Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
You will lose a great deal of time through time wasters who say they'll
turn up to collect but then don't. And answering e-mails from people
wanting something which they don't then bother replying to.

Of course this might just be the vast London group.

Nope. Human life, sadly examples everywhere. Best to get/give mobile
numbers as soon as possible in an email conversation (and not given on
the main list).


Still in my experience the effort is far outweighed by the spoils won
(offered and requested) on freecycle and stuff that I'm certain has gone
to better homes (and in one case a London Hospital!). Because I've done
so well out of it, I now go out of my way to help others on the list
(deliver things, do favours, pay post etc.)

What goes around comes around. I meet some interesting people and stick
two fingers to the council tip men who don't allow good usable rubbish
to be taken away from the council tip. I also take my privacy and safety
quite seriously, and folks *should* be careful - I now only make
personal meetings at train stations, not my front door.

The uk freecycle site deserves a mention http://uk.freecycle.org. If
more people read and abided by the rules, and didn't clog up the mail
list with personal rants and advertising, than it's very usable -
particulary if it's filtered into different mail folders on your machine
and you can handle 4,500 messages a month(!) as in the case of the
London group.

--
Adrian C