One of my duties at my day job is trying to sell bronze statues on eBay. I've been doing it about a year, so I've seen all the questions that people like to ask over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again, and I try to answer those questions in the auction description so people don't have to email me 45,789 times a day. For instance, I don't work on weekends, so I put this paragraph in every auction description:
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Feel free to contact us with any questions. Our email address is *****@naghis.com. We are very inundated with emails, so we will do our absolute best to respond with 24 to 36 hours on regular business days. Also, please take into consideration that no one is here on weekends, so emails and payments sent on weekends may take longer to recieve a response.
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I have reason to believe that even though it looks to me like the above paragraph was written in English, it may be written in another language entirely. Take Bob (name changed to protect the...um...guy) for instance. On Friday at 8:18 pm, nearly two and a half hours after I had left for the weekend, he sent me this email about one of our auctions:
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how about putting that price as a buy it now and i will buy it as long as you tell me that it is in excellent condition. I will pay immediately.
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Naturally, I did not answer because I was at home. On Saturday at 11:59 am, Bob sent another email:
Of course, I did not respond again. At 6:01 pm, six hours and two minutes later, he sent the following message:
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Hi, is this piece in mint condition? And would you like to sell it with buy it now?
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Two and a half hours later, still on Saturday, he sent another email:
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can i get an amen??????????????????????????????
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Less than 20 minutes later, when I still did not respond, he emailed again:
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nolonger interested. Thanks anyway
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When I got to work Monday morning and read the saga after it had unfolded, yeah, I was a little annoyed with the guy. So I decided to do the wrong thing:
Sir, your first email came at 8:18pm on Friday night. I have a wife and I have responsibilities at home and I am not at work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. If the reason you're no longer interested is that I don't work on weekends, please try to be a little more patient and understanding. I will gladly put the price on a Buy-It-Now for you. Do with that what you will.
Thanks,
Jason.
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I did put a Buy It Now option on the auction, but, holding him to the same standard by which he held me, I took it off after a couple hours with no response from Bob. But miraculously, at 3:24 pm on Monday, he responded!
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its 1:28 Calif time. Will be leaving at ten minutes ti 2 and be back at 430pm.
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I considered telling him that I was "nolonger interested", but I figured, heck, it's a sale. I reposted the Buy It Now option, and sure enough, he bought it! Congratulations, Jason.
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