Hello, again.
If you're here, you probably followed the link from my post on Pkmncollectors. If you're mad at me, then I really don't blame you. I take responsibility for what happened. I was irresponsible. This isn't a sob story. I just want to explain to help people better understand what happened and why.
Before I went to Japan in late April, I had a really good reputation here as a seller. I applied for permission to do pickups in Japan at the Pokemon Center and was accepted. I could only get 10 slots, and 2 mods warned me that this was for my own safety, as they didn't want me to get overwhelmed. I respected their decision, but thought, "10 slots? How could I get overwhelmed with that?" Alas, they were right and I was wrong. I got so overwhelmed. I was used to shipping out lots of packages, and I thought that would be the most challenging thing. Unfortunately, it was not. Here are all of the factors that led to me not being able to ship out packages in a responsible and timely manner:
-I severely underestimated how much shipping would cost. I used the Japanese postal calculator to give everyone quotes for shipping. Apparently, I gave the calculator incorrect information, causing it to give me incorrect shipping quotes. I gave people quotes of $2-$3 for EMS shipping, which I soon learned was less than half of what I should have been charging. Entirely_cliched was kind enough to alert me to my mistake before I sent the packages out, so that I wouldn't lose money on a transaction where I was supposed to make money. I sent PMs to everyone involved, asking if they would prefer to get a refund or send the additional few dollars for shipping. As time went on, only a few people responded to the PMs. Some PMs seemed to have been "eaten". Some people responded several weeks after I sent the original PMs. This caused a severe delay in shipping.
-Finding shipping supplies in Japan is way more difficult than it is in the States. This one is pretty self explanatory. If I go into the store in the states, I can pick up some bread, milk, eggs, and boxes and bubble mailers of all different sizes. For a good price, too. In Japan, it is completely different. By chance, I happened upon an art supply store and discovered that they had a small amount of shipping supplies, but they were very expensive. And by "shipping supplies", I mean "bubble mailers only". I couldn't find a box to save my life. I should have done research about where to get supplies before coming to Japan, and I apologize to all of you who were affected because of this.
-My Japanese is poor and I have social anxiety. Also self-explanatory. My Japanese language skills are elementary at best. Communicating with people at the post office was a complete and total nightmare. No one understood what I was trying to say, even though I tried my best. I have social anxiety already, and knowing that if I went to the post office, my anxiety would flare up, I postponed going to the post office in order to avoid panic attacks.
-I have severe depression, and this combined with the facts that my boyfriend broke up with me and my grandmother passed away made being productive nearly impossible. I really don't want to go into detail with this one. Please just know that interpersonal relationships fell apart, my grandmother passed away, and the end result was me becoming very, very ill.
So, there you have it. I know this sounds like a long list of excuses, but it really isn't. It's an explanation of what happened. I know that everything that happened was completely my fault. To the people that were affected by this, please forgive me and know that I'm doing everything within my power to make this right again. I hope that the community will learn to trust me once again and can forgive me, because I do love the community dearly. I'm 100% committed to rebuilding a reputation within the community. If you have any questions about anything at all, please don't be shy! Leave a comment here or send me a PM and I'll answer as soon as I can.
Thanks,
torrid_phoenix
Before I went to Japan in late April, I had a really good reputation here as a seller. I applied for permission to do pickups in Japan at the Pokemon Center and was accepted. I could only get 10 slots, and 2 mods warned me that this was for my own safety, as they didn't want me to get overwhelmed. I respected their decision, but thought, "10 slots? How could I get overwhelmed with that?" Alas, they were right and I was wrong. I got so overwhelmed. I was used to shipping out lots of packages, and I thought that would be the most challenging thing. Unfortunately, it was not. Here are all of the factors that led to me not being able to ship out packages in a responsible and timely manner:
-I severely underestimated how much shipping would cost. I used the Japanese postal calculator to give everyone quotes for shipping. Apparently, I gave the calculator incorrect information, causing it to give me incorrect shipping quotes. I gave people quotes of $2-$3 for EMS shipping, which I soon learned was less than half of what I should have been charging. Entirely_cliched was kind enough to alert me to my mistake before I sent the packages out, so that I wouldn't lose money on a transaction where I was supposed to make money. I sent PMs to everyone involved, asking if they would prefer to get a refund or send the additional few dollars for shipping. As time went on, only a few people responded to the PMs. Some PMs seemed to have been "eaten". Some people responded several weeks after I sent the original PMs. This caused a severe delay in shipping.
-Finding shipping supplies in Japan is way more difficult than it is in the States. This one is pretty self explanatory. If I go into the store in the states, I can pick up some bread, milk, eggs, and boxes and bubble mailers of all different sizes. For a good price, too. In Japan, it is completely different. By chance, I happened upon an art supply store and discovered that they had a small amount of shipping supplies, but they were very expensive. And by "shipping supplies", I mean "bubble mailers only". I couldn't find a box to save my life. I should have done research about where to get supplies before coming to Japan, and I apologize to all of you who were affected because of this.
-My Japanese is poor and I have social anxiety. Also self-explanatory. My Japanese language skills are elementary at best. Communicating with people at the post office was a complete and total nightmare. No one understood what I was trying to say, even though I tried my best. I have social anxiety already, and knowing that if I went to the post office, my anxiety would flare up, I postponed going to the post office in order to avoid panic attacks.
-I have severe depression, and this combined with the facts that my boyfriend broke up with me and my grandmother passed away made being productive nearly impossible. I really don't want to go into detail with this one. Please just know that interpersonal relationships fell apart, my grandmother passed away, and the end result was me becoming very, very ill.
So, there you have it. I know this sounds like a long list of excuses, but it really isn't. It's an explanation of what happened. I know that everything that happened was completely my fault. To the people that were affected by this, please forgive me and know that I'm doing everything within my power to make this right again. I hope that the community will learn to trust me once again and can forgive me, because I do love the community dearly. I'm 100% committed to rebuilding a reputation within the community. If you have any questions about anything at all, please don't be shy! Leave a comment here or send me a PM and I'll answer as soon as I can.
Thanks,
torrid_phoenix