What is the safest method of payment to recieve for a bow when selling over the net?
What is a credit card check?
I'm selling my first bow over the net and am a little nervous.

Thanks.

John

I always use paypal, a USPS money order, or a personal check. But I don't ship tuntil the check is fully cleared

Wait for the check to clear. then ship the bow.

Paypal is the best.  However be careful there is usally a fee associated so you should include with shipping costs or the price of the item you are selling.  However still the easiest and safest.

I have bought and sold several bows and use the money order from the postal service...and never had a problem.

I have always used Money Orders and have had no problems.  But I work for a bank and I know that is really no guaranty. You would not believe the number of forged and counterfeit money orders and cashiers checks that get passed.  They are actually the most popular ones to be counterfeited because the recipients tend to trust them.  Fortunately, forging and counterfeiting are not a common thing in the traditional archery community.  The people that tend to do that kind of thing generally aren't interested in bows.  They want cash or something easily resold.  

Paypal is a very good option, although of course there are fees involved.  Well worth it though if there is any concern. This is especially a good option for international payments.  A check drawn on a foriegn bank can take weeks or even months to "clear".  If it comes back bad, your bank will hit you for it no matter how much time has gone by.  They could send it for collection though, where they will notify you when payment is received, and then you would know for sure.  But again, it can take weeks for that to happen, and the buyer probably won't want to wait that long.  There are also additional fees involved for that.

The best protection you can get is to do your homework.  How long has the buyer been posting here?  Does he/she know someone that you know that might vouch for them?  Get a phone number and address, and check it against the internet or phone company records.  And never, NEVER, accept a cashiers check (or any other type of check) for more than the purchase price and agree to send money in return.  This is a very common scam, and they are hoping you will send them the difference before the original check bounces.

I don't want to scare anyone out of doing business here at Trad Gang.  I have bought and sold a pile of stuff here with no problems, and you can too, if you will just use a little common sense and proper procedures.  If you have any specific questions feel free to PM me.

Of course if you are a buyer and the seller is a new or first time seller, it is good to protect yourself with the same means.

Good point Dave.  That is actually the side of the deal I am most careful with.  I know what to look for when I receive a payment.  But sending one off to a guy I have never heard of is a real leap of faith, and people need to be just as careful there.

postal money order or paypal on ****, but I sometimes take personal checks from Tradgangers,.... and only Tradgangers, 'cause we're cool like that   :cool:  
PS: provided that the Tradgang buyer has a posting "history" on the site, of course

I always us PayPal or a MO...I also use a Tracking number and Insure...
I've never had a bad trade on TradGang..
 Even bought a bow on here the sellar shipped before he receive the money.. If your selling on Tradgang I wouldn't be to worried..
But their is always a first time..
Just do a little research..

Had a bad experience with paypal (through my checking account), where I got double charged because their website messed up. I discovered the double charge within a couple of minutes and called them to try and straighten it out.They said "there's no way we can stop the payment it's already gone through".It still took a week to clear.   :mad:    The long and short of it was that I had to contact the seller myself and hope he would refund the money.    

Anyway, I'm a little leery of paypal after that experience.

BamBooBender, I believe you on the Paypal double charge.  All I want to add is that it can happen with regular banks and retailers, also.  Just a couple of weeks ago, my wife and I went shopping at grocery store and got a double hit on the debit card.  It hurt because we bought almost $200 worth of groceries.  The grocer and the bank took over a week to get it back into our account.

Dave in Ft. Collins, CO

Just a little side point here too. If you're buying something from overseas & send a check or Money Order in US Dollars, the recipient's bank will also charge a ridiculous fee to exchange the funds from Dollars to the local currency. As an example, if you sent me a USD check; it takes 3 weeks to clear into my account & my bank charges me $18 for the exchange, plus commission of 7% of the total amount in fees, no matter what amount the check/MO is for. I was recently charged $23 to cash a $35 check  :mad:
Paypal definately wins out on International sales!

I'll stick to MOs and bank drafts. I was getting so many spoof emails from"PayPal and E***" counterfeiters that I lost all trust in either and canceled my relationship with both.Eventually some geek is gonna get it right and rip off a bunch of people.

If you go the MO route insist on a USPS MO only. I do that because the post office can cash it right there and make sure it's good. Plus I can have them cash it and then ship the item all in one stop     A lot of other MO's ecspecially the one's from conv. stores won't clear unless it's in the stores acct. I deal a lot with conv stores in my job and beleive me a lot of times the money's not there.

for me trading is the only way as everyone gets what they want. if they dont want it they dont have to trade.    if i buy stuff from the states it just costs me way to much as buy the time i have changed it all. say item is $50 thats about $100 nz plus $25 to change it plus another $25 or $20 to send it. now ya can see why i love to trade. as it just costs the postage.  

You kind of get a feel about a person on tradgang if they have been around for a while . I have had 2 deals on Tradgang and no problem.