EDIT: Mods, realized I put this in the wrong area. Please move to feedback subforum
Disclaimer: this is my personal (and because of this, only) experience with this user. I understand some others may have done business with him and might have had a different experience, nonetheless, this is my account and I am writing this to provide info for future buyers to use at their discretion
Before this starts, Allow me to explain the situation. Like a lot of you guys have experienced, I was facing smog issues. My cat was done and I was unable to renew my registration due to no smog. It was sitting on expired tags . I knew several shops willing to fake the smog but as some may know, that's a pricey (and illegal) option, not to mention the fact that it's a repetitive cost. So I went on r3v hoping to try and sort it out legally first. I went ahead and posted a WTB ad for a cat and was contacted by Josh1254 who told me he had a cat available.
From the get go, things hit a rough patch. After sorting out the details, I arranged a meet time.
So I made the trip down and once I got into the city, I attempted to contact him for an address or meet up spot. However, despite sending texts and attempting to call several times I received no responses and ended up just going home after waiting for an hour:
The text seen above stating "I'm not home anymore" was sent about 3 hours after my initial attempt to request an address and well after I had already left. Also while we're on that message, please take note of "Any exhaust shop can install that cat for you"
He later claimed that he never received any of my messages. Which was weird since I had called as well but fine, shit happens, we've all had weird phone behavior before. We arranged another meet up time and it went through without a hitch this time. While we were doing the transaction, he again restated that any muffler shop would be able to weld the cat on for me. He went on to state that should I run into any issues to just shoot him a message and if it came to it, he was willing to do a refund. Based on this information, I decided to go ahead and pull the trigger on the purchase. Now came the fun part.
I started calling and visiting muffler shops in my area. At each one, I was turned down due to it being illegal to weld a used cat onto a car and it carrying a hefty fine that the shops weren't willing to risk. I am well aware that this type of a job has to be done at the smaller shops as the big ones are almost guaranteed to reject anything questionable. Yet I still had no luck despite visiting about 7 or 8 different ones. So I contacted Josh1254 again to let him know my situation and asking if he had any shops he could point me in the direction of. This proved to be somewhat of a challenge since I had to contact him multiple times over several days to get a response (take note of the date stamps), through r3v and text:
Got a new job and busy, I can understand, but to take days to respond at all? But fine. I went ahead and called the shop he mentioned but again was turned down. I ended up needing to go to that city a few days later so I stopped by in person to ask thinking maybe it'd be different but was told the same thing. While in the area, I visited 2 other shops both with the same results.
During this time, my car had acquired 2 tickets in a week due to my tags being expired. At this point I shot him the text seen first in the image below. After no response in two days, I went ahead and got the fake smog on my car done. THis was due to not wanting to waste anymore time looking for a shop or risk getting another ticket while waiting, I decided to just fake the smog. I contacted him once again asking if he could still do the refund as I was having no luck.
I took into account and tried to be respectful of what he had said about work so I tried not to spam him with messages. Again take note of the date stamps. The first two messages are the ones in question. With no response through text, I tried shooting him a message on r3v asking if he had received my texts. No response from there either so I called. No answer.
That lead me to send the final message in the above image. To which he responded as such:
Three things rubbed me the wrong way with this message because all 3 were based on assumptions.
1. his first and last messages regarding finding a fake smog and how if I could find a smog I can find someone to weld. From the beginning I already had this option available, it was not like I had been at a loss for what to do. But I'll always try the correct method if possible before resorting to cheating the system
2. "I told you any shop can weld it on for you, yes because that's what exhaust shops do" So... you had told me that based on your assumption?
Remember that I had made my purchase based on the info he gave me because why would I distrust someone from the get go. Maybe that was my mistake? The point is, contrary to what I was told, every shop I contacted or visited turned me down. That is a fact.
Now I will say, I am not doubting for an instant that there are shops that will do this because I know there are for sure. But I was having no luck and I was out of time.
3. The entire last half of his message assumes I had made minimal to no effort attempting to make things work.
I had requested a refund but at this point, I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen. I'm not calling Josh1254 a scammer. But, to me, after the events, that last message and the fact that it was so difficult to get in touch with him through out the whole deal, he does not honor his word. Based on what I had been told, I did fully expect a refund.
Is it a huge deal? Well I'll say this straight up, the total amount of money involved in this transaction was minimal. Double digits only. The only reason I blurred the amount in the image above is because what prices he sets on his items is his business and I'm not gonna put that out in public. But i did not post this because of the amount of money. It's the principle of the matter. I have done business with many of you on r3v several times, both buying and selling parts. I am not new to transactions here at all and before now, have never had an issue until now.
Disclaimer: this is my personal (and because of this, only) experience with this user. I understand some others may have done business with him and might have had a different experience, nonetheless, this is my account and I am writing this to provide info for future buyers to use at their discretion
Before this starts, Allow me to explain the situation. Like a lot of you guys have experienced, I was facing smog issues. My cat was done and I was unable to renew my registration due to no smog. It was sitting on expired tags . I knew several shops willing to fake the smog but as some may know, that's a pricey (and illegal) option, not to mention the fact that it's a repetitive cost. So I went on r3v hoping to try and sort it out legally first. I went ahead and posted a WTB ad for a cat and was contacted by Josh1254 who told me he had a cat available.
From the get go, things hit a rough patch. After sorting out the details, I arranged a meet time.
So I made the trip down and once I got into the city, I attempted to contact him for an address or meet up spot. However, despite sending texts and attempting to call several times I received no responses and ended up just going home after waiting for an hour:
The text seen above stating "I'm not home anymore" was sent about 3 hours after my initial attempt to request an address and well after I had already left. Also while we're on that message, please take note of "Any exhaust shop can install that cat for you"
He later claimed that he never received any of my messages. Which was weird since I had called as well but fine, shit happens, we've all had weird phone behavior before. We arranged another meet up time and it went through without a hitch this time. While we were doing the transaction, he again restated that any muffler shop would be able to weld the cat on for me. He went on to state that should I run into any issues to just shoot him a message and if it came to it, he was willing to do a refund. Based on this information, I decided to go ahead and pull the trigger on the purchase. Now came the fun part.
I started calling and visiting muffler shops in my area. At each one, I was turned down due to it being illegal to weld a used cat onto a car and it carrying a hefty fine that the shops weren't willing to risk. I am well aware that this type of a job has to be done at the smaller shops as the big ones are almost guaranteed to reject anything questionable. Yet I still had no luck despite visiting about 7 or 8 different ones. So I contacted Josh1254 again to let him know my situation and asking if he had any shops he could point me in the direction of. This proved to be somewhat of a challenge since I had to contact him multiple times over several days to get a response (take note of the date stamps), through r3v and text:
Got a new job and busy, I can understand, but to take days to respond at all? But fine. I went ahead and called the shop he mentioned but again was turned down. I ended up needing to go to that city a few days later so I stopped by in person to ask thinking maybe it'd be different but was told the same thing. While in the area, I visited 2 other shops both with the same results.
During this time, my car had acquired 2 tickets in a week due to my tags being expired. At this point I shot him the text seen first in the image below. After no response in two days, I went ahead and got the fake smog on my car done. THis was due to not wanting to waste anymore time looking for a shop or risk getting another ticket while waiting, I decided to just fake the smog. I contacted him once again asking if he could still do the refund as I was having no luck.
I took into account and tried to be respectful of what he had said about work so I tried not to spam him with messages. Again take note of the date stamps. The first two messages are the ones in question. With no response through text, I tried shooting him a message on r3v asking if he had received my texts. No response from there either so I called. No answer.
That lead me to send the final message in the above image. To which he responded as such:
Three things rubbed me the wrong way with this message because all 3 were based on assumptions.
1. his first and last messages regarding finding a fake smog and how if I could find a smog I can find someone to weld. From the beginning I already had this option available, it was not like I had been at a loss for what to do. But I'll always try the correct method if possible before resorting to cheating the system
2. "I told you any shop can weld it on for you, yes because that's what exhaust shops do" So... you had told me that based on your assumption?
Remember that I had made my purchase based on the info he gave me because why would I distrust someone from the get go. Maybe that was my mistake? The point is, contrary to what I was told, every shop I contacted or visited turned me down. That is a fact.
Now I will say, I am not doubting for an instant that there are shops that will do this because I know there are for sure. But I was having no luck and I was out of time.
3. The entire last half of his message assumes I had made minimal to no effort attempting to make things work.
I had requested a refund but at this point, I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen. I'm not calling Josh1254 a scammer. But, to me, after the events, that last message and the fact that it was so difficult to get in touch with him through out the whole deal, he does not honor his word. Based on what I had been told, I did fully expect a refund.
Is it a huge deal? Well I'll say this straight up, the total amount of money involved in this transaction was minimal. Double digits only. The only reason I blurred the amount in the image above is because what prices he sets on his items is his business and I'm not gonna put that out in public. But i did not post this because of the amount of money. It's the principle of the matter. I have done business with many of you on r3v several times, both buying and selling parts. I am not new to transactions here at all and before now, have never had an issue until now.
Comment