Arbitrarily speaking . . .

[SoftWareRevue]

There are communities that have a lot of money flow through them.

What's anyone's thoughts about establishing a committee to arbitrate any disputes that come up between buyers and sellers.

A community could vote on board members. Depending on the size of the community, the arbitration board would likely need to be between five and thirteen people.

Yes. I just grabbed them numbers out of the air. :p

I gave this subject about five minutes thought before I started the thread. :dog:

But, I believe it could have merit.

Providers of products, labor, or services could choose to be bound by arbitration or not.

If they chose to, they'd receive something to display that they are bound by the arbitration system in place.

This would enhance their position within the community, give members confidence in purchases, and take the guess work out of "He ripped me off! Ban him! threads.

Just a thought and the basic structure.

I'd like to hear others' on it though. :giggle:

[writespeak]

What's anyone's thoughts about establishing a committee to arbitrate any disputes that come up between buyers and sellers.

My first reaction was that it's a good idea. Then I got to thinking about situations when we don't have enough information to verify with 100% certainty who is in the right and who is in the wrong.

If we can always be 100% certain, I say go for it. But if we can't, will the committee just make the best decision they can based on the information they have? If they do and there's a possibility they're wrong, there's also the possibility of ruining the reputation of someone who didn't do anything wrong.

A community could vote on board members. Depending on the size of the community, the arbitration board would likely need to be between five and thirteen people.

Are you thinking of pulling these committee members (or people to vote on to be members) from FU and other forums where you know the people, or do you have something else in mind? People need to know the people they're voting on.

But, I believe it could have merit.

I think so too, but I want to know more about it.

Providers of products, labor, or services could choose to be bound by arbitration or not.

Imagine if you chose to be bound by it and someone accused you of wrongdoing and did a very good job of making it appear so. If that person just badmouthed you online, that would be one thing. But if this committee ruled against you, that would be a much bigger black mark against you. As a service provider, I wouldn't want to be bound by something like that unless I knew with 100% certainty that there'd be no risk of my being labelled as wrong when I wasn't.

I gave this subject about five minutes thought before I started the thread. :dog:

I'm up to about 6 minutes now. ;) How does the Better Business Bureau deal with complaints? Don't they have an "unresolved" category or something like that? That would be less of a black mark than a "wrong" stamp.

If they chose to, they'd receive something to display that they are bound by the arbitration system in place.

This would enhance their position within the community, give members confidence in purchases, and take the guess work out of "He ripped me off! Ban him! threads.

Onto 7 minutes now...what would happen if a scammer put up this something to display? And then took his clients' money and ran? Would this committee be able to provide any protection against such people? Would there be any requirements before people could display that something, such as X months/years in business or clients' testimonials? Would it cost to join? If so, how would the money be spent?

Let's see what other people say about this. :)

Lois

[Scott]

Humm, interesting idea, I certainly don't think I've seen this type of community before.

Board members - I think they would need to opperate under strict guidelines (kinda like a dmoz editor :angel:) and would need to already have proven themselves capable of such a position. Would you rotate the members? IMO, I think this would be a good idea; perhaps some permanent members and some lasting a period of 2 months? (It works for the Security Council).

Something to display - I'm assuming you're talking about something like the BBB's Relability program? (http://www.bbbonline.org/reliability/) This could be a great idea, but as Lois says, you'd need to prevent others from copying it. Could maybe do this by 1) Putting the user's company name on the something 2) Making it a link back to the user's summary on the forum. Another idea which popped into my head - could the something to display change depending on the user's reputation, varying from Blue (No complains) to Gold (Excellent Reputation) or even down to Black (Numerous complaints)?

I need to run, but I'll be interested to see what others think of this.

[writespeak]

This could be a great idea, but as Lois says, you'd need to prevent others from copying it.

Actually, that wasn't what I was saying, but it's a good point. :)

What I was referring to was how the committee would decide who could display that something. Someone comes along and says, "I want to be bound by the arbitration system" and then they get to display that something? Without a system in place to assess who the committee says yes to, any scammer could display that something even after they've disappeared with the client's money.

Another idea which popped into my head - could the something to display change depending on the user's reputation, varying from Blue (No complains) to Gold (Excellent Reputation) or even down to Black (Numerous complaints)?

That might work. :) If it were no unresolved complaints, that is. We wouldn't want people posing as clients and trying to make their competitors look bad by complaining about them.

I've been thinking about how online work is different from bricks-and-mortar business transactions. If a business owner sells TVs, for example, and a customer complains that the TV he bought doesn't work, the business owner either fixes the TV or replaces it, and the problem is solved.

But what about someone complaining that a web designer created a poor quality design? Or the designer complaining that the client was too demanding and refused to pay? Some of us have seen that situation. :eek: What one person considers good design is not necessarily the same as what other people do. Some things you can measure, such as if the code is valid or if the design works in various resolutions. But what about aesthetic quality? You can't measure that. If a client complains to this committee that the designer didn't deliver the goods promised because the design is ugly in his opinion, what can the committee do? Vote on whether or not they also think it's ugly, or say that the client has to pay because the designer delivered on the specific requirements?

The above situation could be avoided if the designer shows the design-in-progress to the client for feedback and the client has the opportunity to back out at various points, but I don't think it always happens that way. And web design is just one example of online work.

:crystal: This idea needs more lookin' into. :read:

Lois

[Scott]

A few conditions could be setup before people can display the something. Here's a few that popped into my head:
1) The user must have a valid domain with complete whois details.
2) There must be no unresolved complaints. Any resolved complaints will effect the nature of the something display (colour, etc).
3) A valid email address must be used (this could be check at registration I think).
4) Although I'm not keen on it, a small cost could be attached to the ability to display the something (need to come up with a name for it :iunno:). This would probably deter most spammers, as long as the cost was reasonable. The money would then go into keeping the site online.

These are just some ideas, feel free to shoot them down :armed:

As for the problem with different people being in different opinions (in areas such as aesthetics) I think not only do you need an unresolved category, but also an "opinion" one (this might not be the best word). If the complaint is something which is due to the opinion of the poster and the company has provided their service as specified, the complaint could be marked as opinion. This doesn't count against the company, but they could use it as advice to better their service.

My main concern with this idea is that it will take a lot of time and effort to get a community with the experience to form a committee. Also, getting the reputation needed for complaints to be taken seriously will take a while. At the beginning, the community could maybe focus on providing advice for those who have had problems with services (things like charge backs, or what to do when a money back guarantee was promised but no refund given).

Lots of potential here I think, will be interesting to hear feedback on what my computer has decided I shouldn't be posting. (It's crashed twice in the process of typing this :fixpc: ) Also, excuse any spelling mistakes, I was posting in a hurry.

[writespeak]

Perhaps the committee could have requirements for members to use opt-out contracts before agreeing to be the artibration system. Designers, for example, would have to have a contract with their clients that allowed their clients to opt out at various stages as long as they paid up to that point. Then it would be the clients' fault if they didn't like the end result because they would have plenty of occasions to comment on the work in progress. The contract should also include a checklist of what the site requires. With these in place, arbitration decisions wouldn't need to be subjective.

That wouldn't work for everything, though. I don't know how it would work for programming, for example. For writing the content for a whole website, there could be an opt-out clause after each chunk of work, but what if the work is only one page?

Lois

[SoftWareRevue]

Yeh. It may be a bit complicated to be feasible.

:idea:

But wait!

That's what we have discussions for.

We need to take the complicated and make it feasible.

So, maybe it needs to be looser. And maybe "arbitration" is the wrong word to use to make it that way.

/me invents a word.

strathum sounds pretty cool. :cool:

But, cool ain't conveying what it is.

Okay. My mind is just too frazzled right now. I've spent most of the day cleaning. :clean: <<<< gonna have to work on emoticons around here.

[writespeak]

But wait!

That's what we have discussions for.

Yeah! The whole is more than the sum of the parts. Together we can come up with something better than one individual could. :scatter:

/me invents a word.

strathum sounds pretty cool. :cool:

"Cool" doesn't describe the, er, other word that came to my mind that ends in "um." :p

Lois

[PHPGeek2k3]

I agree that this could be complicated but again abused alot. there should be set policies / regulations for both the arbitrator's and the involved parties. Honestly you can not force a company / person to do something without court order and even then you its up to the person to actually follow that court order. And thats where international issues come into play, All countries have different leagl systems and laws.

Thanks
- James

[Webdude]

Ok, if you want to do this, here are two services you need to offer.

Arbitration and Escrow.

Dont try to arbitrate those who have nothing in escrow. For example. Two people agree upon something. One says he wants to use FU's escrow service.

This solves two problem because a third party is holding the money. One person cant take the money and run, the other cant take the service and run. If it ends in dispute, FU has the money and can arbitrate from there.

Otherwise, in any arbitration which FU doesnt hold the escrow, then FU has no real power. You'll be nothing more than a Mini-UN. You can decide who is right and who is wrong, but without holding escrow, the one in the wrong will only say "FU" and do what he wants anyway.

Then on top of that, what if it is one of the arbotrators with the dispute. If you have 5 arbitrators, then you take him out for this one. It can tie 2 to 2. So you still need a tie-breaker arbitrator on call.