Bitcoin Forum

So I booked a transaction three and a half weeks ago for 288 BTC at $350.  I send a 10% deposit to lock in the rate at around $1.2 Canadian.  I mail the money the next day and then wait and wait and wait for over three weeks.  Then yesterday I find out that my deposit has been refunded and the Mr. Madhatter is "unable" (more likely unwilling) to honor the locked-in order because he decided that the prices were "too volatile" currently for him to honor his own word.

Now I have no idea if/when I will ever get my $350 refunded to me.  Furthermore, I made this order on behalf of a friend of mine whom I was trying to convince of the merits of Bitcoin.  He gave me the $350 to buy for him and I confirmed to my friend that the order was locked in for 288 BTC and that I would take care of securing his newly bought coin on his behalf.  Now, where am I supposed to obtain these 288 BTC for my friend?  I'll have to pay $2500 out of pocket to do good on my own word because Madhatter was too greedy to honor his!  

Nowhere did Madhatter indicate that a locked-in order could be canceled.  According to his own website, the BTC were supposed to be already available in his possession and "Reserved" to the person who booked the order.  The whole point of leaving a 10% deposit was to guarantee that the order could not be canceled.  If I had known there was a possibility that my order might be canceled then I would never have booked it with him in the first place.  I would have found a much more expedient channel to obtain the BTC.  I was relying in good faith on the terms he specified on his website and on his high esteem within the Bitcoin community.

What he chose to do is outright theft as far as I see it.  If the price had dropped considerably in the last three weeks then he would not have refunded my deposit as is clearly stated on his website.  I bought the coins on the terms that he specified.  It's not my fault if he was (in retrospect) overly generous in the terms that he offered on his website.  This gives him no right to defraud his customers because of his own lack of foresight.

If he wants to save his face and/or ever do business with me or the other people whom he has defrauded, then I suggest he make good on his orders.  Someone who has shown his willingness to unilaterally changes the terms of a contract that he agreed to and even himself came up with the terms thereof can never again be trusted for any kind of business dealings anytime in the future.  I'm not sure is Mr. Madhatter is aware of the magnitude of the mistake he has committed but I hope he will be smart enough to correct it in an expedient manner if he wants to maintain his excellent standing within the community.

Sorry to hear that.

Did you use pgp for your communications? The Madhatter has a very good reputation so I feel that something like this need some kind of proof, unless of course he's willing to give an explanation here.

<snip>unwarranted speculation removed.  original post still visible in quote here (http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=8258.msg124972#msg124972)</snip>

The Madhatter has similarly dishonoured two locked in trades of mine, with mailed payments unaccounted for (net loss to me in excess of 2000 USD all told).  At this time I would advise people not to send money to the Bitcoin4Cash service, at the very least until the situation can be thoroughly clarified.

I suggest you courteously invite the Madhatter to respond here. He doesn't systematically monitor the forum. As presented here, it doesn't look good. Surely he would have hedged his locked-in deals?

I have sent him an email letting him know about this thread and inviting him to respond here.  Regarding his risk model, I am also confused.  I repeatedly asked him to tell me anything about the types of risk his selling practices expose him to so that I could help him to mitigate them, but he declined to even discuss the topic.  My entire email exchange with him is, of course, pgp signed by his key.  But I won't post further here until he's had a chance to reply.

Hmph, well now that we can't trust this guy anymore, what options do Canadians have to buy/sell bitcoins for dollars?

You already made up your mind before hearing the other side of the story?

There are thousands of bitcoiners. If a few react quicker than others they will be balanced by those who do not act so quickly.

It's called freedom of mind. Fleembit has every right to feel uncomfortable and it is ridiculous to expect him to just sit there constipated and not ask for other options.

You have the right to call him out and bring balance (with a slight deviation from the nonexistent center).

But neither of you has the right to expect the other to change. Fleembit shows us that his survival instinct is intact, and when governments start opposing bitcoin I think Fleembit will react quickly and correctly. No offense, JohnDoe, but you're more likely to be part of the second wave of reaction. And that's ok, but don't discount the contribution of those who reacted before you, whether you agree with them or not.

Let me give you a counter example:

This last week has been a weird one with Anonymous. I spammed many channels that something was wrong because I had been told so by people I trusted.

You know who resisted the alarm most and left themselves open to being harrassed by a rogue Anon? The scientists and the ADHDs and yes we do have scientists among us.

So Fleembit should be appreciated for having a survival instinct which is what people who stand around accidents do not have.
You deserve credit for calling him out.

I had already dealt with Mr. Madhatter a few times before and was very satisfied with his service so I wasn't even worried at all about the slight delay this time around.  I took for granted that he would do good on his orders.  All the information I have from him is clearly posted on his website so don't take my word for it just see for yourself and make your own conclusions.  I felt that it was important to communicate the issue to the rest of the community as promptly as possibly and see what other members' opinions on the matter were.

https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/buy.php


At least Mr. Madhatter is honest in his dishonesty so I still feel like he has the opportunity to correct his mistake.  I can only assume he will at least return my initial payment since he did refund my 10% deposit already.  It's the fact that he is unwilling the fulfill the original agreement that leads me to no longer trust him. Imagine you had bought a lottery ticket and won the drawing but then the issuer says "well we can't pay you the prize so here's your $1 back".  Gee, thanks!  The original wording of his statement leads one to believe that the bitcoins purchased were available on-hand and reserved to the buyer.  Madhatter fails to give any explanation as to how he was was "unable" to fulfill the orders subsequently and leads one to believe he is simply "unwilling" to do so seeing as how it would be more profitable for him to cancel the orders.

I would suggest leaving some feedback for him here:
http://www.bitcoinfeedback.com/viewuser.php?id=66

That's from the "Semi-automated Bitcoin purchase" page, so perhaps it is supposed to say "...I am unable of offer locked in trades at this time...".

For those who paid the fee for the locked-in trade before the order process was changed, well of course there is an ethical duty for Bitcoin4cash to honor the locked-in price.

I await madhatter's response. I've had good dealings with him in the past.

This is why I redesigned my website as a market. Instead of trying to match buyers and sellers using my own money and running all these extra risks, I just hold on to the money and let the buyers and sellers sort things out. It's much more transparent and leaves everyone more satisfied in the long run. I hope you'll consider using my service if/when you get your issues resolved.

Seems like bitcoin2cash wins this round over bitcoin4cash . . .

I've used both bitcoin4cash and bitcoin2cash's services...sent my money, did some trades, and got my bitcoins.  I worked with bitcoin4cash six months ago and everything was still affordable with less risk.  Now that bitcoins are worth a lot, more is at stake and people's reputation are on the line.

I will most likely use bitcoin2cash's service again over bitcoin4cash only because my letter does not have to cross borders.  If you live in the U.S. your letter will reach its destination faster since bitcoin2cash is based in the U.S. and does not have to pass through customs.  I will also be mailing small increments of money so there is less risk.

bitcoin2cash's openid system is a little tricky and you have to make sure you remember your openid url exactly.  Otherwise you will not be able to login.

There is always a risk so be careful!

Yes, definitely. The best way is to bookmark your URL so you won't forget it easily.

You send money through the post  ???

Another shameless thread. Seems like kids playing with daddy's wallet.
Risk managing anyone ?
Exchangers not able to manage his risks well, must honour the trades from
own pocket, or ostracized themselves from this community until year 2050.

from the sounds of things and his lack of response, i'm sure he wasn't hedged in any way.  how could u be?  there aren't really any effective ways to do this in a market that's going straight up.  yes, these large sums of money will root out the unscrupulous.  Madhatter was somewhat truculent  with me as well although i was smart enough to pick this up early and not do any business with him.

You hedge your own position by buying the coins when you guarantee the price.

This.  Works the same for selling.  That way, you're not gambling with other people's money.

that takes tremendous discipline.  theres a natural tendency to try and wait for the price to come back under the price u just guaranteed.  its easy for a bull mkt to run away from you.

The price could just as well go up over the price you guaranteed which means you are ate a loss. There is no such thing as a natural tendency to gamble with other peoples money.

I've used the Madhatter for plenty of BTC buys - never a problem.

i hope ur kidding.  what do banksters do everyday?  gamble with OPM thru fractional reserve lending to infinity.

i'm willing to bet that it was a life or death decision for Madhatter.  the way the price was escalating at such a parabolic ramp, i'm sure investors were logically locking prices left and right making a killing off of Madhatter.  what is a fixed rate quote anyway?  its effectively a SHORT against btc.  after all, he's in it to make money; he was willing to fix a price thinking he could buy it cheaper later after the fix (this is the short part) and make money doing so.  the parabolic ramp isn't good for everybody; it kills short sellers.

Just because .001% of people do a certain thing because they have a promise from other thieves to move losses elsewhere doesn't mean there is a natural tendency to do it.

So he went short and lost money, that means he pays now. A price drop isn't good for everyone either, people who are long get killed.

BUT, he did promise the buyers that he would sell at a certain price, so he should have done whatever he needed to do to make that happen, even if it meant a loss to him.

it is important to take away from these events a lesson that trust is contextual and that the past doesn't predict the future, particularly where individual people are involved.

FWIW, I just completed a small transaction with the madhatter about 2 days ago without fixing the rate, and it went great; he even gave me an exchange rate significantly more favorable than mtgox.  Perhaps it's only those locking in an exchange rate just prior to the price going 10x that need to be concerned. 

It sounds as if Madhatter was presented with a difficult choice---go broke honoring his word, or destroy his hard-earned reputation here---and decided on the latter. I'm sure it was a difficult choice for him, and I won't venture to tell him what he should have done. But, having sold his integrity, he shouldn't be shielded from the consequences just because the choice was hard.

Assuming these allegations are true, I won't condemn Madhatter; I simply won't do any business with him.

Those are not the only two options. There's also the possibility to "fess up" to the community that he promised what he couldn't deliver, be transparent about the situation, and work with the community to resolve the problem as far as is possible.

Madhatter had an outstanding reputation here, and he needs to come clean with the community to have any chance of rebuilding his reputation.

I had given the whole concept of openID little thought until I got a "Login Fail" error when I tried to login to bitcoin2cash.  After a slightly tedious education I succeeded. It's a little creepy to me, though.

I still think anyone who uses OpenID login should have these buttons on their site, it makes it so much easier and less confusing. http://code.google.com/p/openid-selector/

Freemoney already kind of made my point but just that the banksters do something does not mean it's a natural tendency. I don't believe there is a natural tendency to commit fraud. Responsible people don't do that, fraudsters do.

I did one cash-in-the-mail transaction with him, it went thru eventually, but it took 4 weeks to complete, luckily there was no wild price fluctuation during this period. I was nervous at the time however, after all mails from US to Canada usually don't take that long.

Just wondering, did anybody else have same issue?

I agree--a lot of this commentary is premature until Madhatter has a chance to respond.  My intent in posting was not to hand out judge, jury, and executioner roles to the forums; but rather to underscore that this is a serious issue that needs to be addressed properly in order for faith in Bitcoin4cash to be restored.  I have a lot of empathy for people who have accidentally gotten themselves into tough situations, but that empathy can only be attained by the practice of complete transparency in the matter.

I'm in California and I did a locked in rate transaction with bitcoin4cash at $1.44. It took about 2 weeks for bitcoin4cash to receive my cash and I received all of my coins at $6+.

Are you saying he gave you the higher rate even though you locked way low at $1.44? If so, that would be heroic of him.

I like those buttons, but in my case my open ID url appears to be my blogspot address, which I didn't know and since it's not one of the choices I'd still be stuck. How am I to know that google owns blogger? Don't they own everything that MS doesn't?

I don't think he was necessarily shorting or betting against bitcoin.
Just that with normal fluctuation some fixed rate sales would make him a loss, and others would make him a gain, so they would even out.
This will not work when the prices are only going in one direction.

He says on his site now that he is unable to honor them.
If he refunds your money I don't see a problem.
Retails stores take orders for things they end up not being able to provide all the time, and they just do a refund.

I think some people are just pissed that they wont be getting $2000 worth of BTC for $300.

judging from what people are saying, though, his strategy wasn't functionally market-neutral, because he would not allow himself to lose money if the price rose. it's like he gave himself a bailout.

refunding money isn't sufficient in transactions that hedge risk, like (basically) all financial transactions. contract lawyers and economists have the notion of 'expectation value', upon which the efficiency of a contract rests. you don't have efficient contracts if they can be unrolled so that they never took place. instead, you just have hope, and hope is less efficient than contract.

He honored the contract to give me the fixed amount of bitcoins I purchased at the locked in rate, so yes.

He did say he doesn't visit this forum very often, hopeful someone can drop him a line so he can provide some explanation.

No, he's saying he got the low rate that he agreed to. Nothing heroic about something keeping promises.

Absolutely, and rightly so since that is exactly what he agreed to deliver. He could just as well have been handing them worthless or 1 penny bitcoins by the time the money came in. No one made him promise to honor the rate at the time of sale, but he did.

well, that just proves my point; he lost 6/1.44 or 417% on that one tx.  multiply those kinda losses x potentially dozens if not hundreds of lock ins and he's out of business.

he knows this thread exists believe me.

Just adding my bit of weight to the discussion: I am in the market, and am waiting to see how this all comes out before I decide to whom I will send my money.

Only if he did not purchase a similar amount of coins at the time of the lock-in (or even previously when the rate was lower, or generate them, etc.); or if he was already relying on being able to sell those coins in the event of a rise (in which case why call them "locked in" or "reserved"?).  This type of risk management is critical to running an exchange business at all.

Oh boy.. where do I begin...

Basically this person tried to scam me so I refused his business. I have the right to refuse business don't I? I mean, everyone does. Try starting a fist fight at your local bar and see how willing they are to serve you afterward.

He booked a locked in trade and mailed the cash "when he felt like it". Better described as "when he was sure the rate would go up". He mailed a letter from the same country and his post mark and order date were almost 1.5 months apart. I'm sorry, but I can't be expected to hold rates forever. I simply can't do that.

I reversed his deposit and mailed his cash back to him. Not once did he email me about it. He decided to wait until I revised my site (a week later) to post here. Tsk tsk.

Avoid doing business with this guy. I know I will.

This is another "fun" case... allow me to explain:

This person claimed he mailed me letters for locked in trades from months ago. But alas, no such letters ever arrived. I'm not going to accuse him of lying, but I will say that he has a history of not mailing in a timely fashion.

He has, in the past, booked trades and never mailed anything for several months only to email me promising to send the cash promptly. Eventually he makes good on his word, but it is always extremely late.

The last time he pulled this shit the rate hadn't moved much so I just honored an *very* old rate. This time I didn't honor it (it was 2 months overdue!!!), and he threw a fit.

He contacted me only after the price skyrocketed to offer to replace the missing (?) cash as long as I honored the rate from 2 months ago.

The booking was already 2 months old so I told him "no". The trades were expired. (My system automatically expires locked in trades after 60 days. You can mail a letter from anywhere on the planet to my location in 2 months. It's very lax. Yes, I will add this to my FAQ - before you all ask.)

Anyway.. despite my firm answer he didn't listen and mailed me letters for these expired trades and expected me to honor the old rate. I returned the mail to him promptly, as I told him I would.

Oh, and yes the changes to Bitcoin4Cash's website are a coincidence. No, I'm not broke. No, I'm not shutting down. No, I'm not scamming.

These 2 people are yelling because they tried to scam me and I caught them. I promptly returned their cash and deposits - would a scammer do that??

So you are accusing eMansipater of lying?

He specifically said that he was not.

So you've already reached your conclusion?
To me the matter is still clear as mud...I'd be interested to see what's in their email communications that eMansipater said he is "inclined to publish"

When I bought from Madhatter, months ago, he made it clear that the deal was contingent on payment being postmarked by a day or two after we had talked.

Thank you, Madhatter, for responding. I'm inclined to trust you on this. At the same time, I have to wonder: what's the deal with eMansipator?

I'd ask to see the email, but I'm not sure what it would prove. Which brings me to an important moral: DIGITALLY SIGN YOUR CORRESPONDENCE, KIDS!

This is a tough one...eMansipater, a bitcoin.org global moderator, vs the MadHatter.  I don't know who is right on this one...

I figured this would be what eventually came up, or something like it. I didn't believe the OP right off the bat, and I wouldn't believe that he was the villain just on the word of one person - however, a reputation is more than the word of one person and Madhatter seems to have quite a good one.

Is there any way that evidence can be presented here as to whether the OP got his money back, and especially if the postage dates match Madhatter's side of the story. (Maybe the OP said he got his money back and I just missed it.)

You could use Ubitex (link in sig)

I don't know who is telling the truth here, but i believe the Madhatter, because his great reputation in the community is long-standing and at the top tier, imho.

He has done a great deal to promote Bitcoin, and has given all of us valuable information and advice many times, which is recorded in this forum...

Whatever really happened in this deal, the Madhatter and his Bitcoin4cash is certainly NOT a "fraud," imho...

This is the most offensive thing to me about this situation--not the monetary loss, but the fact that the Madhatter has first implicitly and then explicitly accused me of trying to defraud him.  Some of the claims in the above post appear improperly researched, and others are outright false.  With your permission, Madhatter, I will post our entire (digitally signed) email exchange here, to compliment the complete information I have available to me in other forms.

If I was trying to scam the Madhatter I would have to be the most foolish criminal in the world, and I think it's pretty clear from my participation in the community here that I am neither foolish nor a criminal.  He runs an anonymous service, so only an idiot would attach both his real-world and (well-established) online identity to the trades in question during the precise period the Madhatter claims I was trying to knowingly scam him.  Yet this is exactly what I did when seeking to honour my own obligations at worse rates to me than the market of the day, and I will provide ample evidence to prove it.  The recent surge appears to be the only reason my trades aren't being honoured.


Continuing:
You should all understand that the underlying context for the situation here is persistent and rampant problems in the Canada Post postal system.  My sister-in-law, for example, recently had a package going from my city to the same province as the Madhatter which was lost for several months before turning up.  Some useful references:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/story/2010/11/23/mb-letter-carriers-sorting-dispute-winnipeg.html (http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/story/2010/11/23/mb-letter-carriers-sorting-dispute-winnipeg.html)  (I live in Winnipeg, the "testbed" for Canada Post's new system they are developing)
http://savemoneyinwinnipeg.blog.ca/2011/02/22/problems-with-the-mail-10660686/ (http://savemoneyinwinnipeg.blog.ca/2011/02/22/problems-with-the-mail-10660686/)
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/story/2010/11/15/mb-canada-post-complaints-mail-neville-winnipeg.html (http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/story/2010/11/15/mb-canada-post-complaints-mail-neville-winnipeg.html)
http://www.leaderpost.com/mail+moves+slowly/4681185/story.html (http://www.leaderpost.com/mail+moves+slowly/4681185/story.html)
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/canada-posts-little-secret-121374374.html (http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/canada-posts-little-secret-121374374.html)
http://winnipeg.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20110413/wpg_strike_vote_110413/20110413/?hub=WinnipegHome (http://winnipeg.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20110413/wpg_strike_vote_110413/20110413/?hub=WinnipegHome)
http://postandparcel.info/39044/news/canadian-postal-union-talks-pick-up-pace-under-strike-threat/ (http://postandparcel.info/39044/news/canadian-postal-union-talks-pick-up-pace-under-strike-threat/)
etc.

I did not mail you letters "for locked in trades from months ago."  I mailed them on time months ago, and have been in regular communication with you since then wondering why they are taking so long and asking you whether I should consider them lost or stolen.  You have repeatedly assured me there was no problem, and never once mentioned that you planned to cancel the trades.  Had you requested it or warned me at all of the impending cancellations, I would have immediately re-sent additional money.

I do not have a history of untimely mailings.  The postal service has a history of untimely mailings.  Case in point--my first three trades:

1GHrztccFjTVnrzpk1QmR8XeVmniH2fEqP (http://blockexplorer.com/address/1GHrztccFjTVnrzpk1QmR8XeVmniH2fEqP)  transaction 536-927 booked on January 7 (http://blockexplorer.com/tx/99000e195e7c3d5746cf4166665572b3642deecfceea932569e0970aadabc0f2#o0)
14e9e8uWGpgZUwarcWDNGmpQbcFKbarrds (http://blockexplorer.com/address/14e9e8uWGpgZUwarcWDNGmpQbcFKbarrds)  transaction 205-192 booked on January 13 (http://blockexplorer.com/tx/21f006496f09d839a4c2eb02ca014ee1b6bb3d9889f11a59d06d42f7be6e35a5#o0)
1CV2TbssjiDwHwExvBn4CLR6QXJELdKCwv (http://blockexplorer.com/address/1CV2TbssjiDwHwExvBn4CLR6QXJELdKCwv)  transaction 399-754 booked on January 14 (mybitcoin to mybitcoin trade so no record in blockchain but I am happy to allow a trusted member to log into my mybitcoin account and verify it)

These trades were all mailed shortly after booking, yet as you can see they were processed in a clump on January 24th.  If the Madhatter had only bothered to look at the postmarks he could have verified for himself that Canada Post, and not me, was the cause of the delay.  Yet despite this the letters still arrived within a maximum period of 10 business days.  It was long enough to make me uncomfortable since they only had to travel two provinces over, but it's well within the time you later quoted me as typical for your trades.


This statement is patently false.  The only way I can think that you would make it is if you were conflating my expresspost for a separate trade with these two letters which are still missing; or if you have somehow confused me with someone else.  The latter is perhaps the only reason I can think of that you would turn on a trusted customer and community member so abruptly.  The following is the entire history of my trades with you, continuing from the above three:

On February 10th I booked my fourth trade with you (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=c19dd2e10ce5cfe5b27f96c644fa6766001a5c15) for 100 CAD, and sent the letter shortly thereafter.  Although I was prepared from my previous experience to expect a certain amount of delay, I didn't expect this to be a problem.  These coins are for people who plan to hold them for a long time.

On March 6th, still taking the previous trade on faith, I booked my fifth trade with you (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=0ac5e6b09c5423b002a63cf8b78169979e4c364a) for 100 CAD.  These are the two trades which are in dispute, and they are for a combined total of 214.45 btc, plus 21.44 btc in deposits that have been promised back but which have not yet been returned.  Neither letter has shown up so far, but since they were mailed at different times I find it exceedingly unlikely that both are lost or stolen.

By the time I booked additional trades on the weekend of March 18th-20th (50 CAD (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=b6a18f46ccd12b17fbb752ff14e7fb2417329b68), 500 CAD (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=1a3d3b9a4ebae32e8f275ac9c69be169fb7b0b87), and 100 CAD (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=b4a1fc6e2bc887104f129efb5c4572fbba2e6259)) I was getting worried that I still had not had either the February 10th or March 6th trades processed.  Therefore I emailed you wondering if you had had problems with delayed mail, to which you responded that although one letter had once taken 3 months I didn't need to worry.  I also asked if you would accept a registered mailing for the new trades (the website said not to send these).  You said this would be okay in your email of March 24th, which I read a couple of days later.  Going on your description of what constituted normal timing for your trades, I waited a couple more days to offset the cost of the expresspost by including another trade on April 4th (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=512d14e79ea7bb581359b89781a0d8d28bb13a1c) (20 CAD) and then mailing right away.  At the time of mailing, everything except the 20 CAD had been done at worse rates for me than the current market rate, as can be verified by examining that period in bitcoin charts (http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/mtgoxUSD#rg2zczsg2011-03-26zeg2011-04-07zvztgSzm1g10zm2g25).  But since I am in BitCoin for the long term I didn't mind, and also took away from the experience that even if my two missing letters took a long time to arrive they would still be honoured.  Nothing was mentioned about anything being cancelled after a certain amount of time.

This delay in mailing of approximately one week is the longest I have ever delayed in mailing a trade, and since I sent it by expresspost the trades still arrived within 10 business days of when you authorised me to send them by that method.  The quoted statement is false.  It should also be noted that when I inquired about the two missing letters I identified myself as eMansipater and signed my real name to the email, which no scammer would do if they were trying to defraud you via those trades.  All my trades have also included my email address and return address.  But most significantly, as I have already drawn your attention to in an email, the two trades in question were at a disadvantage to me when I began inquiring after them (http://twitter.com/#%21/bitcoineconomy/status/49968827668246528), and remained so for nearly a month afterward (http://twitter.com/#%21/bitcoineconomy/status/57911058685366273).  I am clearly not a scammer.  Your accusation that I was somehow trying to defraud you is both baseless and extremely onerous to me.


Continuing:
On April 30th, with exchange rates now rising, I logged into the tracking option and was surprised to see that my February 10th (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=c19dd2e10ce5cfe5b27f96c644fa6766001a5c15) trade was marked "cancelled."  Since neither the website nor any of the Madhatter's emails had ever warned of cancellation, I was extremely concerned and emailed him immediately, telling him if there was any problem I could simply re-send the cash or even transfer Mt. Gox dollars.  On May 3rd, he emailed me back and told me for the first time ever that he had configured his system to cancel trades at 60 days and that he did not plan to honour the trades past then despite still telling me it was "probably too soon" to write off the missing letters.  The trade from March 6th had still not reached 60 days and after another email exchange patiently attempting to find a "win-win solution", I quickly mailed an expresspost (http://www.canadapost.ca/cpotools/apps/track/personal/findByTrackNumber?trackingNumber=LT640634590CA&LOCALE=en) with additional (repeat) payment for the not-yet-expired trade (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=0ac5e6b09c5423b002a63cf8b78169979e4c364a), and also included repeat money for the February 10th trade since I expected the situation would be resolved amicably upon a review of our correspondence and my trading history, which he seemed initially confused about.  I even offered that the repeated money could be held as collateral (or the bitcoins escrowed with clearcoin) until the original two letters show up.  But he became obstinate, cancelled the second trade, and refused delivery of my expresspost despite having the tracking information in hand that showed it had been mailed before the second cancellation.  He implicitly accused me of attempted fraud with phrases like "How convenient. I wasn't born yesterday."  His treatment of me despite my forbearance and patient seeking of win-win solutions has gotten me somewhat riled up about this--which should be significant for anyone who has read my posts here.

I intended to wait until receiving the refused expresspost back before posting here on the forums, but when "Bobby" posted I felt it was important to mention my own experience at the same time.  I emailed the Madhatter to let him know about this thread, and have today received back the refused expresspost (An indication of how slow Canada Post continues to be).  Although he has my information he has not yet returned my deposits, which he promised to do when he began insisting the trades had to be cancelled.  I refuse to email him a request to do so since that would be a tacit acceptance of the cancellations which were never mentioned either on the website nor in our extensive correspondence (which included an anecdote by him of mail taking 3 months to arrive).

I have gone to great lengths to resolve this amicably, but the current situation is unacceptable.  Without warning of the cancellations I had no way to mitigate the risk they exposed me to, and the cancellation of the second trade after I had already sent a repeat payment for it is totally inappropriate.  But most of all, the accusation that I have attempted to defraud him is libellous and abhorrent to me.  I expect better from someone who so many people have trusted, and most of all I expect an in-depth explanation for how on earth he has himself been exposed to any risk by my proposed solutions.  What will he do when the two delayed letters arrive?  I already held all the risk in this relationship from the beginning, and now he has accused me of trying to scam him.  This has to be thoroughly and carefully resolved in complete transparency.

Vlad has put it very concisely.  If the time-limited nature of the trade had been made clear from the beginning, it would be equivalent to a call option.  I did not intend, however, to contract for a call option.  I considered the trade made and the coins reserved, with my deposit as the Madhatter's hedge against non-payment.  Despite this I have been very open to re-sending payment if warned and given time to, escrowing, etc. since I understand neither of us can control delays in the mail.  All I want to know is how any of these options expose the Madhatter to risk, rather than simply affording him an opportunity to profit off the increased value of already reserved bitcoins.  I also demand that he change his website to declare that trades will expire, and when.  When I made the trades all it said was:

eMansipator, I believe you are within your moral rights to post this exchange with or without permission, since you were party to it and no promise of secrecy was made. In fact I hope you do. This case is impossible to judge on relative reputation.

This is an example of why I don't do trades through the mail.

It's entirely possible that neither side is fradulent, but that a failure of the government managed postal system is to blame.

Possible.

This doesn't make any sense.

I insinuated that you were possibly trying to scam me via email due to the fact that this is the 2nd time you've mailed to me late and expected me to honor an old rate. The first time could have been the mail system, but twice? It's definitely suspicious, to say the least.


We all know that you are going to do it anyway.


What recent surge? I refused 2 pieces of mail in a year's time. The first one was yours - an expired trade. The 2nd one was an letter that was mailed late on purpose. (Bobby)


If you knew that your province was having mail troubles when you did your first batch of locked in trades, why did you proceed to do it again?


What about the other batch of ancient trades that you emailed me about and then sent them with expresspost?


I have a "boiler plate" response for emails regarding delayed mail. I get about 30 emails a day and time constraints don't permit me to investigate each case in depth. I usually have to send those boiler plate emails to save time.

Anyway, there is a huge difference between 1-3 weeks and 2 months. Especially when the letter is mailed from within the same country.


You are the only person who has ever used expresspost to mail me. The first expresspost you had sent me was for 3 (or 4?) late trades.


Boiler plate email. I send out gobs of those. People mail me from Europe all of the time for open rate trades. I've had a few letters in the past (2?) that took a couple of months to arrive. More specifically, from Germany. I don't remember every single person I email. I send too many per day.


I told you I didn't want MTGOX credit. I also told you I would accept the recent expresspost at an open rate (by creating a new booking). You refused. I proceeded to tell you that the trade was cancelled and I was even willing to refund your deposit without any penalty. All of this fell upon deaf ears. You mailed me the cash anyway expecting me to just eat it. I RTS'd the expresspost as soon as it arrived and let you know via email. You never gave me a Bitcoin address to refund your deposit to, even when I asked for it.


Trade cancellation is automatic, btw. It happens at the 60 day mark. That piece of code has always been there.


The emails you were sending me reeked of childish behavior and general time-wasting. I had enough of arguing by that point. My system had already canceled the trade. I am under no obligation to wait around for a "replacement" letter. I refused your business and you proceeded to mail me cash anyway, despite my numerous protests. I have the right to refuse business to anyone. I don't have to take your money.


I returned it as I said I would from the beginning. Hardly "scamming".


You never did give me an address to send your deposit back to. I'm still waiting.


I explained this in email. I would return them as well. The trades are expired. Tell you what: if they arrive with a roughly-accurate postmark on them I'll publically state to everyone that you didn't try to scam me. Until that happens, I really don't believe you.


I'm not exposed to risk. I'm exposed to future losses. When I have to hold your coins for months and months while the price skyrockets I'm losing. I could be selling them to someone who actually sends me a letter in a timely fashion.

What am I do to? Hold rates forever? Try pulling this with a bullion dealer like Kitco for example. They'd nail your credit card with price difference within 30 days or less. 60 days is more than fair.

In summary: I don't hold locked in trades forever. I have the right to refuse business, especially from those who have an established history of jerking me around.

This thread has made me realize something new.  My employer has begun to block bitcoin trade sites, including bitcoin4cash.com.

This is why I prefer exchanges. There's no temptation on either side to cancel a trade before settlement or take their time with sending to see how the market moves. The trades are only executed when both the BTC and USD are ready to change hands. Otherwise, since either side has such a huge motive to lie, even if you are telling the truth, many people will still have doubts.

What are you talking about?  There have been no trades except for the ones detailed in my post, and everything there (except for the missing letters which are still m.i.a.) has arrived within 10 business days.

Email conversations have a reasonable expectation of privacy, and I will not be accused of violating someone's privacy except as a last resort.  If you prefer to do it differently, I am happy to have you publish the entire exchange yourself.  Stop playing these bantering games and let's just lay everything out.  I couldn't care less if either of our egos are bruised--let's just get this thing resolved to the satisfaction of the entire community here, and for goodness' sake double-check your records before getting all personal.  If this whole anonymous business thing is going to work, transparency and community response are going to have to take the place of courts and mediators in resolving disputes.  Too tired to respond more tonight, will reply to the whole thing after I can get some rest and clear out a growing backlog in my business.


p.s. edited the OP's thread title as I also feel "fraud" is too strong of a word and the discussion is largely focussing on my situation now.  If he has a problem with that he can edit it back.

I tend to agree.

Ive had a trade with madhatter before and everything went smoothly.

I'm talking about the other expresspost you had sent me before to cover late mail. You know what I'm talking about.


I don't expect any emails I send someone to remain private. I'm conducting business in public view. Do as you wish.


So you are planning on wasting even more of my time? So I'll have to login to the forum each day and argue the meaning of each sentence I previously wrote? No thanks. I really have better things to do with my time. I won't return to this thread.

Note: I made the 60-day time limit more clear on Bitcoin4Cash. I am also accepting locked in trades again and my Bitcoin inventory is being replenished.

Better things to do than defend your company/reputation?  If I were you, that would be rather high on my priority list...

Somewhat OT, but does Canada Post offer delivery confirmation or tracking options on mail?
I know the USPS lets you add it to First Class mail for just $0.18.  I now make it standard practice to put tracking on all my outgoing First Class pieces to help arbitrate non-receipt disputes like this.  Even then, I feel like the USPS delivers things with tracking in a more timely manner, as each mailpiece is being monitored through the system.
Perhaps MadHatter should encourage (or require) his customers to add tracking to their Bitcoin4Cash orders and provide that number to him, especially when sending cash through the mail.

Sorry it took me a while to reply. As I'm very busy, I only have a few minutes each day to visit the forum.  You must be mistaken about which transaction this is concerning because my trade was booked on April 22, 2011:  https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=bfc81c4efeb1779ed2b9c49699c700705387e1a0 and was marked canceled on May 13, 2011.  I first noticed on May 13 but only had time to make my post on the forum on May 14.  Sorry for the lack of private communications in trying to resolve this issue but since I don't have much time to access the Internet and since I felt that your statements made on your website were unambiguous in their intention, I felt compelled to warn the community as quickly as possible of the situation. 

I'm not sure where you get 1.5 months from since my transaction was already canceled by you after only three weeks of being booked.  It may have taken me a few days to get the payment mailed off although I did send it as soon as I could get the money together at my earliest convenience.  If it had been mentioned anywhere that there was a maximum delay to mail the letter then I would have respected that deadline but there was no such indication and I could only assume that I was allowed to mail the payment whenever was convenient for me.  Since I'm very busy operating several different businesses and since I was making this transaction on the behalf of a friend of mine who had to first give me the money to send to you it was not my highest priority time-wise and may have indeed been delayed by a few days but obviously not 1.5 months as claimed (since the transaction was booked less than one month ago at this time). I'm not sure how you can know what my intentions were and claim that I was attempting to scam you while admitting no responsibility in the matter when I was respecting all the terms specified on your website.  I had done business with you four times in the past and was very satisfied with the service every time (even though on a few occasions it took a several weeks between the time I mailed the payment and the trade was completed) so had no reason to be worried that there would be any problem this time around.  I think a 60-day time limit is reasonable however this time limit is still more than a month in the future so I'm not sure under what grounds my transaction is being canceled and I'm being accused of wrongdoing.  If you would consider reversing your decision and completing my transaction then I would be very appreciative, would retract any accusations I made against you and would certainly continue using your services many times in the future.

I have to say I don't think Madhatter had any wrongful intentions or had the intention to scam anyone (unlike he accuses me of doing) but rather made some important business mistakes by not properly anticipating his own risks, by making the terms of use of his service overly ambiguous and by choosing to resolve these mistakes in such an unprofessional manner.

You should grab yourself a VPS server.  Putty + Firefox portable = gold.  It's incredibly easy and bypasses all forms of internet "blockage."  Assuming your SSH tunnel is open.

The best they can see is there is bandwidth traffic through a specific port.

I bring it with me to every job now!

I agree that the accusation of "fraud" was too harsh.  The situation is more of a misunderstanding as I see it since there doesn't seem to be any malicious intent on the part of anyone involved.

It could prove a lot! I'd like to see the email correspondence. Let their words speak for themselves!

Sending cash in the mail has always sounded a little daft to me. At the very least shouldn't it be sent in a trackable way, like return receipt or something? Madhatter's site (and others) should recommend this, in my opinion.

My business is based on a niche. It's for people that want to buy/sell BTC with anonymity. Therefore, tracking a package defeats that purpose. If you want security, I would recommend that you use a wire transfer and buy/sell on Mt Gox.

It's fine to send cash in the mail as long as it's a small amount and something you can afford to lose. I did it once and probably won't do it again.

The issue in question is not whether or not Madhatter received the payment.  He says he received it and returned it because he was unable to honor the locked in orders.  I have not yet received the return payment however I know "return to sender" mails can be subject to substantial delays up to 5 weeks in my experience so I'm not worried about my payment being eventually returned.  On his website Madhatter recommends against registered/tracked mail because it will cause additional delays, etc (which is true).  Personally I've sent hundreds of cash payments through Canada Post and never has a single one been lost.  I used to buy precious coins and collectible Paper Money through the internet and the vast majority of these were shipped untracked without a single incident of mail theft or loss with some valued between $250-$500. The only package I ever had lost was both tracked and insured by Canadapost Xprespost and unfortunately for me was worth much more ($3000) than the maximum insured value ($1000).  If ever I have to send packages valued above $1000 I'll always use UPS/Fedex in the future as they have even much delivery rates and will insure the full value of shipments. I suspect that tracking or declaring a value to a CanadaPost package makes it more susceptible to theft as most letters go through unnoticed without anyone suspecting there may be cash hidden inside.

To clarify: if the exchange is digitally signed, it will prove a lot. If it isn't, it won't prove anything, since it could just as easily have been fabricated on the spot.

Since eMansipator said it is signed, I'm hopeful.

I had a really great first experience at Bitmarket.EU (https://bitmarket.eu/market/USD), where one wires to the seller, rather than the exchange.

IMHO, MtGox is great for professional traders, trading teams, dark-pool dwellers and other market manipulators. Other than that, i think it's time to stop recommending the MtGox monopoly to the average user.

It's one of the entities making the fairytale about "the completely decentralized" Bitcoin a complete and absolute myth...  :D

But wait, how does tracking some random letter compromise one's identity, or amount purchased?

Ubitex is an anonymous peer to peer exchange.

Alright, I've had the chance to look at this with fresh eyes and I think I can identify the place where the situation diverged.  The lightbulb statement for me was this line:

As you waded through your gobs of email I believe you confused the first half of my initial email, which asked about the two missing letters; with the second half which talked about three trades made immediately before emailing (weekend trades and email sent on Sunday).  To clarify I've inserted bolded comments below:


I apologise for the unwarranted speculation in my original post, which I have removed (although it exists for the record as quoted (http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=8258.msg124972#msg124972)).  If I believed this was the second time this had occurred, I would have been suspicious too.  My original post is a good example of the paranoia that can arise when you are worried someone is trying to scam you, so I get it.

To recap without wasting anyone's valuable time, the only two letters of mine that have been late are the same two I have been communicating about with you from the beginning:

booked Feb 10 (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=c19dd2e10ce5cfe5b27f96c644fa6766001a5c15)
booked March 6th (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=0ac5e6b09c5423b002a63cf8b78169979e4c364a)

while the expresspost I was asking permission to send on March 20 was for these three trades:

booked Friday March 18 (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=b6a18f46ccd12b17fbb752ff14e7fb2417329b68)
booked Sunday March 20 (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=1a3d3b9a4ebae32e8f275ac9c69be169fb7b0b87)
booked Sunday March 20 (https://www.bitcoin4cash.com/status.php?tcode=b4a1fc6e2bc887104f129efb5c4572fbba2e6259)

After you authorised the expresspost on March 24th the money was on your doorstep within 10 business days, as all my trades have been.

When our conversation (http://pastehtml.com/view/aui7tmtfe.html) about the missing trades abruptly decayed I was extremely confused, but if you were operating under the assumption that I had previously been late with other trades, it finally makes sense to me.  Hopefully we can get this all resolved now.

For those who didn't dig deep into the news links, Canada Post workers could be striking as early as May 30.

http://www.bclocalnews.com/sports/122543553.html

Wait, aren't the postal workers in Canada civil servants?  Civil servants in the US can't strike, union or not.  Which is how Regan got away with firing all of the air traffic controllers when they went on strike in the 1980's.

Just 'cuz it's against "the law" doesn't mean they won't do it.  There are "illegal" strikes here in Canada all the time.  Anyway the politician who would try to fire them all would probably get assassinated by the union bosses' mob friends, at least here in Keb'ec, land of corruption.

Postal strikes are perfectly legal here, however it works out.

Also want to update the status of the original posting.  I did receive Bitcoin4Cash's refund of my original payment for $350 as well as the 10% deposit of 28BTC.  However I think it was very immature and unprofessional of him to accuse me of attempting to scam him when he was the one who violated the terms of our contract.  If he had the guts to acknowledge and apologize for his mistake I might have forgiven him but I certainly won't ever do business again with someone who can't even own up to his own mistakes and instead blames his own customers, those who were let down after doing business with him on his terms in good faith that he would honor his contracts.  I can only feel sorry for this guy being such dishonorable loser.  When someone puts their trust in me I feel honored and wouldn't let them down no matter how many 100s of BTC or $$$ I might be able to gain by scamming them.  I apologized to my friend for not being able to obtain his BTC and insisted on paying him $2000 for the current market value of the BTC I was supposed to order for him.  Unfortunately my mistake in relying on Madhatter still caused my friend to distrust the Bitcoin community as a whole, the result of which I feel responsible for.

Even for the average user it makes sense to go to the place with the highest liquidity, because there you are likely to get the best exchange rate/ lowest spread.

I don't even think mtgox is the best exchange in terms of user experience, but somehow it managed to become the largest (perhaps because it was one of the first), and because it's the largest it attracts most people and becomes even larger.

Market forces will always push towards a small number of big exchanges dominating the market. There is little we can do to prevent this.

I just want to say that I sent my order to Madhatter and had no problems. Thanks!

Madhatter, you are making this seriously annoying!!  I'm not ranting--I'm just tired of this thing dragging out so long here.  I have bent over backwards here to find your mistake, and to make peace.  This is win-win, bro!  Don't make me put this in my signature  ;) .  Just bite the bullet and admit you got a little too busy with everything and missed a detail--I don't think anyone here cares about bruised egos.  Are you telling me that in three months neither of these letters have arrived?  Because they haven't ended up back here.  I have better things to do right now than explain to my bride-to-be why I still don't have the 214.45 bitcoins OR the missing-in-transit $200 OR even the 21.44 in bitcoin deposits you keep saying you'll return.  And don't give me that "I don't have an address to send them to" bit either, because my address is right there on those pages on your server that I've linked to several times now.  Seriously man [playful bulldog face].

The whole reason people who don't send money are scamming you is that the agreement is made at time of deposit.  You can't insert deadlines after the fact without warning, and me re-sending MIA cash is more than fair since I'm taking the hit.  You've got to be filthy wealth at this point--just bite the bullet and do the right thing before rising prices make it feel even harder.  I am not going away.

bump.

and I thought me waiting 24 hrs for 11 BTC was bad. SHEESH!!!

I guess at this point he could sell the btc he was going to give you and refund your money and profit at the same time.

There are a *lot* of ways this can be resolved to mutual benefit in such a bull market, and any of them that includes a retraction of the smirch on my character and a best-effort attempt to make good would earn back my respect.  Does anyone else want to send him a polite reminder email about this thread?  I have continued to send such notices, but I suspect he may be blocking my address.

I'm sorry for all the grief you receive, The Madhatter, for providing your service. It's the penalty you pay for being useful.

Now, you'll have a new crapload of complications with this Mt. Gox thing. I sure hope you don't get discouraged. You've been straight with me in the past, and I'd like to do more trades with you in the future!

silverman