Help with a questionable buyer

[genalind]

Hi, everyone. I am fairly new here and have two gigs set up at the moment: one for proofreading and editing and another for product reviews. I just received an order placed on my proofreading gig (24 hour turnaround) for a review (5 day turnaround). There are two problems with this:

1. I would not have time to complete this because of the timeframes.
   
2. (This is the main issue I have) The buyer ordered with an attachment that
   
   basically said "go to Amazon and give me a five-star review on the product
   
   below. Then send me the proof."
   
   
   
   I will not do a product review unless I can actually test the product. My review gig clearly outlines my expectations.
   
   Had he seen that, or had he sent be a request before ordering, he would have known I would not accept this.
   
   
   
   Now, I have sent a message back with three options for him. I advised I could leave an unverified rating stating that “product looks good”. This is not my first choice, and it would not help him in the least - but at least I wouldn’t be lying-it does look nice. Or he could mutually cancel and either order correctly with the pertinent information (free product code, etc.) or look elsewhere. Now I am just watching the clock tick away with no response to this.
   
   
   
   Additionally, he has a small line at the bottom of his request that if I would like to do future reviews with him, I could just send him my email address. HA! Like THAT would happen.
   
   
   
   I don’t want trouble with Fiverr as I am just starting out. I don’t want the order to time out and count negatively against me. I won’t go against TOS. I won’t complete the order as is. I don’t know if I should report him for any or all of his request. I am just not certain what other steps I should be taking at this time.
   

[sincere18]

Two things.



First on your proofreading gig, you should remove the extra you have about delivering something within 12 hours. If you cannot do 1 day turnaround that is fine, but do not have it in your gig then.



Second, you should right away do a mutual cancellation of the Review gig. This buyer is up to no good.



I didn’t read your review gig description, but I hope it says you do not do Amazon reviews, because you do know it is against Amazon policy to have paid reviews of any kind, right? If someone wants a product review for their own website or something, fine, but you need to be careful about doing reviews for third party sites where it is against the Terms of Use of that site.



So I would send a polite note offering a mututal cancellation, say something like I am sorry as you have read in my gig I am not able to do this kind of review. Then hope that he just accepts.



Then you might consider reporting him to Fiverr that he was giving you their email to try ang go around the system but you clearly refused that. However, since the gig you may be offering may have issues, I am not sure if you want to call yourself out to Fiverr. So hopefully the buyer just agrees to the cancellation.

[genalind]

Thank you for responding so quickly!



I can do the 1 day turnaround (or even less) for proofreading and editing. But this order was not for that. So should I put it way out, just in case someone orders something that is totally different, as in this case?



I will revamp my Review gig. It does mention Amazon. I was initially concerned that it was against the TOS, but thought I might have been misunderstanding because some of the top sellers in that category review for Amazon. I will take care of that, however.



I will offer the mutual cancellation and hope for the best.



Thank you again for your suggestions. They are appreciated!

[sincere18]

Reply to @genalind: Ok, so for the proofreading order, did this buyer put in an order through your proofreading gig for something else? If so, you need to simply let them know that this order is outside of the current gig description and so you are not able to offer that, but you can do it within X time frame or please accept my mututal cancellation.



If it was for the review gig and it clearly states your turnaround time, then you simply let the buyer know that for this gig and the nature of work that is required you do not offer one day turnaround like other gigs, so please accept my mutual cancellation offer.



As for the top rated Amazone review sellers, I’m not sure what to say about that. Amazon has even gone so far as even to infer “Fiverr” in their TOS, where they say what is not allowed…Paid reviews from $5 sites, or something along those lines. I found that specific page outlining it before on Amazon.

[genalind]

Reply to @sincere18:

Yes, this buyer did put in an order through the proofreading gig for something else. So I will take your suggestion and ask them to mutually cancel. If they never respond to me, do I just let it go, or is there something else I would want to do to protect my standing?



Sorry for all of the questions. I really do just want to do the right thing from the beginning. For myself and to be prepared for buyers in the future who just might make a mistake.



I have also removed a reference to Amazon (only had one, so I am a little more on top of things than what I thought) in my Review gig, and will be updating it even more shortly.



Thank you once again for all of your assistance!

[sincere18]

Reply to @genalind: yes, taking on an order for something other than what hte gig actually states can end up being a bigger problem. Because they may give you negative feedback and you have nothing to refer back to, in order to say, this is what is included in my gig that you bought. Custom quotes that clearly spell out what is included will help with that. Especially if you ever have to take anything to customer support.



I think if you offer a mutual cancellation after a certain amount of time, you can maybe cancel it, but I am not sure. I would search their help/support about mutual cancellations and learn the procedure.



As for doing the right thing, read some of the tips in this forum for buyers, there are plenty of tips that steady sellers have given. A few long threads you can read through that are floating about should give some good reference material.

[fonthaunt]

Reply to @sincere18: In case this helps with how these gigs still exist - Fiverr has been removing Amazon gigs when they get a complaint directly from Amazon, but otherwise those gigs are generally ignored, especially when they are bringing in lots of money for Fiverr. There are definitely TRS that offer them. One thing I found out is that Amazon can track what page the person was on prior to clicking a product link. If it comes directly from Fiverr, they are much more likely to report it to Fiverr. Savvy buyers and some sellers have figured this out and they will use a direct search on Amazon, not a hyperlink.



There are also loopholes. I needed the money badly for a time and what I offered was in a grey area. I had a gig that offered a paid feedback service with a free review. I charged $5 to read an Amazon e-book and write x words of honest feedback/critique sent to the author privately. If the author requested it, I would write an honest review (no guaranteed positives or set number of stars) and post it on Amazon, but the review was free. I have no problem saying that it was an a shady edge since some would say the review wasn’t really free. However, it helped the author, it got me more orders, and since I only did honest reviews I didn’t find it unethical. The gig is paused now and I don’t have time currently to read entire books for that price, but since I read a lot anyway I would offer it again if I felt ready to do so. Just though I would mention some of the ways people get around it without getting their gigs removed.

[fonthaunt]

Reply to @genalind: Cancellations are tricky when the buyer won’t respond. I hate those the most since the seller is in a bit of a tough position on them. If you offer a mutual cancellation, best case scenario is that the buyer will accept it within a day at you are done with it and there is no harm to you.



The problem I have had is that if they don’t accept the cancel, to my understanding the cancel will go through anyway with a couple of days but is not considered mutual. Those cancels are “forced” and can damage your account if I understand what others have said. So far, I’ve been lucky and my buyers have always either worked it out with me for an alternative service or accepted the cancel.



My best suggestion is to submit a support ticket to Customer Support as well and explain the issue very simply and briefly. Let Fiverr know that the buyer ordered something that does not match the gig. Also, let Fiverr know that the buyer tried to get you to work outside of Fiverr. Ask CS for their advice on what to do if the buyer doesn’t accept the mutual cancellation. At least that way if it turns into a non-mutual cancellation, Fiverr has a record that you attempted to do it correctly and it was the buyer that was in the wrong.



If any other veteran sellers can offer advice that would be great! I know quite a bit about Fiverr but I haven’t been here a full year yet. @sincere18 has also given you some good thoughts but is not a seller (as far as I know) so this thread could really use a chime-in from a moderator or someone with lots of selling experience! 🙂