I tend to prefer to give a little more time, jsut in case something may have happened to prevent the member from sending in a timely manner.
Although there are always exceptions, all of the members that I've dealt with have gone out of their way to ensure that purchases, trades and PIFs are delivered in a timely manner and that they are packaged to prevent damage.

Let's face it, stuff happens sometimes and we just do our best to keep everything balanced when it happens to us. It oculd be very easy to forge to mail an item if a bunch of "stuff" happens at once.

Here's a current example: I purchased a hone from a member a while ago. After about a week or so I sent a message to ask if the member had any shpping or tracking information about it, in the hope that it could be traced. After a bit of research we found out that the city and zip code were slightly off on the shipping label, causing it to get lost in transit. Both of us are still waiting for it to show up - we just don't know which one of us will get it. Stuff happens, and sometimes all we can do is be patient. We've worked out a plan to make the deal good, so it'll just take a bit more time to get everything square.

However, if the person you've traded with simply ignores your attempts at contact while still taking time to post comments and items for sale, I believe it would be worth your time to send one more message to let the member know of your misgivings and the possibility of posting details in the forum. I would only do that as a last resort, but if there's someone out there that has begun taking advantage of members I'd rather know about it before it affects too many members.

This is one of the few forums of which I'm a member that I would have no problem making a deal based on a "digital handshake" of PMs and fully expect the deal to work out as promised without any complications. The members all seem to genuinely want to help each other improve upon what used to be considered a chore, and many actually enjoy going the extra mile to make hat happen, without any expectation of getting something in return.

Wow, I've got to get off my soap box.

Short version of above comments - we're a family here, and we should treat each other as family members. When someone messes up we bear with them and work to solve any problems that are caused. If the family member continues to mess up, we take steps to help the family member not make the same mistakes in the future. (Can you tell I'm a dad?)

- Mark (S-4-C)