New Flea Market ?

I see we have a new Flea Market now called Marketplace and it appears to be Panjo software that is somehow tied to the Forum as we are being told to login there first. I hope this experiment works! What I am wondering however is where are all the ads? I see 37 items for sale right now. Was it not possible to populate the new software with all the existing items for sale?

I've been long curious about who actually administrates and runs our website day to day. It seems with the financial resources this club has and the importance of the web site to members we could have better software, a better search engine (most folks come here looking for something) and less churn.

happy wanderer said:

Was it not possible to populate the new software with all the existing items

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Still a work in progress.
http://www.bmwmoa.org/?page=marketplace&hhSearchTerms="Marketplace"

Moving the ads from the Flea Market isn't as easy as it sounds, but we are going to make an effort to get much of that content into Panjo. It will take some time to do it. We can likely have 300 items in the Marketplace in a short period of time. Have patience with us on that one. It is a tedious process to get it right.

Responsibility for the website lands on my desk at the moment. The new site is the first step to improve this property and make it easier to access for updates, more relevant content, better searches and, most importantly, integration with our back end member database. I would love to have a team of people working on it all day long, but the resources simply aren't there. There is a lot of work to be done relative to our web presence and we have over used the term "We're working on it," but we are working on it.

New Market Place

Still sporadic at best. I logged in and setup and item for sale, got the email, but when I went back to view the new item no items would display. I discovered by accident and trial and error that if I wasn't logged in then I could view items for sale Once I had logged in I could no longer view any items for sale. This isn't a complaint, but just a heads up for admin.

Frankly this new marketplace confuses me.
I am a member of the MOA and until now enjoyed shopping at our exclusive marketplace.
It now appears that I must join Panjo (an external entity - payment processor) before establishing contact with the member that is selling.
I am subject to all their terms and conditions
I don't have any interest in doing that.
I do NOT want to be tracked or profiled.
Who is paying the Panjo fee? (they obviously don't work for nothing)
How secure is their link to Paypal?

This has been a private members only gentleman's site based on honesty and trust that BMW riders share universally.
IMO we don't need an Ebay type of marketplace.
What was wrong with the old system of buying and selling?



Another question....I cannot find/manage any of my ads that I had not 2 weeks ago

GSAddict said:

.
It now appears that I must join Panjo (an external entity - payment processor) before establishing contact with the member that is selling.
I am subject to all their terms and conditions
I don't have any interest in doing that.
I do NOT want to be tracked or profiled.

Click to expand...

I replied to two ads and only had to provide my email address.

GSAddict said:

Another question....I cannot find/manage any of my ads that I had not 2 weeks ago

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You should contact Ted Moyer.

Right now it does not appear possible to contact anyone in the MOA. All the contact email addresses have disappeared. There is no "Contacts" on the home page. Also, when you log into the home page part of the site anything you click on launches another tab in my browser and I am no longer logged in. I do hope it doesn't take 60 days to fix that...

Having read the terms and conditions of Panjo I get the sense that we (the club) are turning over the Flea Market to a 3rd party. Yes you can still use PMs to get a hold of the seller but it's not easy and obvious as it was before when we had the "contact seller" feature. Also Panjo is reserving rights to images of items we post and we are more or less being forced to use PayPal only. I presume this is so Panjo can collect fees back from PayPal but whatever the deal is it is certainly not transparent. In the past members could send cheques or money orders or bank transfers or whatever they chose. It seems this may no longer be possible.

Many people (I'm not one of them" choose not to have anything to do with PayPal. They don't want more private information stored by a 3rd party. Are they now to be excluded? If you google "Panjo complaints" and really dig into the fine print of the T's and C's I think you'll find it's a very big change to the way we used to do business with each other. And maybe that's what bugs me. The trust and easy nature of dealing with fellow members is getting lost somehow. It seems more like eBay now.

As far as this website goes I really hope Chuck's stated "sixty days to fully populate the site" comes true.

Per another thread, Ted Moyer is probably open for contact: call or email him directly. ted@bmwmoa.org, 205-821-7205.

Re: Panjo...we I was checking this out some time back, I thought the paypal part is optional and that buyer/seller can work out any deal they want. I don't know about the photos.

happy wanderer said:

Right now it does not appear possible to contact anyone in the MOA. All the contact email addresses have disappeared.

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http://www.bmwmoa.org/staff/

This is interesting reading.

http://www.panjo.com/terms

The more you dig the better it gets.

https://panjo.uservoice.com/knowledgebase/articles/177344-does-panjo-report-transactions-to-the-irs

I love the IRS part and wonder who "certain customers" are.


Does Panjo report transactions to the IRS?
← About Panjo

Internal Revenue Code (IRC) Section 6050W states that all US payment processors, including Panjo, are required by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to provide information to the IRS about certain customers who receive payments for the sale of goods or services through Panjo.

I realize they have to comply (doesn't everyone now?) But it doesn't seem like our old Flea Market to me anymore and calling or emailing Ted is not going to change the decision to farm out the Flea Market to a 3rd party. The time to ask members what they think is before, not after. There's a little more here than just "give us your email address and start playing". People should be aware of that.

mikegalbicka said:

http://www.bmwmoa.org/staff/

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May I ask where this link is located?

happy wanderer said:

...................The time to ask members what they think is before, not after.............

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The flea market, the way I understand it, was a "custom build" by a very talented former member. The old flea market was not functioning well and would not integrate with newer, mandated versions of VB.
I completely understand your concerns but having a flea market is and has been very important to members and Panjo works well (but not like the old F/M) with VB.
OM

happy wanderer said:

May I ask where this link is located?

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On the Home page click on Connect or Toolkit, then Membership Team down at the bottom.

happy wanderer said:

May I ask where this link is located?

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BMW Homepage > Tool Kit > Membership Team

BMW Homepage > Connect > note the link at the very bottom of the page

BMW Homepage > Nav > Membership > note the link at the very bottom of the page

In fact, go to the bottom of most of the individual pages on the homepage, and you'll find this link.

happy wanderer said:

May I ask where this link is located?

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Thanks. I'm starting to sound like the cranky pants whiner around here but I just want to point out that maybe the link should say "MOA Staff" or "MOA Team".

There's quite a few poeple in that list that perform other functions than membership. And yes, I am easily confused.

happy wanderer said:

...Having read the terms and conditions of Panjo I get the sense that we (the club) are turning over the Flea Market to a 3rd party. Yes you can still use PMs to get a hold of the seller but it's not easy and obvious as it was before when we had the "contact seller" feature. Also Panjo is reserving rights to images of items we post and we are more or less being forced to use PayPal only. I presume this is so Panjo can collect fees back from PayPal but whatever the deal is it is certainly not transparent. In the past members could send cheques or money orders or bank transfers or whatever they chose. It seems this may no longer be possible.

Click to expand...

We still own and administer the Flea Market. Panjo is more of a Software as a Service Model. They are the engine that is powering the Flea Market.

You are always free to deal directly with another member. The contact seller button at the bottom of each listing will send the seller an email and you can also contact the seller through the forum PM system. I am not necessarily suggesting it, but a seller also has the ability to place their email within the body of the ad.

You do not have to use Paypal. There is an option to collect payment on your own and that does not restrict your listing or cost you anything if you collect payment by cash, check or your own credit card processing. Paypal fees apply if you use Paypal.

Panjo asks for the rights to use your images because photos are copyrighted material. There is an optional piece to advertise your listing outside of the MOA Marketplace. You can easily opt out of this with one check box, but if you choose to advertise within the Panjo global marketplace, they need that permission.

Don't forget to google "Panjo success" as well. Several reputable forums, including bimmerforums.com, are having great success for their members with the application.

20774 said:

In fact, go to the bottom of most of the individual pages on the homepage, and you'll find this link.

Click to expand...

For me, Connect and Tool Kit are the only two that display a list of email addresses.
The others give you a contact us form and I'm guessing this email goes to everyone on the board

Lee, you're right. I was thrown off by the words "Membership Team" at the bottom of the screens. So at the bottom of the Connect screen is says "MOA Membership Team" but at the bottom of the Tool Kit page, there's the link to Membership Team but also "Membership Team" at the bottom of the page. All of those get you a list of email contacts. If you go to Nav and click on Membership, the bottom of that screen says says "Membership Team" but gets you a contact forum to submit a message to a wide group of people. Are you confused?? I am!!

Ted, calling Ted to the white courtesy phone. This needs to be cleared up so that it's clear where a link is going to take you. A link to email contacts or a link to a forum to fill in to send email to the board, editor, or the entire membership team.

Whew, that's hard to keep track of!!

FWIW, flea market surfing is total confusion, click, wait, click, wait, wait, clack, click, pop up, wait, pop, click, wait. Poof, click, real fun. Guess that's over for me. Don't have time or patience to fool around in a website.

The old market was so bad? You could see all the pertinent info after one click, you click immediately to see other items, click back, continue scrolling to see other cool stuff.

I know we can't go back to this old fashioned flea market. Just saying, no replies needed, have a great time.