Help! Cheat by Arkady, the CMON famous terrain maker

[Levi]

Dear fellows,

This is my first post since I registered here years ago. I am fraustrated by Arkady's cheat over the last two years. I paid him around $800 for a Helm's Deep terrain comission. He for the last two years ignored the project and tens of my emails with excuses of car accident or heart attack hostipalization. Hiwever, internet records shows he never stopped selling his works on CMON and Ebay, there are his works even now on the CMON frontpage.

Arkady is a good terrain maker, but my patient ran over to his cheat. I hope here friends can help me on this case. I can not bear a liar still posting and selling his stuff without any influence. I need your help!

PS: I have the paypal transaction records and emails in the past two years. Please help!

Yours sincerely
Levi:excruciating:

 

[Dragonsreach]

Technically;
Terms of service of this site section 4
4. If there is a dispute between participants on this site, CoolMiniOrNot is under no obligation to become involved. In the event that You have a dispute with one or more Users, You hereby release, CoolMiniOrNot, their officers, employees, agents and successors in rights from claims, demands and damages (actual and consequential) of every kind or nature, known or unknown, suspected and unsuspected, disclosed and undisclosed, arising out of or in any way related to such disputes and / or our service. If You are a California resident, You waive California Civil Code Section 1542, which says "A general release does not extend to claims which the creditor does not know or suspect to exist in his favor at the time of executing the release, which, if known by him must have materially affected his settlement with the debtor."


However this does not preclude any member of this site expressing their dismay.

 

[Levi]

Thanks for the technical reminds! I hope fellows here can help me to figer out a way for this tragedy.

 

[jamesmhebert]

Have you tried these?

Levi,

A couple of options. These are simply ideas that come to mind. If Arkady is "the real deal" it is possible a series of real-life circumstances are the reason for his silence. It does not excuse the silence, but it may explain it. Either way, I wish you luck in resolving the situation.

1
Did you pay via a credit card, or a service like PayPal? The card company or service may offer arbitration or follow-up on your behalf, if you have a good "paper trail" of mail or receipts and show your good faith efforts to contact the artist. If you bought through ebay, they may make an attempt on your behalf, even at this later date.

2
Arkady's account here indicates he/she is still logging in to the site. Have you tried both the CMON messaging and/or using the arkady.mini_studio@wp.pl email?

3
Arkady is also a member of the dakkadakka.com forum (https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/user/profile/89778.page), though the site did not indicate recent login activity. Have you tried contacting through dakkadakka's PM system also?

4
You might consider contacting the people on those boards who list Arkady as a "friend" (this is a feature of both the CMON and the dkaakdakka board) to see if they can put you in touch with him/her. I would NOT involve them in the story of your situation, ONLY let them know you are trying to contact Arkady and "the normal channels" are not working.

5
Do you know Arkady's real name, or were you in communication only through the board? If you had it, you could search Google. Something may offer you a contact method there.


Finally, if none of these work, it may a painful lesson and a bitter memory that things did not even out in this transaction. Obviously, it will reinforce your own resolve to ensure it does not happen again, and that you have full and valid contact information (and a means to recover your payment) the next time you commission an artist's work. All the same, I hope this works out for you.

Good luck!

 

[Levi]

Dear James,

Thank you so much for the kind and detailed suggestions, those are very, very helpful!

Honestly, I always believed Arkady's excuses about his one after another unfortunate excuses, even now I am still concerning his health condition as he told me so. But, this is not how things work, as I saw his business has been going but mine was ignored for two years. I learnt a lot from your suggestions!

After this thread was post here, I recieved an Email from Arkady's studio. The communication I post here in below. Basically, he said the shipment was sent out with a tracking number and I will recieve it around in Feburary. However, I checked the tracking number but the post service said there is no such order tracked in record. I then asked and he replied that due to the weight and size of the shippment, there will be no tracking service until it arrived to my country. To me its wierd because why there is a tracking number without tracking information, nevertheless, I believe him once again and wait, as he said, 30-45 days. I will come back again with the result, and I sincerely hope it will be a good result.

Anyway, I appreciate your kind suggestion again!

PS: the email communication after this thread was post:

From Arkady on 28 Jan:
Hi,
parcel is large and has a custom size, weight, and therefore could not be sent by air but by land - sea. There is no standard for monitoring and only at the end of the information packet arrived in China. The time to deliver it to 30 to 45 days.
Regards

From Me on 27 Jan:
What shipment do you use? If you are using Poland Post Service, there is no record on that tracking number you provided.

From Arkady on 25 Jan:
Hi. Package was sent with the number CP196781546PL. It should reach in February. Greetings Arcady Studio

From Me on 22 Jan:
I dont know whom is reading this email, what I ask is the good I paid for. I believed you tens of times on your health condition etc. But how do you think when I saw your ebay and cmon activities without any update to my stuff? I need you give me a final cut and we are done. I wont bother your master work again, OK? Thank you!

From Me on 21 Jan:
Let me know your final solution and close the case. Thank you! You are acting on CMON, selling items on Ebay, are you really playing my patience? I have showed enough understanding and kind to you, why you still ignoring the promise?

Levi,

A couple of options. These are simply ideas that come to mind. If Arkady is "the real deal" it is possible a series of real-life circumstances are the reason for his silence. It does not excuse the silence, but it may explain it. Either way, I wish you luck in resolving the situation.

1
Did you pay via a credit card, or a service like PayPal? The card company or service may offer arbitration or follow-up on your behalf, if you have a good "paper trail" of mail or receipts and show your good faith efforts to contact the artist. If you bought through ebay, they may make an attempt on your behalf, even at this later date.

2
Arkady's account here indicates he/she is still logging in to the site. Have you tried both the CMON messaging and/or using the arkady.mini_studio@wp.pl email?

3
Arkady is also a member of the dakkadakka.com forum (https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/user/profile/89778.page), though the site did not indicate recent login activity. Have you tried contacting through dakkadakka's PM system also?

4
You might consider contacting the people on those boards who list Arkady as a "friend" (this is a feature of both the CMON and the dkaakdakka board) to see if they can put you in touch with him/her. I would NOT involve them in the story of your situation, ONLY let them know you are trying to contact Arkady and "the normal channels" are not working.

5
Do you know Arkady's real name, or were you in communication only through the board? If you had it, you could search Google. Something may offer you a contact method there.


Finally, if none of these work, it may a painful lesson and a bitter memory that things did not even out in this transaction. Obviously, it will reinforce your own resolve to ensure it does not happen again, and that you have full and valid contact information (and a means to recover your payment) the next time you commission an artist's work. All the same, I hope this works out for you.

Good luck!

 

[Maenas]

Hello there, just hoping you get to arrange your deal properly.

On the tracking number issue, I got a similar "incidence" have you checked the company on which the parcel is starting the travel? (country of origin) or on the company that is going to receive it (country of destination)? Sometimes checking the tracking on both places gives you more info about the parcel. I once got a parcel that spent two week at the customs office of origin and two weeks more at the customs office of destination... almost the double the time invested for the parcel to go from one place to another.

That could happen if its specially heavy/big/small... Anyway hoping all this gets to a good end.

 

[anotherpainter]

I did not want to post on this because:
First: its very hard to impossible to pick sites on this kind of disputes on the internet because you mostly only hear one site of the story.
Im not saying its wrong what you say but i/we cant jump to an conclusion because of on internet forum post comment without replay from the accused.
Specially when is business reputation is on the line! Thats why i think that a forum is not the right place for conflict like that.


However: IF its true what you say:
I understand you did not see any other way after 2 years. I would not believe shit anymore.

[Edit]

I would pull all strings. Fill fraud complain on ebay and paypal and your creditcard. After 2 years the chances are slim but i would still try it.
He has to give paypal prove of shipment. So a bill from the shiping company to fight the charges.

If it fails you have to make a decision:
Sue him in his country. With all the emails and logs you have a good chance to win.
But you will have to pay lawyer and so on upfront.
And in the end it can be that he is just unable to pay you, your layer and the curt back.
And you are at the end of a line of a lot of people who have claims where there is nothing to get.
You could still go for it out of Principe...

OR

Drop it loose the money and gain an expierience.



What you should have done is:
After several months you should have pulled your money back via paypal!
I know a lot of people trust and wait in the hope it all turns out good.
But in Business if someone is unable to deliver or pay, that means you are not the only guy he is
in dept with. You want to be the first who gets his money out because the last ones will not get anything.

 

[gohkm]

AnotherPainter - terrain tends to be heavy. Shipping by air may be prohibitively expensive. It's the OP's call on shipping method, and insurance against loss or damage is always available.

 

[anotherpainter]

@gohkm Ok that makes sense, i edited this part.

 

[Levi]

Arkady's team replied me early Feb said they shipped it out and I will get it in 30 days. Its April now and there is still nothing! I then wrote him never gets replies..... I am so angry to see his ebay business is still running and his cmon presentation still on.

 

[bullfrog]

I don't understand his explanation regarding the tracking number and something just doesn't sound right. If sent by sea there might be a long time with no activity on the tracking whilst in transit. You should, however be able to be sent a tracking or consignment number from the moment the package enters the parcel service. One just isn't generated when it reaches your country. There has to be a traceable number from the start to finish. Otherwise how would the postal service in your country know it's really the same parcel? But then again I'm by no means a postal worker or service expert.

Recourse through eBay and your credit card issuer might be a very long shot due to the time elapsed but still worth a try.

It might be an expensive lesson for you but not all people are like this. To protect yourself in future maybe ask if you can pay half up front and the rest prior to shipping after you receive a photo of the completed works. I tend to buy something small from a new vendor and increase the value as our business relationship develops.