MidPenny
MidPenny
MidPenny is no longer a PennyBurners Verified Penny Auction.
Why has the Verification been revoked? The owner of MidPenny, Jonathan, has not been upholding the standards of what PennyBurners expects from its Verified owners. What happened? Well, it's sad, and a bit confusing...
On October 25, 2010, around 9:30 a.m. Jonathan messaged PennyBurners on Yahoo.
MidPenny Jonathan (10/25/2010 9:35:37 AM): that pennywarriors.com guy is very rude
MidPenny Jonathan (10/25/2010 9:36:15 AM): He is accusing me of having multiple accounts on his site and threatening to post my information to people about it. He knows I am a site owner.
PennyBurners (10/25/2010 9:36:51 AM): do tell...
MidPenny Jonathan (10/25/2010 9:37:01 AM): I only have one account
PennyBurners (10/25/2010 9:37:05 AM): isn't this sort of what happened with Coolguy?
PennyBurners (10/25/2010 9:37:09 AM): any chance its the script?
PennyBurners (10/25/2010 9:37:10 AM): ;)
I was referring to a misunderstanding, and possible script error that occurred and lead up to Coolguy451 being accused of this same exact thing. This was covered mostly in private, but came to a "head" publicly here: Midpenny Customer Service [RESOLVED]
When Jonathan and I finished chatting, I expected Jonathan to clear his name with Dan, another respected site owner, and life would go on for everyone. Then, around 1:00 p.m. a new post was created: Here's a new one
Dan, from PennyWarriors, posted about a user registering multiple accounts, receiving two times the free registration bids, and mimicking another user's bidding name. He went on to explain that they would have never noticed, but that the user in question called to request a refund for the account they never bought bids for. This lead Dan to research the issue and find the second account, which had a different IP, different email, but same name. Dan found a second user account, linked to Jonathan, which mimicked bidder's name (which violated PennyWarrior's terms and conditions [read here, last section]:
User Names and IP Addresses:
Each bidder may register only once using their postal address. Additionally, only one bidder registration per IP address is permitted.During the registration process, the user must choose a username. The username should be appropriate. It must not be offensive, deceptive or misleading, obscene or offend common decency, or infringe the intellectual property rights of third parties. If Penny Warriors becomes aware that a username is inappropriate, or has compromised any policies herein, Penny Warriors reserves the right to suspend or delete the bidder and can replace the username without prior notice.)
Seeing that the situation was not handled, PennyBurners fired off an email to PennyWarriors to check the damage, and try to reconcile the issue:
On Oct 25, 2010, Nicholas Boccio wrote:
Dan,
Was this Jonathan from MidPenny? What evidence do you have? I ask because calling customer support when doing something like that defies logic, especially considering he is a site owner.
Also, maybe it's nothing, but he had the same thing happen on his site when he was using PHP penny auction script. A VERY well respected and well known bidder appeard to have set up multiple accounts. This turned out to be an unexplainable software glitch, something penny auctions script are known for (random glitches). I am asking if there is any proof that this wasn't a glitch. If indeed he is guilty of this, I would have to remove his PennyBurners Verification status forewith.
Any information you can privately share on this matter would help to either correct the wrongful accusation of an innocent bidder, or close the door on a bidder trying to take advantage of the system.
I appreciate your time, and thank you in advance.
-With gratitude,
Nicholas Boccio
(832) 596-7014
Administrator, PennyBurners.com
“It has been my observation that most people get ahead during the time that others waste”-Henry Ford
Dan responded, quickly reiterating what was said in the thread, and shedding a few more details. I spoke with Jonathan more about this when he told me he wanted to post and respond to Dan's thread. I did not think that was a good idea, but he already did... Here is the post: http://pennyburners.com/community/showpost.php?p=7073&postcount=9
This is significant because it is deceptive. It is neither claiming that he is the unnamed bidder the original poster was talking about, nor is he claiming innocence. Simply posting to appear as if he is shocked like the other owners who posted above him.
I still wanted this situation to get resolved. Dan emailed me just as a Yahoo conversation between me and Jonathan was ending. He simply asked what the outcome was of "the situation." I replied:
From: Nicholas Boccio [mailto:admin@pennyburners.com]
Sent: Thursday, October 28, 2010 2:57 PM
To: 'Dan'
Subject: RE: Penny Auction Owner
Dan,That would be up to you, as it seems he violated your rules.As for him and his site on PennyBurners, he says that he changed his name to IwonttStop and did not register two times. I am not sure if there was a glitch in your software with him changing his username, or if he really did try to circumvent your system.If you get a chance, call me anytime. I have spoken to Jonathan about this, and would like to discuss this with you as well. My goal is to find the positive resolution of this situation, whatever that is.
-With gratitude,
Nicholas Boccio
(832) 596-7014
Administrator, PennyBurners.com
“It has been my observation that most people get ahead during the time that others waste”
-Henry Ford
Dan called within 2 minutes of this email being sent. His story matched what Jonathan had told me for the most part. However, Jonathan never went into detail about the accounts, which email he used, or even the names he registered with. Dan, obviously, had all of this information. He never told me Jonathan's email addresses, but explained that he used his "penny auction site" email, and a personal email. The question of a software glitch was somewhat ruled out, based on each account receiving registration bids, each account having the same name and contact information (minus email), and Jonathan calling to get a refund for one account, only for Dan to find out that it was another account for which the bids were purchased.
Having that information, I got back on Yahoo to finalize this with Jonathan (2 days later). He did not want to talk about it, and kept telling me to "Drop it." Jonathan got very emotional, which led up to him using expletives towards me, this site, and its Verification Process; the status of which, I was doing my best to help him keep... Jonathan claimed to not remember which email(s) he used to sign up, and could not remember the other bidding name he claims he switched his name from.
At this point Jonathan was pretty much on a free-fall to the ground in terms of how he handled these questions, and my want to keep him as a Verified site owner. A short time later is when he became extremely confrontational, and unprofessional.
The main reason the Verification is being revoked, is not whether or not Jonathan actually registered twice with PennyWarriors (as that situation was dealt with by PennyWarriors). It was the lack of professionalism, respect, and want-to-correct a situation or misunderstanding. Fires don't put themselves out, and we cannot naively think that he would handle a similar situation with a bidder any differently. That is something we must have confidence in, to uphold the standards of the PennyBurners Verification.
MidPenny is still a legitimate site, and has a good history of shipping out items, and working to correct site problems which are ever-present in this industry. MidPenny is now found in the "Unverified Site In Good Standing In The Community" section.
Despite what was said to PennyBurners, we still hope that Jonathan can continue to expand MidPenny and work towards its success.
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