{ANNOUNCEMENT} WBX Exchange Frozen

[dooglus]

That was mine, yes. Actually it is additional ~1900 AUD that Andre still owes me. Please find below the original mail from him. I can also forward the e-mail to dooglus (for the header or whatsoever) please give me a shout and I will do so, potentially also witht he complete discussion with Andre.

Couple of comments:

1) If he owes you an extra 1900 AUD alone, who knows how much extra he owes to all his other customers.  I was naively thinking that if the database showed a payment had been made, then the payment had been made.  Sounds like that's not the case.

2) Unless Andre steps up with a full list of liabilities, what's to stop anyone from claiming they are owed a similar amount?  I'm not at all saying your claims aren't honest, but the next guy's might not be.

Andre really needs to make the total level of liabilities be known, else there's no way to fairly distribute the remaining BTC.

[sonba]

1) If he owes you an extra 1900 AUD alone, who knows how much extra he owes to all his other customers.  I was naively thinking that if the database showed a payment had been made, then the payment had been made.  Sounds like that's not the case.

UNfortunately true. If Andre is not stepping up I only see the possibility to set a deadline until where people have to hand in claims. If no claims were handed in we would have to assume tehre is nothing else.

2) Unless Andre steps up with a full list of liabilities, what's to stop anyone from claiming they are owed a similar amount?  I'm not at all saying your claims aren't honest, but the next guy's might not be.

I thought about this one, as well. There is no easy way for me to proove this. I see two possibilities: 1) I can forward you the complete mail correspondence with Andre incl. headers
2) I can prove on my account that the money never arrived. I'm not sure whether the Database stored to which account a payment should have been gone. if it's the case, it is easy to prove. If not, I can only show, that all payments went always to the same account, except for those mentioned above.

[repentance]

How many customers need to be paid out Chris?  If it's substantially more than the number who've contacted you through this thread, then maybe there needs to be a thread on reddit or some other places so customers who don't frequent here have some idea of what's going on.

[Seal]

I suspect he has gone again.  I have not heard anything via my lawyers despite his asking for contact details (and my providing them), and I don't think he is interested in providing any answers to some quite reasonable questions, let alone meeting any of his obligations. 

That leaves me in an awkward position.

I have the remaining Bitcoin assets of the exchange, but neither the authority nor the necessary information to distribute them to their rightful owners.

i wouldn't rush it. you don't want to be in a situation where you've distributed funds and then find out 3 months later that it was done incorrectly.

Thank you payb.tc, that is a very sensible comment.

In other liquidations, there can be a liquidator appointed, and that can be from the business or from the creditors.  A file of creditor claims would be made, and paid on.
For now, I'm comfortable with Chris just holding onto things.  If he is agreeable, we could provide evidence of claims over the next three months (say to 1 August) and if nothing else happens before then, he would distribute on that basis. 

I would even be comfortable contributing some coins to him for his efforts/troubles.
(does the database scrape you have include client contact details?)

I'm also comfortable with Chris managing the resolve of this. I've also offered a donation for his continued efforts in the resolve of this. Much less can be said for Andre's efforts in both managing this situation to resolution and providing clear updates.

[dooglus]

UNfortunately true. If Andre is not stepping up I only see the possibility to set a deadline until where people have to hand in claims. If no claims were handed in we would have to assume tehre is nothing else.

The problem with this is that it's quite possible there are customers who don't know about this thread.  I have no way of communicating with them.  I don't have contact details for most WBX customers.

I thought about this one, as well. There is no easy way for me to proove this. I see two possibilities: 1) I can forward you the complete mail correspondence with Andre incl. headers
2) I can prove on my account that the money never arrived. I'm not sure whether the Database stored to which account a payment should have been gone. if it's the case, it is easy to prove. If not, I can only show, that all payments went always to the same account, except for those mentioned above.

I do have all the withdrawal request details, so that could work.

[dooglus]

How many customers need to be paid out Chris?  If it's substantially more than the number who've contacted you through this thread, then maybe there needs to be a thread on reddit or some other places so customers who don't frequent here have some idea of what's going on.

85 accounts have more than 0.1 BTC or 0.5 AUD
65 accounts have more than 1 BTC or 5 AUD.
50 accounts have more than 10 BTC or 50 AUD.
13 accounts have more than 100 BTC or 500 AUD.

I've not counted the participants in this thread, but would guess it's around 15 or 20 at most.

It's a shame that Andre has somehow lost control of his website.  That would be the perfect place to announce what's going on.

[PatrickHarnett]

How many customers need to be paid out Chris?  If it's substantially more than the number who've contacted you through this thread, then maybe there needs to be a thread on reddit or some other places so customers who don't frequent here have some idea of what's going on.

85 accounts have more than 0.1 BTC or 0.5 AUD
65 accounts have more than 1 BTC or 5 AUD.
50 accounts have more than 10 BTC or 50 AUD.
13 accounts have more than 100 BTC or 500 AUD.

I've not counted the participants in this thread, but would guess it's around 15 or 20 at most.

It's a shame that Andre has somehow lost control of his website.  That would be the perfect place to announce what's going on.

I know when I started trading WBX it was a pretty small group, but it is only 85 that's still pretty small.  Also, the total below 10BTC/AUD50 is 35 accounts and would be a pretty small proportion of the total funds to deal with.  (One of the businesses I worked with last year we dealt to all the small accounts first, simply to make the more serious accounts easier to deal with without the noise of very small overdue ones.  It was an efficiency thing.)

[repentance]

It's a real shame Andre didn't handle this better from the outset.  Given the relatively small total amount involved, it might have been possible to put together a rescue package which ensured users had most of their funds returned and Andre was able to walk away from WBX with no further legal liability.

[Bigpiggy01]

It's a real shame Andre didn't handle this better from the outset.  Given the relatively small total amount involved, it might have been possible to put together a rescue package which ensured users had most of their funds returned and Andre was able to walk away from WBX with no further legal liability.

Andre was offered that option but chose not to respond to it.

[repentance]

It's a real shame Andre didn't handle this better from the outset.  Given the relatively small total amount involved, it might have been possible to put together a rescue package which ensured users had most of their funds returned and Andre was able to walk away from WBX with no further legal liability.

Andre was offered that option but chose not to respond to it.

I suspected that might have been the case.  Good to have it confirmed, though.

[Seal]

It's a real shame Andre didn't handle this better from the outset.  Given the relatively small total amount involved, it might have been possible to put together a rescue package which ensured users had most of their funds returned and Andre was able to walk away from WBX with no further legal liability.

Andre was offered that option but chose not to respond to it.

I suspected that might have been the case.  Good to have it confirmed, though.

I believe a number of people offered to help offer assistance or even take over the exchange. I know that for a fact as I was one of them.

[dooglus]

I received a PM from a WBX user:

Hi Chris, I just wanted to contact you and let you know where I stand with wbx. I am owed $180 from a cash deposit that never even showed up on my wbx account. This was deposited on the 24/02/12 annoyingly after the site ceased trading.
You're a great man for sticking around. I wouldn't of blamed anyone for washing their hands of the btc and all this carry on so thanks.

I hadn't thought of these kinds of liabilities.  So not only to we have BTC and AUD balances on the site, we also have withdrawals that were never really paid out, and now deposits which were never credited to the WBX accounts.

I've no idea how it's possible to get an idea of the total liabilities when I don't have any handle on the total amount of unpaid withdrawals or uncredited deposits.

Andre, you really need to step up and provide this information at the very least.

[repentance]

Chris, it might be worth you making contact with ITSA for advice on how to proceed.  Explain to them that you have control over the only known assets of an insolvent sole trader although you were not involved in operating the business itself, that adequate business records for establishing the amounts owed do not exist and that you do not feel comfortable making any disbursements without appropriate authorisation.  Make sure you explain that you have no reliable means of contacting those who may be owed money.

They have a toll-free number which some overseas callers can use.

http://www.itsa.gov.au/dir228/itsaweb.nsf/docindex/Contacts-%3EContact%20us#overseas

You can also make an email enquiry.

info@itsa.gov.au

It's possible that they may not be able to assist you, but even a "can't help" from them establishes that you tried to seek appropriate guidance on how to proceed.

[payb.tc]

even a "can't help" from them

get this "can't help" in writing.

[repentance]

even a "can't help" from them

get this "can't help" in writing.

Yep.  While I don't think Andre would have a hope in hell of shifting legal liability to Chris if refunds were made in a manner not consistent with legal requirements, I'd still like to see Chris as protected as possible regarding the disbursement process without him having to shell out for legal advice.

[sonba]

even a "can't help" from them

get this "can't help" in writing.

Yep.  While I don't think Andre would have a hope in hell of shifting legal liability to Chris if refunds were made in a manner not consistent with legal requirements, I'd still like to see Chris as protected as possible regarding the disbursement process without him having to shell out for legal advice.

yeah, completely agree. If I ever get some money back, I'll definitely donate a fair share of it to Chris for his efforts. I still feel somehow troubled by the amount of work/issues/trouble he now has, only because he programmed for a (seemingly) guy who seems to have no interest whatsoever to treat his customers fair.
Especially taken into account that some people (e.g. Seal) offered to take over the exchange, others offered legal help (e.g. myself) but not a single answer to those offers...

[rjk]

You guys can talk about doing something all you want, and point fingers and scream and yell too, but I predict that next year at this time the same exact shit will still be happening, and Andre will still be coming back every few months to post an insincere update. Just like he has been doing recently, just posting often enough to make people think he cares.

[Raoul Duke]

I'll ask again: why doesn't Andre have a scammer tag under his name?

[rjk]

I'll ask again: why doesn't Andre have a scammer tag under his name?

Apparently, those are only for repeat offenders or those that may be likely to do the same again. At least according to the administration here, from what I understand. I guess that goes to show why quite a large number of scammers don't get tagged.

[bulanula]

I'll ask again: why doesn't Andre have a scammer tag under his name?

Apparently, those are only for repeat offenders or those that may be likely to do the same again. At least according to the administration here, from what I understand. I guess that goes to show why quite a large number of scammers don't get tagged.

Excellent. So if I vanish for a month do I also get the tag removed automatically like a boss

Loving the hypocrisy on this here forum mates ...