Help Centre

For Internet Explorer/Windows:
From the browser menu:
Tools > Internet Options > General
Select the "Temporary Internet Files" section
Press the button marked: [delete files]

Firefox (Mac & Windows):
From the browser menu:
Tools > Clear Private Data..
When the dialog pops up, select the 'Cache' option and de-select others
Press the button marked: [Clear Private Data Now]

Safari Mac:
From the menu bar:
Safari > Empty Cache
Press the button marked [Empty]

Safari Windows:
From the browser menu:
Edit > Empty Cache
Press the button marked [Empty]

Opera Mac:
From the menu bar:
Opera > Preferences > Advanced > History > Disc cache
Press the button marked: [Empty now]

Opera Windows:
From the browser menu:
Tools > Preferences > Advanced > History > Disc cache
Press the button marked: [Empty now]

After you have cleared your browser cache, reload the page to refresh the content you see.

You can navigate through Bargain City by using the tabs (located at the top of all Bargain City's pages).

Tabs:

• Home - Takes you back to the Bargain City homepage
• Browse - Browse ads by category
• Search - Search form
• New Ads - Lists the newest ads
• Post Ad - Post your free ad
• My Ads - Manage your ads
• Help - Find answers to commonly asked questions.

We want to provide you with a positive experience and to help you enhance your business of buying and selling online. One of the key issues and concerns our users have relates to suspicious activities. Below are some of the behaviors you may want to look out for when dealing with other buyers and sellers.

The Seller may:

• Request for payment overseas, payment to a third party, or to a location different than the one listed on the seller's ad
• Priced a normally expensive item at a very low price
• Use an image from an outside source that does not relate to the item being put up for sale
• Refuse to provide a shipment tracking number
• Repeatedly give excuses why you have not received your item
• Request payment through a non-traceable method, such as wire transfer, Western Union, and Money Gram
• Use very poor English

The Buyer may:

• Request to provide a partial payment and pay for the rest afterward
• A buyer may "erroneously" overpay you with a cashier's cheque and ask you to reimburse the "overpayment", although the cheque is a fake. Banks will cash these cheques, but the cheques will fail to clear when being processed at a later time.
• Similarly, after sending a fake cashier's cheque/money order, a buyer backs out of a deal and asks you to repay by personal cheque/Western Union/wire transfer
• Insists on COD method of payment. Many scammers use a fake cashier's cheque on CODs because carriers such as FedEx do little to confirm the buyer's identity.
• Use very poor English

Additional useful tips:

• Try to buy and sell locally to avoid long distance fraud
• Always obtain the buyer/seller's phone number and attempt to communicate directly before agreeing on a sale
• Do not give out credit card or bank account information through email. Unless the seller has a secure credit card processing feature on his/her website that you trust, otherwise do not give out your credit card information.
• Be wary when dealing with sellers in foreign countries, as the distance and difference in legal systems make it difficult to resolve conflicts
• Be wary of listings relating to: "income guarantees", "get-rich-quick" or other unrealistic claims, and some "work at home and make lots of $$$"
• If your shipment comes with tracking, request a tracking number from the seller
• If a high-tech item has a serial number, try asking the seller to provide that number

If and when you notice these types of behaviors from buyers and sellers, please exercise proper judgment and common sense, on whether or not you wish to deal with them.

If you are a victim of fraud or know information of fraud, call the Canadian PhoneBusters hotline at 1-888-495-8501. The RECOL (RCMP Reporting Economic Crime On-line) is another good site where you can file a complaint. http://www.recol.ca

If you encounter a bug when using Bargain City, please contact us and tell us as much information as possible about your issue including:

• The web page address that the bug occurred on.
• Anything you did that could have caused the bug.
• What web browser, operating system, and Internet service provider you use.

See: How do I report a bug I've encountered on the site?

We're constantly adding new features from feedback we receive, so please contact us and send us your ideas on how to make Bargain City even better.

Yes, Bargain City is a free service. Posting and replying to ads is totally free.

Bargain City takes your privacy seriously. We will not sell or rent your personally identifiable information to anyone. To learn more about privacy, read our Privacy Policy.

Cookies are small bits of text stored on your computer that are sent to our web site to identify you from other visitors. We use cookies to deliver a high level of functionality, services and personalization to you when using our website. Cookies enables us to do simple things like remembering what city you live in, storing your watched ads, remembering your preferences and more. Please check your browser settings and make sure cookies are enabled when visiting Bargain City.

Bargain City supports the following browsers:

• Internet Explorer 6.0+ for Windows
• Netscape 7.1+ on Windows
• Mozilla Firefox 1.0+ on Windows & Mac
• Safari 1.2+ on Mac OS X 10.3 (Panther)

Other requirements:

• You need to have cookies enabled.
• You need to have JavaScript enabled.

If you still don't receive the confirmation email, it may have been inadvertently flagged as spam by your email service provider, you may need to contact your internet service provider about possible email difficulties. Other symptoms can be, you may have entered your email address incorrectly, or your email inbox may be full.

Bargain City is a free, person-to-person local community classified site. There are no auctions here, and no bid wars... just a simple way for buyers and sellers to connect. You can use the site to post and find ads for electronics, furniture, jobs, cars, pets, services, housing and much more. Bargain City is easy to use, local and completely free.

Bargain City aims to be a safe and fair place for Canadians to buy and sell. Any one compromising this will face appropriate consequences. Offensive language or abuse anywhere on the site will not be tolerated. We reserve the right to remove any listing that violate the Terms of Use or Prohibited Content policies.

By limiting our service to Canadian residents, we hope to provide a safer community for our users. Over the years, buyers and sellers have found that sending payment or shipping items internationally offers them little protection or tracking capability.

At this time, we do not have plans to expand Bargain City outside Canada.

Having a browser with JavaScript enabled is a standard requirement for most quality sites these days. Because it allows us to provide the highest quality site for you, Bargain City requires it too. JavaScript enables things like games, tools, information programs and services to run on just about any computer. When using Bargain City, it enables functions to operate like:

• Navigating intelligently between pages
• Preloading images into your browser's cache.
• Performing intelligent searches.

We send a confirmation code to your email address to ensure that you can receive email at that address. We use your email address to send you email communication from buyers and other activity-related announcements. For this reason, it is important that the email address you provide is up-to-date.

If you think there should be a Bargain City site for the city you live in, then please contact us and let us know. In the mean time we encourage you to use Bargain City in the city nearest to you.

No, searching is not case sensitive, so using capitals will make no difference to your search results.

Click the Browse tab, found on the top of all Bargain City pages. Then select the category you'd like to view.

Click the New Ads tab, found on the top of all Bargain City pages.

• bat
• bats
• battery
• batteries
• bath
• bathers
• bathroom

• Offensive classifieds
• Classifieds in the wrong category
• Prohibited items or services (as defined in the Prohibited Content)
• Harassment or offensive language
• Privacy violations

Bargain City provides an open marketplace in which sellers and buyers are responsible for all activity related to transactions, including the sale and exchange of goods and payment.

Please note, Bargain City will not intervene in general disagreements between buyers and sellers.

• Terms of Use
• Prohibited Content
• Privacy Policy

You can also use the Email to a friend feature to email yourself the ad.

• Contact the seller just as you would if asking the seller a question, and arrange to meet them to view the item.
• Always test the item fully before paying for it. If it can't be tested before the sale, just say no.
• If the item is large and the seller offers to deliver but wants a deposit before delivery you run the risk of losing your deposit. Suggestion: meet the seller at the pickup location with the deposit and help the seller deliver it.
• Bargain City does not offer any transaction or payment services. If you are offered this, please report the ad to us immediately and we'll remove it. Be sure to include the ad's Item# when reporting.

We reserve the right to reject ads or even ban a member who does not adhere to our user agreement in order to help safeguard our community of buyers and sellers. Please read our Terms of Use.

In addition, ads for, containing, or linking to the following will not be accepted:

• Explicit adult products or services
• "Income-Guarantees", "Get-Rich-Quick" schemes, or unrealistic claims
• Chain marketing * Stuffing envelopes, ad typing, or similar ventures
• Pyramid or binary schemes

These variant forms of SPAM will also be rejected:

• Posting identical, near duplicate, or otherwise, variant listings for the same item/service
• Posting a listing for the sole purpose of collecting user information or raising money
• Posting a listing with inappropriate links, titles, descriptions, or unauthorized use of content to which the person posting does not have rights
• Posting a listing that contains unsolicited or unauthorized advertising or promotional materials. This may include a listing that instruct the user(s) to contact the person/company posting the listing for more information and then require the user to pay a fee for the information
• Posting a job listing that requires a monetary investment by the user at any time
• Posting a listing that requires a user to register before getting detailed information about the product or position
• Posting a listing through unauthorized robots (crawling software)
• Soliciting other members to post a listing

However, with an account you can manage posts efficiently. Posting ads, editing and deleting them is much easier.

• Include one or more pictures in your ad.
• Make the title and description as detailed as possible. For example, when selling a product include its brand, model number, condition, and features.
• If you are flexible on price, state that you will accept "best offer".
• Make it easy for buyer to pick up the item; let them know where the item is located and when you will be available.
• Tell your friends about Bargain City. The more people who use Bargain City, the more responses you'll get!

However, you are welcome to send us your category request.

There are 3 ways to capture photos and save them 'digitally' on to your computer:

Digital camera
The easiest way to capture and transfer digital photos to your camera. A digital camera is just like a regular camera, except that it does not use film. Instead, images are stored digitally in its memory. Once you take a picture, you can connect your camera to your computer and save the photo to your computer. Remember to make note of where you saved the file.

Regular camera with Flatbed Scanner
Take a picture with your regular camera, get the film developed, and use a scanner to convert the photograph to a digital image. The scanner will then ask you to choose a location and file name to save the image. If the item you are selling is small and flat (like baseball cards or stamps), you can just put them directly on the scanner. Remember that you must save the photograph in either a .gif or .jpg format in order to use it on Bargain City.

Regular camera and Digital Film Processor
There are a couple methods you can use to transfer images from regular film to your computer.

• You can ask your local digital film processor to scan copies of your photographs onto a computer disk (CD) to take home and transfer to your computer, or...
• You can ask your film processing service if they use a web service that can digitally post copies of your photographs to a website. You can then copy these from the website to your computer to use whenever you like.

Posting is as easy as 1, 2, 3!

1. Click the "Post Ad" tab, found at the top of all Bargain City pages and choose a category for your ad.
2. Enter your ad's details (title, price (if applicable), contact info, etc) and click the "Post Ad" button.
3. Lastly, if you are already a member you can just login to activate your ad or you'll need to check your email's inbox for the confirmation email.

Here is a basic explanation of each option:

• Fraud: Any listing that appears suspicious, or if you believe that the listing's intent is to scam users.
• Illegal or Inappropriate Content: Any listing which contains content that violates our Terms of Use or is deemed to be Prohibited content.
• Miscategorized: Any listing that appears in the wrong category or subcategoy (e.g. a boat that appears in the motorcycles category). This option may also be used if the information presented in a listing on Oodle (address, price, contact information, etc.) is different from the information in the original listing source.
• Spam: Any listing that has been posted multiple times in the same region or does not contain classifieds content (e.g. a link to a website without anything specific for sale). This option may also be used for any listing that has been posted across multiple categories.
• Unavailable: Any listing that no longer exists.

• Arrange a time and place for the buyer and you to get together. Plan it so that you are not home alone.
• Have the item ready to test (i.e. if an electronic good, have it plugged in ready to test) outside or in your foyer area or garage. Do not invite the Buyer into your place of residence.
• Ask for cash; only accept a cheque or money order if you can wait for it to clear before giving the item to the buyer.

• You may need to refresh/reload the page that displays listings for the category where your ad was posted in.
• Make sure you are looking in the correct category.
• If you are unable to locate your ad using a keyword search, make sure that the keyword actually appears in the text of the ad.
• Other possibilities: your post may have expired, or it may have been flagged .

• You have not published your ad. If you are a registered user, simply login to activate your ad. If you aren't a registered user, check your email from the Posting Confirmation from Bargain City. The email will have a link to activate your ad.
• Your ad violates the Terms of Use or maybe you've violated the Terms of Use in the past and you've been blocked from posting ads.

1. Bargain City is free. Posting ads at Bargain City doesn't cost you anything. So, how do we make money? We make money from the advertisements in the pages here.
2. Bargain City is simple. At Bargain City, you post ads anonymously and buyers will contact you directly.
3. Since Bargain City is city-based, you will find buyers near you. This saves not only your time but also the hassle of packaging and shipping items by mail or courier.
4. Unlike a newspaper, with Bargain City you can edit your ad at any time and you can remove it once you've sold your item; to stop inquiries from people.
5. Bargain City protects your email address from spam harvesters. Your email address is never published on Bargain City. Buyers must use the contact form attached to your ad, this allows buyers to contact you without your email address being revealed to them (unless you reply to their email, of course!).
6. You are automatically reminded by email when your ad has expired and up for renewal. You have the option to renew it for additional 90 days.

• Your ad expired automatically after 90 days of it being posted.
• Your ad was flagged by other users.
• Your ad voilated the Terms of Use.
• You removed the ad yourself.

© 2010 Bargain City. All rights reserved.