SCAM ALERT: spendbitcoins.com / Jeremy West

[Inaba]

I'd like to let everyone know that Jeremy West at spendbitcoins.com is unable/unwilling to follow through with deals he makes for BTC.  I would advise everyone to steer clear of his business, as he has shown that when he later decides he does not like the agreement he has already made, he will back out of it.

Be very careful if you decide to engage in any business with him, as it's entirely possible he will keep your BTC and not provide the goods or services he's offered. While this has not happened to me (thankfully) and he backed out of the deal prior to me sending bitcoins, I would question any deal I made and whether or not he would honor it once the BTC were received.

For those that care, the problem originated in his auction for a time share.

Starting Bid: 1 BTC
Bid increment: Minimum 1 BTC
Auction closing date/time: 10 November 2011 at 20:00:00 UTC (Click to see date/time in your timezone.
Instructions: Post a bid below which is a minimum of 1 BTC higher than previous high bid.

You are bidding on 1 week (3 Dec-10 Dec 2011) in a fully self-contained 2 bedroom condo at the beautiful Hanalei Bay Resort on Kauai, the so-called garden island of Hawaii. We booked it using our timeshare early this year, but due to pregnancy complications will not be able to use it. Luckily, it is transferable, so you can take advantage of this opportunity to get a full week at a super low price! Bidding starts at 1 BTC and goes up in minimum 1 BTC increments by posting your bid below. Auction closes 10 November 2011 at 20:00:00 UTC (Find out when that is for you by clicking --> here).

excerpt from http://www.intervalworld.com/web/cs?a=1503&resortCode=HAN&parentResortCode=HAN:

Hanalei Bay Resort is situated above scenic Hanalei Bay with a view of the Na Pali Cliffs, Bali Hai Mountain, picturesque beaches, cascading waterfalls, and swaying palm trees. It is located within the world-famous Princeville Resort, which features 45 holes of championship golf. The resort offers eight tennis courts with an on-site pro shop, gift shop, and two swimming pools, one complete with multiple waterfalls and streams that cascade directly into the pool. Guests have direct access to the beach and Hanalei Bay.

The final bid price includes accommodation for the entire week at the resort for up to six people, and there is no reserve on this auction, so start bidding! See my feedback at http://feedback.spendbitcoins.com, http://bitcoinfeedback.spendbitcoins.com & http://ebay.spendbitcoins.com and bid with confidence.

Nowhere in his original auction did it state the bid could not be open ended... it did not, in fact, state anything about the format of the bids at all.  As anyone who's used any auction site in the world knows, if you bid X dollars on a product, your bid is the top bid above the bid below you, not the "max" amount of your bid.  As such, I bid "up to 66 BTC" on the auction.  The next highest bidder was 35 BTC.  Apparently, my bid of "up to 66 BTC" was unacceptably too low for the auction, and thus he "reopened" it for "an hour" to take more bids in a "silent auction." 

But in either case, even if Jeremy did not "intend" to have a "normal" auction like every auction site on the Internet, my high bid was well above the next top bidder of 35 BTC.  In either case, Jeremy did not like the result and thus decided to "reopen" the auction in a "silent auction" style so he could manipulate the price to be whatever he wanted.

Anyone that dishonest does not need your business.  Buyer beware.

[1713997251]

1713997251

[ineededausername]

This is what I saw: Someone else had a bid for 40 and you had a bid "up to 36."  Someone else won the auction.

[Inaba]

No, the 40 BTC was edited after the fact.  My post was also edited after the fact to reflect the high bid of 35 BTC by the previous bidder, not like the 40 BTC bid that was edited to be over the previous bid.  I never had a bid "up to 36 BTC."  The only bid I had was essentially "up to 66 BTC."

If we were to play that game, I could have edited my post to reflect 41 BTC

[kookiekrak]

pretty sure i saw that you were wiling to bid up to 100 btc, then you edited it down.

[Jeremy West spendbitcoins.com]

To whomever reads this thread:

Please read the auction thread at https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=50763.0 and judge for yourself.

Highest Regards,
Jeremy

[Inaba]

Yes, please read it.  Also please understand his "rules" were edited after the auction ended to include a clause of "bidnappers" (whatever that is) and was NOT part of the original auction, which I quoted above.

[SgtSpike]

SCAM ALERT?  Oh please.  I'd trust Jeremy more than 99.9% of the people here.  He's done more in the way of customer service than most other Bitcoin "companies" can even hope for.

You're just mad that you couldn't win the auction cheaply with your cheapskate bidding method that no one else agreed upon or was using.

[Inaba]

I trusted him to, until he showed that he does not honor his agreements. Glad I found out before I sent him BTC!

What would you call it, if not a scam.  Advertise an auction, but you don't like the outcome, so you change the rules after the fact and "reopen" the auction.  Sounds like the definition of a scam to me.

[SgtSpike]

I trusted him to, until he showed that he does not honor his agreements. Glad I found out before I sent him BTC!

What would you call it, if not a scam.  Advertise an auction, but you don't like the outcome, so you change the rules after the fact and "reopen" the auction.  Sounds like the definition of a scam to me.

He extended the auction because there was no unambiguous winner.

[Inaba]

But there was.  If a normal bid was not valid, my high bid of 66 BTC would stand.  That is a clear, unambiguous winner, since the next highest bid was 35 BTC (or 40 BTC if you take the edited bid).  I've been out of school for awhile now, but I think that 66 is still greater than 40 in new AND old math.

[ThomasV]

I had excellent business relations with Jeremy West. I believe that this guy is honest and dedicated to his customers.

Calling him a scammer because of a disagreement on an auction is, at the very least, excessive.

[Litt]

I can understand the frustration, but the same style of bidding on Ebay cannot work exactly the same way without effecting the closing price on a forum thread simply because of the fact that your highest bid amount is clearly visible for all the other bidders to view.

As much as you want to believe these bids to be exactly the same, they simply cannot be due to this. The reason is fairly obvious imo.

If the highest bid amount is visible to other bidders, everything changes. This forum is not able to accommodate bidding of this type as ebay or other auctions sites can. Closest thing to it would be to hold a silent auction accepting highest bids.

[Inaba]

So explain why it can't host an auction of such a type?  Does it affect the closing price?  Yes, I agree it does.  That does not automatically make it unfeasible.  In fact, if it has any effect at all, it is the opposite effect.  

I say my max bid is 66 BTC... all someone has to do is say 67 BTC and my previous bids are invalidated.  Knowing the maximum bid of someone is better for the seller than knowing the current bid, since you (the bidder) knows you have to bid X amount to win.  How is this any different than someone saying 66 BTC flat out?  All other bidders STILL have to bid more than that.  Knowing what you're up against as a bidder is always better than not knowing, so I fail to see how it's somehow unfair to anyone involved.

I'm calling him a scammer because he made a deal and then decided not to honor it.  It's not about the auction, it's about the principle.  Any deal I make with you or anyone else, even if I don't like the outcome, if I've made the deal, I will honor it.  I will not back out of it arbitrarily.  Worst case scenario I would contact you privately, explain the situation and try to come to a mutual accommodation.

Jeremy did not do this... he just decided to arbitrarily reopen it until he got the price he wanted without even contacting me in any way, shape or form.  I even tried to get him to do the right thing in his auction thread, but he essentially told me to take a hike (though not in so many words).  Hence, why we have this thread.

[REF]

Nowhere in his original auction did it state the bid could not be open ended... it did not, in fact, state anything about the format of the bids at all.  As anyone who's used any auction site in the world knows, if you bid X dollars on a product, your bid is the top bid above the bid below you, not the "max" amount of your bid.  As such, I bid "up to 66 BTC" on the auction. 

have you ever been to an auction house? when you put up your bid its how much you willing to pay. not the next highest bid + 1. Okay he should of stated that in the rules but he isnt a scammer stop complaining and stop being sour. you didnt lose anything except time.

[pbj sammich]

Read the whole thread, and agree that your bid off whatever + 1 isn't the same as an actual bid amount. Also the editing of bid posts should at any time in an auction thread like this should completely invalidate the bid. It certainly doesn't reflect at all well toward your scammer claim.

[Inaba]

have you ever been to an auction house? when you put up your bid its how much you willing to pay. not the next highest bid + 1. Okay he should of stated that in the rules but he isnt a scammer stop complaining and stop being sour. you didnt lose anything except time.

Yes, and at an auction house, I can make as many bids as I want in the time alotted.  The bids do not close at X time.  The bids keep going until there are no more bidders bidding.

This auction ended at X time, therefore it's nothing like an auction house auction.  It's like an eBay auction.  Have you ever been to eBay?  You bid your max bid and the top bid is X amount higher than the previous bid, not your max bid.  This auction, online, is far more like eBay than like an auction house.  

Read the whole thread, and agree that your bid off whatever + 1 isn't the same as an actual bid amount. Also the editing of bid posts should at any time in an auction thread like this should completely invalidate the bid. It certainly doesn't reflect at all well toward your scammer claim.

I would agree with you if it was and open ended bid.  It wasn't.  It was set to a maximum of 66 BTC.  So its' not whatever + 1. It's whatever + 1 so long as whatever is less than 66 BTC.  If someone wanted to outbid me, bid 66 BTC.

[SgtSpike]

have you ever been to an auction house? when you put up your bid its how much you willing to pay. not the next highest bid + 1. Okay he should of stated that in the rules but he isnt a scammer stop complaining and stop being sour. you didnt lose anything except time.

Yes, and at an auction house, I can make as many bids as I want in the time alotted.  The bids do not close at X time.  The bids keep going until there are no more bidders bidding.

This auction ended at X time, therefore it's nothing like an auction house auction.  It's like an eBay auction.  Have you ever been to eBay?  You bid your max bid and the top bid is X amount higher than the previous bid, not your max bid.  This auction, online, is far more like eBay than like an auction house.

Depends on the type of bidding.  There are plenty of write-in auctions that end at a specified time.  Jeremy never stated that this was like an eBay auction, nor did anyone but YOU bid like it WAS an eBay auction.  So what makes you think that eBay bidding rules apply?

Read the whole thread, and agree that your bid off whatever + 1 isn't the same as an actual bid amount. Also the editing of bid posts should at any time in an auction thread like this should completely invalidate the bid. It certainly doesn't reflect at all well toward your scammer claim.

I would agree with you if it was and open ended bid.  It wasn't.  It was set to a maximum of 66 BTC.  So its' not whatever + 1. It's whatever + 1 so long as whatever is less than 66 BTC.  If someone wanted to outbid me, bid 66 BTC.

The whole reason Jeremy extended the auction was because of the editing of bids, nothing more.  With the bids being edited, he had no way of verifying the story on either side, so he had to extend it and make it a PM auction to be fair.  What is your suggestion?  That he allow you to keep your edited-in bid of 36?  Or that antanes (or whatever his name was) would win at 40BTC?  Or that you should win at 66 BTC?  What if antanes edited his post again to say 67 BTC?  Where would it end?  How could either of you prove your bids?

[PatrickHarnett]

Maybe you should re-title as "sore loser" alert.  I read the other thread and wouldn't come out with a scammer label like that.  You tried some tricks, and it wasn't appreciated by someone trying to run something sensible.  You didn't just piss off "Jeremy West" but probably all the other bidders and people who read the thread.  However, I than you for the warning not to deal with <user>=Inaba.

Sometimes being a smart arse is just that, an arse. 

[Bitcoin Oz]

I have dealt with Jeremy many times and he has never even hinted at being a scammer. "Scamming" means you actually lost money to someone not you didnt get the deal you wanted and now you are stamping your foot. If this thread causes Jeremy to lose sales in fact it is YOU who are the scammer because you publically defamed an honest bitcoin business.

To be a crime there has to be a victim. The only victim I am seeing here is Jeremy and spendbitcoins by your baseless claims.

Now you need to make the victim whole Inaba.

[bitjet]

I've done a LOT of transactions totaling more than a $1500 with Jeremy and he has been super honest, helpful and a pleasure to deal with.

Sorry your experience was no so great, but I assure you Jeremy is good for his word if you feel wronged it would have to be cluster fuck of a situation.