this is a cautionary tale of how to (and not to) sell a phone. i go through phones like underwear, and i can tell you that covering your own butt is the easiest way to avoid these unfortunate situations.
first off: NEVER have someone to your home. you never know who you're dealing with. secondly, make sure that the person fully checks out the phone, and is completely satisfied with what they are buying BEFORE they leave. unfortunately, a lot of people get buyer's remorse, and expect you to just refund the money to them, despite you selling an item that was properly described.
when selling a phone, i always make sure to overstate any possible problems, even if they don't really exist. i feel it's better to be as up front as possible. that way the persons are usually surprised at how much better the phone actually is.
i just sold an unlocked phone to a guy a few weeks ago, and was with him for ten minutes as he went over the phone. i plainly asked him to make sure if he had any problems now, since this was a no refund sale. he said all was good, and paid me. well, five hours later i get a text from him saying the phone doesn't work, and he wants his money back. it was an unlocked g2, and he said it wasn't getting any data with his tmobile plan.
i reminded him that he had looked at it for a good while, and assured me he had no problems with it. at this point, there was nothing i could do. apparently he had checked out the phone with the wifi on, and hadn't tried the data plan. i also did all the requisite checking on google (something he wouldn't do himself) and had discovered that all he had to do was call tmobile and get the proper apn settings so that he would get the data working.
from that point he claimed he was a moron, and that he didn't even know how to do that. after i laughed at him for that response, i reminded him to take a deep breath, absorb what i had told him, and to fix the problem himself. it was not my responsibility to show him how to do that, and the extra time i took to find this out was above and beyond anything i should have been expected to do for this sale.
he eventually stopped texting me, and i assume he went ahead and made the adjustments on his own.
but i would NEVER have someone meet me in my home, for various reasons; but the main one is what you are looking at now.
from now on (after my last experience) i am going to make the person sign a contract stating that the phone was sold as described, and that they fully checked it out before buying it. i know there are shady people out there...those that buy, and sell. you need to cover your bases as best you can.
