest telling her she didn't seem reliable. She read it, but I never got a response.

I sincerely hope this works out. Not taking pictures of the finished product BEFORE sending it out to you seems REALLY suspicious.

[miharuokami.livejournal.com]

This is late but I have had trouble with her too. I traded a faom base made by lolautumn(?)? for fur. While I got the fur wasnt the quality I felt it was described as and it wasnt as much. I got the I sent it but it got sent back excuse too...