Zion, IL
I heard there was a thread posted about me on this website, so I figured since there was a public opinion being formed about me I might as well present my side so you would have all the facts. I sold a Twister pinball on Ebay. The winning bidder was Mlaka1….Mike Laka in Illinois. He is about an 1 ½ hours away from my location so I figured it would be a pick up. Here is his first correspondence with me:
“I won the auction and would like to pick up the machine on Friday. Please be sure that everything is working 100% as I will personally go through the entire machine and run through all of the system tests as well.”
I didn’t like the aggressive tone of the email but regardless, I explained that during the last part of the auction (since I had no requests to come view or test the pinball) it had been moved to cold storage with no power or heat. Since he couldn’t test the machine I offered to cancel the auction. Here is his response:
“Unfortunately, it's a legally binding contract.
I have a heated box truck that I can put the machine in and lock up and leave at your storage facility. The truck will go up to 90 degree's with heat and it has full power to run 10 machines simultaneously. I will go out to breakfast and then when I come back in an hour, we'll plug it in and go through it. If it isn't working 100%, I am confident you understand that we'll need to deduct the non working items from the price.”
Am I really going to leave my machine in some guy’s truck for an hour? Really? And bringing any game up from 20 degrees to room temperature in an hour is asking for trouble, let alone a game that is 20 years old. So I say no…and again I offer to cancel the auction. Nope, he was not willing to cancel the auction…so the correspondence goes on that again he’ll show up with a heated box truck and now he’ll send his “tech” guys down to test it. Then he tells me his is going to pay by PayPal so PayPal can guarantee the purchase. I told him Paypal payment would be immediately refunded. Here is my last correspondence directly from him:
“In the state of Indiana, this is a legally binding contract. I'm going to contact my attorney and see what legal rights I have because I want the machine for what I won the auction for. I'm also contacting ebay to see what they can do to assist. At this time, I can not allow the auction to be cancelled. "
I'll follow up once I have my attorney and/or ebay have returned with my legal rights to this matter.”
Wow..really? Your attorney? Now remember, prior to the end of this auction I had no contact from this buyer. No questions, no requests for additional pictures, no requests to come view and test…nothing. He then goes on ebay and LIES and marks the item as “payment sent” JUST so he can leave me bad feedback. In the negative feedback he FRAUDULENTLY states the machine is not working. For the record the game is working 100%. He had never seen the machine; there has been NO money that ever changed hands; I never misrepresented the item; and understood his frustration at not being able to test. Nope, not good enough for him. Any sellers out there, stay away from this guy! He will just cause you problems! We all know how nit-pickers can be. They bid a crazy amount on an auction only to come nit pick every aspect at pick-up to knock down the price and to make sure a real customer has no chance of getting it. I’ve had a few of these guys over 20 years of dealing with coin-op equipment. But the vast majority of my sales and purchases have been cordial and my many repeat customers have been satisfied.
