After many complaints about incomplete deals, company offers three-tier verification system.
Sedo sells a lot of domains, but many of the domain sales on its site are never completed. A number of people — including readers of Domain Name Wire — have recommended that bidders be authenticated to cut down on bogus bidding.
Today Sedo introduced a three tier system for verification. Here’s how it works:
1. Tier 1 lets you bid on any domain under $10,000. You just have to provide a valid credit card.
2. Tier 2 lets you bid on any domain up to $99,999. It requires you to validate your email address, complete an application, and fax a copy of a government-issued ID and a recent bank or utility statement.
3. Tier 3 lets you bid on any domain. In addition to tier 2 requirements, you must make a $1,000 deposit via wire transfer.
I applaud Sedo for making this change. Now we’ll just have to wait to see if it should have been implemented before the Pizza.com “sale”.
Domainer says
Its about time. Any word on pizza.com transaction?
Kelly lieberman says
This sounds very fair. I think that this will prevent many unsavory types from bidding. I hope that there is some financial incentive in this process to make sure the deal “closes” in a timely fashion as well…an earnest deposit for example..
Rob Sequin says
My take… big deal.
How many domains are bid on over $10k at Sedo.
I know someone who bid six figures on a name yesterday and was not asked for any verification other than logging into their account. There is no way I’m sending them $1000 for the privilege of making a bid.
Good intentions but bad idea from Sedo.
They should have an ebay or Forum type ratings system. Simple as that.
Andrew says
@ Domainer – word is the pizza.com deal isn’t closing any time soon.