When you buy and sell stuff all the time, you tend to run across a lot of shady people. You hear about it all the time; Craigslist scams, EBay sellers that purposely give vague descriptions to avoid actually telling you about something's condition, or buyers that are looking to screw you out of your stuff. You can get pretty jaded. It's not often that you hear stories about good people... it's even less often that you get to do something about it. Here's my quick story about one such person. Back in March, I decided that it'd be cool to rock some Lincoln Premiere caps on my 54, so I found a guy on Craigslist down in OH that had a set for sale. I called him, we spoke and he told me that he actually had 8 caps, and that for the price we agreed upon (which was very reasonable) he would send me the nicest 4 of the lot. I got the feeling that he didn't know/care they were a custom car fan's wet dream, more that they were just nice old caps for someone with a '56 Lincoln. I sent a check and he sent the caps....which is where things started to go awry. I received the box about 3 days later. When I opened it up however, I found a Cuisinart panini press, and some Easter candy along with some hand written notes from a 5 year old to her uncle, and some photos of said 5 year with her family. Cute, but far from '56 Lincoln hubcaps. So I called the seller, and told him about what I received, which was as surprising to him. Turns out that he had gone to one of those "we pack it and ship it" type places and they had actually sent me the wrong package. No worries, it's a mistake, everyone makes em. I called the place, and spoke with the manager, who was very accommodating, but explained that he had just hired some new people, and he assumed one of them screwed it up somehow. I sent the Easter package back to him, figuring whoever was expecting a sandwich press and some family memorabilia was as caught off guard as I was to get old hubcaps instead. The manager told me he would figure out the screw up and find my package, or at the very least, compensate me. I wasn't worried, and I told him that the caps meant more to me than the money that I paid for them because of their rarity, so if we could find them, that'd be best. A week went by. Nothing. Another week past. Still nothing. I kept calling, all the while keeping my mood light, since I've found that in most cases being polite will render better results than throwing threats and dropping F-bombs on the poor schmuck on the other end. Unfortunately, it was the same answer each time. The package seemed to have vanished. I still held off though on pulling the plug though... until about a month rolled by. In the mean time, I called the seller, just to keep him informed. I told him about the situation, and since by this point, I figured the caps were gone, asked what he would take for the other 4, (the ones that weren't quite as nice). He told me, "I feel terrible that this happened. You can just have them for the price of shipping". I argued, but he was insistent. I sent him a check for the shipping price since I knew how much it was from the first set, and he told me that he took them to the same place and they didn't charge him since they had lost the first set, so he tore up my check. This time the package did show up, and the caps are very nice. I was super excited to have them, though it was bittersweet knowing that if these were the "not so nice" ones, the ones that vanished were probably gorgeous. Regardless, to take his time to drop off the other set, and furthermore to refuse any money for such nice pieces was a huge good deed on the sellers part in my mind. That's not something you find much anymore. Finally, since I had the decent caps, and more time had past with no word from the place, I decided to finally pull the plug and have the guy at the shipping place put in the claim to recoup my original investment. When I called he was excited to hear from me. "Oh man, I'm glad you called! I couldn't find your number, are your caps chrome with stars in the middle of em? Well they showed up at our other location downtown and they've been sitting there. I just wanted to make sure those are yours. Consider em shipped today." Yesterday, they showed up.Wow...Beautiful pieces. So it's time to do my good deed. After almost 2 months, I got the parts that I paid for, but I also ended up with a second set of very decent caps free of charge. I'm putting them up for sale HERE and when all is said and done, I'm going to mail the guy who gave them to me a money order for whatever I get from them. I feel like that would be a good way to return the good karma, and it would just make me feel good to know that this story, even though it's on a very low level (I mean, let's face it, we're talkin hubcaps, not millions of dollars) could inspire a few people to believe, that despite all the shadiness you often hear about, there are still a few good, solid, stand up folks out there. Here's the "decent" caps (not too shabby right?) They are for sale in the classifieds: (15" 1956 Lincoln Premiere Caps) Got stories of the good people out there? Share em!
My buddy and I have a saying when something good happens or you do the right thing; "10 points to Gyrffindor". So, "10 POINTS FOR GRYFFINDOR".
Them "pack it and ship it " places charge 2 or 3 times the normal postage fee that you would pay with USPS. Guess where they bring it once it,s packed ? That,s right, USPS.
Gorgeous caps you have there. Are you selling them via the HAMB? Keeping your cool paid off and it seems like you met some helpful people. Kind of makes the day go alot better when folks do nice shit for others. 3 weeks ago i went to my local Machine Mart to grab some tools. I've been going there for years, get a good discount and the folks there are really helpful and friendly. After getting some really good advice and price on a new compressor i decided to call their head office and praise their staff. Spoke to their Area manager and passed on my thanks for some great customer service. He was over the moon, took my details and promised to follow it up. This week i get a call from the manager of the shop thanking me for notifying his Area manager. His area manager gave all of his staff £50 as a bonus and the folks there were well happy. 2 days ago i get a nice letter back and a £25 voucher to spend in store. Who'd have though all that from a simple phone call. Happy days
Sometimes the planets align and things just go right. It may take awhile but it does happen. Those are some nice caps by the way.
Thanks for posting your experience. It's nice to hear a good ending for once. Cool that you remember the good deed and pay it back. Nice job!
Yeah, I linked them in the story, but here's another link to the HAMB classified ad: 56 LINCOLN PREMIER HUBCAPS
Good on you Chris! Always knew your were a real stand-up guy and the original owner of the Premier caps is gonna be very pleasantly surprised. Glad everything worked out in the end, man!
Hey, thanks Todd. I just think it'd be cool to hook the dude up out of the blue... this time I'll make sure to send him a money order so he can't not cash it.
Great story!! It's always good to hear that the human condition is still intact!! And good for you to share the wealth back to him! ....but we wanna see yer '54 with your new hubcaps on it!!
Finally a great story with a happy ending. Just shows most people are good. It only takes that one to screw up how we judge everyone else. Dart you are better than okay! So is the man you dealt with!
SOLD! Thanks for the positive comments guys. I'm happy to be able to do this, it's people like this guy, afterall that keep my faith in mankind (or atleast they people in our hobby) alive.
I dont think the seller was an idiot, he just didnt wanna be bothered with packin them. I do think someone at the store had a serious brain fart moment... but that's here nor there at this point. I'm just happy they didnt jump right to filling out the claim form and cleaning their hands of it. I had a similar experience once where i bought some contol arms and the guy who packed it himself did an awful job, so one ended up blowing a hole in the box and dissapearing. I called fedex and they had NO interest in looking for it... like a giant steel control arm wouldn't be noticable if it was sliding around in the back of your delivery truck.
I recently had a wonderful transaction with a person from a Craigslist ad. I was looking at an OT car, however the Craiglist ad was very weird. He had videos up of him basically beating on the car (burns outs, etc) and had comments like "Yes, this car is VERY fast", etc etc etc. I sent him a basic e-mail asking about trades. Later that day I get a call from the guy and we end up talking cars for nearly an hour. He knocks off 1/3rd of the price and then asks if that is enough for me to drive up and take a look at the car. I get that much cash and head up the next day to take a look at it. End up chatting with the guy for a couple hours, going through photo albums of his past cars and current car that wasn't at his place. I find out that he had been dealing with a bunch of really bad craglist buyers and was just fed up with it to the point that he figured it would be sold to some teenager to wrap his dream car around a telephone pole. I paid him what he had thrown me as an offer and he was very happy because he knew the car was going to a good home and I was very happy because it was an amazing deal. Turns out he had a bill to pay and I paid him the amount of the bill plus $100 to drown his sorrows, after we had left my wife commented that it felt like we were buying one of his kids. I went into the situation very skeptical but came out feeling like I had made a new friend.
Good stories, gentlemen. It's nice to hear something positive. With all the stories I hear about scammers and ripoff artists, most of the people I come across are honest decent people and many will go out of their way to help somebody out. I try to do the same. It pays to be cautious though. Even though there is only a small percentage of assholes, they are still out there. As the saying goes "Praise Allah and tether your camel".
There are lots of wonderful folks in the world. My wife spends all her time working for an animal rescue and I help out when I can. Some of those folks are so wonderful that it make you want to be even better. Good begets good. And from my read of this story all three involved are pretty special.
It's awesome to hear stories about the good people in the world. Everyone always talks about the negative. Keep us posted on his reaction when he receives the money.
The Jalopy Journal
