Can someone write that they’re been offered xx via pm if there’s not the bid in topic?
Seems baffling if not cause could be a pure lie no way of knowing if there being honest about the offer or not

Then you feel like you’re competing with someone you can’t even see there bids

There’s no stopping people from PM trading.

I’m not talking about accepting a trade via pm
More of accepting a bid via pm
Goes both ways? A bit dumb being able to say ‘I got offered this’ then there not being a single bid in topic

Ty for both replies!

This post was edited by NiceEnigmaBrah on Jan 10 2025 01:40pm

You can do it in PM but it's best to keep everything in the topic so it's public. Less of a chance of being scammed.

just don't bid in PMs and don't accept bids in PMs to be safe.

This post was edited by KevlarKondom on Jan 10 2025 01:40pm

People can write any random offer and use it as an offer, pm or when bidder has 0fg.

I usually just skip those items if I happen to be looking for that particular item.

it is pretty simple, bids accepted via pm are between you and the other party
bids in a thread can be scrutinized by the community
you choose which risk level you want

how do you think all those nigerian scammers get paid? PM phone calls with no oversight

There is a rule against PM trading under illegal trades:


However since the PM inbox is unmoderated due to privacy, nobody would ever know whether those claiming they had PM bids actually did receive a PM bid or were bluffing just to raise the bid.

As a trader you are in control and you can refrain from BM trading behaviour such as PM trade sniping and fake bid claims, you can also refuse to trade with those who you believe engage in these sorts of behaviour.

As a seller if you receive a “PM bid” you can always redirect them to post that bid in your topic, since people do that just to avoid potentially being outbid and it’s always a bad idea to acknowledge bids in private since you could be getting more in public.