New verification process is designed to meet regulations.
Escrow.com has started a new verification process for its customers, both buyers and sellers.
In order to send or receive payments to a personal account, users will have to provide a copy of a government-issued ID (such as a drivers license) and proof of personal address (such as a utility bill).
Businesses will need to provide a copy of a representative’s government issued ID, proof of address of that representative, and company registration documents.
This will no doubt add friction to the process of buying and selling domain names, particularly if the other party is not a frequent domain trader.
But the verification is necessary for Escrow.com to not run afoul of government regulations. Escrow.com GM Jackson Elsegood wrote on NamePros:
To combat the funding of terrorism and money laundering activities, US Federal law requires all financial institutions (including escrow companies) to obtain, verify and record information that identifies each person who opens an account. This requirement is present in many pieces of legislation, but the strongest requirement comes from FinCEN and the US PATRIOT Act, section 326. You can find more information about the US PATRIOT Act and it’s requirements on the US FinCEN site.
First thoughts, if it is the law it’s the law, what can you do. Second thought, what a pain. Mind you it may help reduce domain thieves from using escrow.com. Likely a small percentage really but still escrow.com will see a small revenue adjustment for sure, no more criminals! Or criminals who now forge documents, either way lol
It’s a good idea, I just did it, was simple.
Can you share the process step by step, did it take much longer, when did they request it etc. Thanks
I guess i spoke to soon, They just turned me down for low quality of the document i sent in..LOL.
I have been using Flippa Escrow for my last sales cause they are still 10%.
As far as Escrow, I don’t have a company, so i just verified the info that they had already and sent a copy of my drivers licence.
Everything went o.k but got an email saying the picture quality was poor and it was declined, everything else was fine.
They turned us down 4-5 times for same reason without telling what the issue is. Really weak process and hope they improve on it or people will walk away.
The funny thing is, i sent the same Document, my drivers licence to Dropcatch so i could be a verified bidder and it was excepted.
guess i will use sedo’s escrow service for buyers who don’t want to do this. many will not i believe.
No, thanks. Will stick to Uniregistry’s SSE.
Doesn’t Uniregistry use Escrow for large transactions?
There is no way the small business buyer will send their passport/DL, along with credit card bill to Escrow for a single transaction.
According to the legislation this is not mandatory until 2018, not sure why Escrow has jumped the gun.
Also, the goods classification can be reclassified, or argued when it comes to domains.
Lots of loopholes can be used here, time to use them, otherwise Escrow.com will go the way of the do do bird.
We are already doing that verification these days.
But IMHO there is something weird in this “sudden” need for “verification” coming from the new Escrow.com management/owners.
FinCEN and US Patriot Act section 326 (2001) regulations and subsequent integrations and modifications, are not something new, as those guys are trying to make you believe, they have been around for years.
Furthermore, there are not stricter regulations being enacted from now on, as they are (falsely) telling us.
To put it short, FinCEN, formed in 1990, requires financial institutions to “record and report suspicious activity that might signify money laundering and fraud.”
Section 326 of Patriot Act (“Verification of Identification”) prescribes regulations establishing minimum standards for financial institutions and their customers regarding the identity of a customer that shall apply with the opening of an account at the financial institution.
As far as I know, Escrow.com was already KYC-compliant before it was purchased by Freelancer.com, otherwise it would not been allowed to operate.
Payoneer asks you to provide a copy of a government-issued ID, but that’s nothing new for them, it’s not starting from now on I mean.
So why Freelancer and their apparently “overzealous” guys are coming out now with that?
I suspect that’s another way of the company for freezing (and keeping) their customers money with the generic excuse of lack of verification related to money laundering and anti-terrorism regulations, which it looks they are using (and have used) as a pretext to keep their clients money, as the many negative online reviews and complaints about Freelancer scam-like “business model” testify …
That’s on top of the worsening of the service quality …
A warning to the guys at Freelancer/Escrow.com: if that’s your plan, better you get ready to get sued multiple times, and lose your license to operate “monetary services”, besides of course losing a lot of your clients.
A word to the wise … 🙂
Just an FYI, Per California regulations, customer funds are held in a non-interest account.
I know, but that has nothing to do with what I was referring to. 🙂
“but the strongest requirement comes from FinCEN and the US PATRIOT Act, section 326.”…………So these changes are to comply to the U.S. Patriot Act? The U.S. Patriot Act was signed into law in 2001. The bigger question is why did it take 15 years to comply to Federal law?
” The bigger question is why did it take 15 years to comply to Federal law?” Escrow.com is under new ownership. It was clear old ownership didn’t follow the law, everyone knew that but comfortably, we all enjoyed that ride and said nothing.
Martin – The Patriot Act is specific to REAL ESTATE ESCROW. For this reason they have been in compliance for over 15 years. This is a current overreach with an illegitimate excuse.
Escrowdotcom apparently switched banks under the new Freelancerdotcom ownership from Bank of America who had 15+ years of experience with escrow banking and long track record with escrowdotcom and Brandon Abbey.
–
Escrowdotcom chose Wells “creating accounts for their customers without permission to earn bonuses” Fargo as their new bank.
Wells Fargo has no experience running domain escrow like Bank of America had for 15 years and since Wells Fargo is under major heat for the shady stuff they did previously so there seems to be insanely strict demands.
–
The only question is did escrowdotcom ruin their Bank of America relationship because they wanted to save a few dollars by switching to Wells Fargo OR
did escrowdotcom ruin their Bank of America relationship by trying to be cool and techy and moving to San Francisco and the San Francisco Bank of America did not want the escrowdotcom business that the Los Angeles Bank of America had done flawlessly for 15 years.
–
Now escrowdotcom is much slower than under Brandon Abbey and the employees escrowdotcom now has seem clueless and their attitude is that despite them making several mistakes and taking a long time on a transaction everything is still fine as long as the seller got the money in the end.
–
New escrowdotcom:
-slower in sending closing statements
-slower in sending funds once closing statement is sent
-clueless employees
-some employees have attitudes that are not a good fit for customer service
-and to top it off they are now demanding ID copies from sellers AND buyers making for increased privacy risk for all and leading to more dropped transactions by buyers.
–
At the moment escrowdotcom seems ready to give the domain escrow business away if some escrow company steps up and works like old escrowdotcom did.
@Jan,
“Now escrowdotcom is much slower than under Brandon Abbey and the employees escrowdotcom now has seem clueless”
Some domainers keep saying Escrow.com has gone downhill. I’m not seeing what you’re seeing. On the contrary, I’ve seen them hold steady or even make significant improvements.
I cannot say you’re wrong. After all, it’s your own experience you’re describing. All I can know is my own experience with the company. And it seems fair to state for the record that – whatever some domainers are frustrated with – not all of us are experiencing the same difficulties. Don’t know why that is. But that’s the way it is.
I don’t say this to contradict you or deny the legitimacy of what you’ve observed. Only to balance 1 viewpoint with another.
Sometimes I wonder how much of this boils down to loyalty to Brandon Abbey, whom new management at Escrow.com replaced and who is now working with a competitor. But it’s not for me to judge from afar how other people’s transactions at Escrow.com are going. Mine have been fine.
I have done hundreds of transactions at Escrow.com and for the last 6+ months they have been simply slow and awful.
If Verification processing becomes an issue my goodness. I mean half the time buying or selling to non domainers is a process in itself in terms of transfer process. Now add to that the time and anxiety in waiting for parties to send in ID, will it be accepted etc.
First bad experience and I move on in a heart beat. I will gladly use another service. After over a decade and 7 figures in transactions with them it’s their loss.
Maybe this article will enlighten them to easing off for a while longer to get it right.
It is the classification of goods, that is very specific to that document, domains, and not the same thing as tires.
Their legal team can find a way around it, but it will take the say of all of you to let them know the type of buyers you deal with.
They don’t interact on the same level, buyers will not accept this.
They will say screw you, we will go over to godaddy, and put in our credit card, and buy a name, no verification needed for that.
Can’t blame Escrow.com for intrusive regulations at the level of the U.S. government. It’s not as if THEY want this as a company. What a huge deterrent to customer acquisition!
As frequent domain traders, we can complain about the hassle of sending in our own documentation. But that hassle only adds maybe an extra hour to the countless hours we already spend each year handling domain transactions. Our own compliance isn’t that big a deal.
But think of all the small and medium-sized domain sales with first-time customers that will face this extra hassle. Industry-wide, this means some of us will lose sales when buyers back out. And those buyers will lose the domain name they wanted, which is bad for their business too. Even if transactions go through, the process is more unpleasant. Buyers will be more suspicious about transacting with strangers online, not more confident.
Some day maybe everybody will have an Escrow.com account, just as so many people have Paypal accounts. But we’re not there yet. This added difficulty feels like getting a flat tire while going full speed on the highway. A real setback for domain sales.
Just completed the verification process. It was pretty seamless. If you follow the instructions, the approval process should be completed within 24 hours. At the end of the day, it may be a benefit to buyers and sellers; even though it is another intrusive tactic of big brother…
I was approved within hours today.
I think it is a good idea. Better late than never! IMO
@Andrew – Any idea why existing Escrow.com account holders have not already received notice of this change? I’m surprised something of this magnitude has not been more formally announced via press release or email to customers.
The added step is going to slow transactions and introduce another hurdle.
Hi Max,
We’re rolling out an email to all of our customers but with over a million we’re doing so over the week so that there isn’t a single rush on the verifications team. There’s also a banner when you login that lets you know that account verification is now required.
Cheers,
Jackson Elsegood
General Manager, Escrow.com
Jackson,
Are you implying over a million people have actually transacted using escrow.com? I have seen you mention this a few times. Regards,
Brandon
Payoneer escrow is an option. They are bigger than escrow.com. No problems there so far.
Is Payoneer demanding ID copies and utility bills from all their escrow customers (sellers AND buyers) like escrowdotcom is now doing?
All money transmitters, banks and other financial institutions in the US are required to verify their customer’s identity, the process can vary between institutions but is required to include an address and photo ID.
payoneer uses offshore bank. guess you are going to lose a good chunk of business to them. if these laws are specific to real estate, i am not sure why domain transactions are being caught up in it. it a shame really. i have used escrow.com pretty much exclusively but see no choice now but to look for other options as buyers won’t want to jump through more hoops. its hard enough to get them to do anything..
Mr Elsegood,
I think you should respond to some of the questions we raised in our post instead of repeating like a parrot the same old stuff.
Those regulations have been in place for years.
We suspect your “sudden” need of that “verification” is just another way of your company for freezing (and keeping) your customers money with the generic excuse of lack of verification, as you are doing (and have done) at Freelancer, where it looks scam is your “business model”.
Your very negative “track record” with clients at Freelancer, with thousands of complaints, is a clear proof of that.
I think you need to remove your tin hat on this. There’s no value to the company to freeze money. They don’t earn interest, and they are regulated so they don’t get to “keep” any more that’s not disbursed.
Hi Jan,
The answer is yes and no. We have built a very comprehensive KYC system to evaluate registrations. If we are unable to validate the persons identity we will ask for additional information. This is not new to us.
Best regards,
Brandon
Hi David,
Payoneer is a very strong company. If you didn’t see this you might find it interesting – https://techcrunch.com/2016/10/05/payoneer-raises-180-million-for-its-global-payments-technology/
Look for a lot of good things coming from Payoneer in 2017.
All the best,
Brandon
Will the ID copies escrowdotcom demands be held and the verification performed in their San Francisco office OR in their Vancouver Canada office OR their Sydney Australia office OR their Manila Philippines office?
Escrowdotcom seems to have clueless employees who do not know how to do their jobs:
https://medium.com/@forEmil/escrow-com-the-escrow-service-from-hell-2035923fc9f8#.4wixo790b
All of our employees pass through a strict vetting process in line with our escrow licenses. While this buyer had trouble with transferring a domain I’m glad to say we were eventually able to sort it out with them.
@ Jackson Elsegood
By “we were eventually able to sort it out with them” you mean that Escrow.com failed to complete the transaction, wasting over a month of buyer/seller’s time and $100 of buyer’s money, let alone getting the buyer so frustrated?
I definitely move to other platform than Escrow.com.
Today there are many choices.
It is true Escrow recently switched from a long standing relationship with BOA to Well Fargo, who has been under the radar for all of what they did.
I have no idea why anyone would want to bank with them, after all that.
They maybe requesting more regulations as they are under the microscope so to speak.
I saw Morgan Linton wrote a fluff piece that gave no details.
I see people saying it is not an issue, but speak to your buyers, they will drop like flies, and there is not much you can do about it after the fact, you will have to have contingencies in place as in a merchant account possibly.
when did this happen? as of late december i was still getting wires from escrow.com coming from bank of america.
“It is true Escrow recently switched from a long standing relationship with BOA to Well Fargo, who has been under the radar for all of what they did. I have no idea why anyone would want to bank with them, after all that.”
There is an old saying “tell me who you walk with and i’ll tell you who you are” … should I say more? 🙂
Brandon Abbey stated this it is well known, you seem to act like you know everything else surprised you missed the obvious
@Andrea Paladini,
“There is an old saying ‘tell me who you walk with and i’ll tell you who you are’ … should I say more?”
That’s crazy! Wells Fargo has 70 million customers. And you’re seriously implying that people who transact business through Wells Fargo aren’t trustworthy?
I maintain a Wells Fargo bank account because Bank of America literally has NO BANKS in certain states within the USA. Depending on where I am, if I have to go sign paperwork or deposit the odd paper check, then I’d have to drive 300 miles to the neighboring state just to find a Bank of America bank.
There are always a lot of factors in play for choosing a bank. And it’s unreasonable to the point of insanity to demand that 70 million people close their Wells Fargo accounts to please you.
I was not referring specifically to Wells Fargo. That’s a generic way of saying, I guess you didn’t get the right context of what I said.
I have no problem at all sending them my ID. Years back I did it with DNForum I sent them a copy of my bill for address verification. Just recently I did it with hostgator I sent them a copy of my ID to get web hosting service from them.
As a seller I also don’t have a problem submitting my ID for verification purposes. But that’s not the real problem here. Because of these extra security steps at Escrow.com there will now be an increased likelihood that buyers will cancel transactions due to the hurdle of providing a government-issued ID and proof of personal address for a simple one-time transaction. This will hurt sellers and Escrow in the long term.
Escrow.com has been slowly getting worse over the years. This is the last straw. No way would I ask a buyer to provide their drivers license to a random website and have them store your DL indefinitely.
I don’t like Escrow.com anymore either and consider them at most a “necessary evil” which I fortunately didn’t need for my last sale for which I used PayPal for $x,xxx. Nice and clean.
Well, I don’t have a drivers licence, no utility bills in my name. All I have is a card and bank account to pay via so that removes me from signing up for escrow.com
Nice to know before I wasted my time
Didn’t take long for this to hit me…closed a deal last night. Rather large and the woman asks we use escrow.com as she heard good things. I say sure thing and start walking through it, we got to Seller phone number and she balked. At this point I said they will want ID as well. Let’s just say this morning we are not using Escrow.com.
I speak with many people in a week and they dislike telling me details about themselves, this doesn’t help.
I have literally had people pen a new bank account to receive funds let alone give their ID freely to a company they don’t know.
I suspect existing users like myself who know they can trust escrow.com will have no issue with it…new users who are asked to use for first time, yikes.
So what did you use? Might as well finish your story with a happy ending
Oh ok, we decided on a simple domain contract I used in the past and a bankwire. I always do my research and if I feel I can trust them, I am ok with that. Its faster, cheaper but risky sure. In all we do in life trust is a factor. I have literally done millions in business via email and wire. Escrow.com is used by me generally when the buyer/seller wants to or I am buying from a country I cannot “reach” per say.
This isn’t risky at all. In fact, it’s actually the way it should be done. I don’t know why a lot of domainers think they need Escrow services. You don’t.
Escrow should only be used if the buyer doesn’t fully trust you and they should pay for it, if they want it. But you don’t actually need escrow to complete a deal.
Selling a domain is very simple …
1.
You’re in business right? … So act like it. Set up an LLC. In most states you can do this online, without the help of an attorney and the cost is around $150.
I suggest using an attorney if you don’t know what you’re doing, but I usually do these myself. I’ve been in business for over 23 years and know the deal.
2.
Set up a bank account for your business.
3.
When selling a domain, email the seller two things … a purchase agreement and an invoice. The invoice should be on your company letterhead and list your info, their info, what their buying, purchase price and bank wire remittance info.
4.
Have buyer sign the contract and invoice, scan it and email it back to you. Then buyer logs into their bank account online and shoots off a wire to your bank or physically goes to their bank and sends a wire.
5.
You receive wire next day. Transfer domain. Done deal!
6.
If they absolutely have to have escrow and you don’t want to use an escrow service like Escrow.com, then simply do this …
Have your attorney do escrow for you. Put it in the purchase agreement. Buyer sends wire to your attorney trust account. All attorneys have trust accounts (or at least reputable ones do).
Make buyer pay your lawyer’s fee for escrow. When wire hits, your attorney lets you know they have the funds. You transfer domain. Your attorney sends money to you, minus their escrow fee portion.
Best way to get your money from your attorney is to have an account at the same bank your attorney does, so when it comes time to get your money, all they have do is log in online to their trust account and transfer your money into your account, at the click of a button!
I’ve personally done both scenarios and I’ve never had an issue with closing a deal. If you have a legit professional website, with an 800 number, an address, buyers can talk to you, you use legal agreements with invoices … in other words … you’re a real professional acting business … serious buyers will not have a problem with either scenario above.
Your attorney already knows who you are and won’t ask for ID. And as long as you’re using a attorney that has a professional website, a telephone number to their firm, a physical address, they can be reached by phone, their reputation can be easily checked by a buyer – then real buyers won’t have an issue trusting to send money to your attorney.
7.
I would also suggest opening a merchant account, of which you will obviously have to be vetted for, but it’s only once and it won’t be required for your buyers.
Your merchant company can verify credit card transactions when processed, to make sure there is no fraud before you transfer domain.
I make buyers pay the merchant fee for the transaction and I add verbiage to the contract that leaves no wiggle room for a chargeback. I’ve never had a chargeback done and I only accept credit cards for transactions in 5-figures.
Six figure transactions and beyond must all be paid by wire. On my business as a whole, I only do transactions for 5 figures and beyond and most of my payments come by wire.
It appears to be quite a hassle. And I already had to send them an image of a card and signature years ago.
Does Payoneer really require anything like this too? I can’t find that. Can anyone point to where Payoneer says this kind of thing is required too? Has anyone used Payoneer yet? I’m certainly ready to start using them if it’s a better experience. They clearly are cheaper too.
Okay, I saw on the site that Payoneer *may* request some docs, but the whole feel re that issue seems far more customer friendly.
Just dawned on me, not that the Chinese love to use escrow.com but this sure doesn’t help. I once had a guy buy a name and when a Generals name was used I asked why, it was his Uncle in the Chinese Military and he had the ability to send/receive large sums where he did not or was afraid to. Imagine we tried using ID and bill route at escrow at that time ????
When I signed into my escrow.com ccount last night, I was asked to submit my ID and a another document for verication purposes.. I signed in today and it’s no longer asking me
please post services that do not require this. payoneer saying basically ‘it depends’ is not good enough
I also just tried to create a payoneer escrow account but seems needlessly complicated…you have to create two accounts to get paid out? a payoneer escrow account and then a regular payoneer account? very annoying and a huge turn off. make it easy!!!!
That’s true, I inquired Brandon as well about that “double” account.
As far as I know, Payoneer is working to unify the account to make it easy.
i will use it if/when they do. it makes more sense to be a stand alone product. most people won’t want/need a payoneer account.
Ditto this with Payoneer, get the account setup into a single account, and I will complete signup.
We are now using Paypal for $1000 or less, Sedo Escrow, and once Payoneer is ready we will try them.
I prefer there being a separate signup for the Payoneer payment product that includes a debitcard and a separate signup for Payoneer escrow.
:
I only need escrow service that is trustworthy and does not scare away buyers with ID and utility bill demands and I prefer the escrow service to be without buyer leaks and as simple as possible so as not to confuse buyers because many times domain purchases are impulse buys and many times the buyers are not too sophisticated.
:
Sedo’s escrow service at 3% and them taking control of the domain and immediately releasing funds after that and taking care of the customer support for the buyer in taking control of the domain would be perfect if the Sedo escrow would be on a dedicated site so there would be no chance of the buyer finding another domain at Sedo and purchasing that instead so there would be no buyer leaks.
:
If Payoneer keeps escrow separate and does not confuse the domain buyers with selling them a payment product and debitcard but instead just provides a straightforward escrow like old escrowdotcom under Brandon Abbey did then Payoneer escrow will become the market leader.
:
escrowdotcom was built by hundreds of domain investors referring escrowdotcom hundreds of buyers each during the years because escrowdotcom under Brandon Abbey was quick, efficient, easy and hassle free.
This absolutely free marketing by hundreds of people can easily be marketing Payoneer escrow if they keep the escrow product like old escrowdotcom was.
:
There should be NO confusing the buyers with payoneer payment product or payoneer debit card but the escrow service by Payoneer should be dedicated to just escrow and preferably on a dedicated escrow site and work like old escrowdotcom did.
:
Obviously Payoneer can up-sell these valuable leads on their other payment services and their Payoneer account and debitcard etc. but this should be done AFTER the escrow transaction has been completed and should be marketed to the really valuable leads (escrow service user referred to Payoneer by domain investor for free and the domain buyer had a good and hassle free experice with Payoneer escrow so they have a favorable opinion of Payoneer and who most likely does business through internet because they bought a domain for hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands of dollars etc) as an UPGRADE from Payoneer escrow in the style of:
You had a great experience with Payoneer escrow and we would like to tell you that we offer many more ways to pay and accept payments like the Payoneer account and Payoneer debitcard etc..
Sedo external escrow, 3% fee
yeah, sedo but main downside to them is that they are slow. you have to email them to start a transaction and might hear back a few days later. have to wait for them to accept transfer, etc.
I tried them recently, it took five days total for me to close the deal.
last time i used it, took 3 days just for someone to respond and start it.
Sedo needs a system where the seller can start escrow by themselves.
Dedicated site for just escrow service by Sedo that would prevent buyer leakage would make Sedo the market leader in escrow because escrowdotcom is somewhere very far away from the reality of domain sales with their over-reaching ID and utility bill demands from both sellers AND buyers.
:
Can Sedo do both of those things before Namescon?
They would get hundreds of millions in escrow transactions.
The sale will not remain private. In sales reports they claim it was them who sold the domain.
Seller can request that the sale is kept private when using Sedo just for escrow.
:
Sedo escrow charges 3% and takes control of the domain and sends seller the money while the domain is in Sedos control and Sedo also handles transfer of the domain to buyers meaning no newbie tech support from the domain seller to the domain buyer is needed.
:
If Sedo would have a dedicated escrow site meaning no lost sales to buyers finding another possible domain to buy then Sedo would own the space escrowdotcom currently owns very soon IF Sedo does NOT start demanding copies of ID’s and utility bills from sellers AND buyers like escrowdotcom has decided to do.
we need to bug sedo to make this happen. it wouldn’t take much for them to set it up so its more automated.
“I think you need to remove your tin hat on this. There’s no value to the company to freeze money. They don’t earn interest, and they are regulated so they don’t get to “keep” any more that’s not disbursed.”
@ Andrew Allemann:
Thanks, but I don’t need “tin hat” lessons from you.
I perfectly know they don’t earn interest, but unfortunately there are many ways of making money “disappear”, especially online.
No offense, but maybe it’s you who have to “remove your slices of ham from your eyes”, as we say here, getting better informed about what you are talking about.
Before judging others I’d suggest to check at home, with all your conflicts of interest, involving you and your advertisers, public and “private” backers.
As regards your out of place “tin hat” or “conspiracy” thing, it’s typical of who has nothing smarter/ better (or nothing at all) to say.
I’d suggest you to check Freelancer horrible track record with clients and all what’s around that instead of talking about hot air.
I’m used to analyze facts, and facts speak louder than words.
These guys are heavily regulated. Audited by the state. Keep separate bank accounts b/t escrow and operating. They don’t benefit from holding your money an extra week unless it’s to cut down on potential fraud. So, other than outright stealing money and then shutting down the business, why would they do this? And why go through the hassle of collecting all of this info to be in compliance right before committing fraud? It makes no sense. If they wanted to commit fraud they’d just not pay you and keep the money.
It’s more complex than you think.
Oh yeah? How so?
I’m sure you can find out by yourself. 🙂
exactly. nothing.
Escrow.com could move its core operation to another jurisdiction to overcome this friction. The buyer abandonment rate is going to go up with this. Hopefully Uniregistry Market SSE will take care of the lower value sales from now on.
@Andrew Allemann
Nothing for you maybe.
Generally speaking, those people who, for their own interests, close not only one eye but both of them, won’t make things disappear, truth always comes out, sooner or later (more sooner than later) … and at that point someone will have to pay …
Bootlicking is really a bad disease … good luck to those who make a living from it …
@Andrea Paladini,
Slow down for a second. You’re insinuating a conspiracy on the part of Escrow.com to cheat customers:
“just another way of … freezing (and keeping) your customers money with the generic excuse of lack of verification, as you are doing (and have done) at Freelancer, where it looks scam is your ‘business model’.”
Some of us don’t see that. Rather than call us bootlickers, why not lay out your case? How – specifically – is Escrow.com making money from this change? In theory, how would they profit? And what facts, if any, indicate that they’re deliberately cheating everyone?
I won’t dismiss you as a “conspiracy theorist”, Andrea, because banks and other financial firms often DO engage in conspiracies to cheat their customers. Wells Fargo, incontrovertibly, is a case in point.
But the hypothesis doesn’t make sense to me yet. And even if it were plausible, don’t we need to assemble a few facts before passing judgment? Intuition – even as oracular as yours may be –isn’t enough to persuade other people. We don’t see what you say you see. Please explain. Or, if you can’t, please consider whether you’re mistaken and possibly slandering a company that’s doing its best.
Obviously, a lot of people in this thread dislike Escrow.com intensely. So if you can make your case, some of those people will be happy to believe, as you do, that there’s a conspiracy at work here. If Andrew and I are too skeptical and blind, bypass us and muster your evidence to persuade those other people.
I see no conspiracy. Escrow.com will lose customers and lose money by adding extra requirements for account verification. Could they possibly cheat enough existing customers to compensate for that loss?
@Joseph
I never mentioned any “conspiracy”, and I’ve already said what I think about people who use that term …
About Freelancer, I’d suggest you to check their horrible reputation and the thousands of complaints from their clients.
Yes, I think that’s a scam-like business model, and sooner or later Authorities will wake up …
Frankly speaking, we feel more and more uncomfortable to do business with a company of that kind.
FYI, we stopped using Escrow.com when Freelancer purchased it and I don’t think we’ll use it again in the future unless ownership changes and the new owner is a trustworthy entity.
IMHO Escrow.com was a great company to work with before being acquired by Freelancer, now we don’t feel comfortable and safe dealing with them.
Never called you “bootlicker”, since I never talk to you before about this matter. I was clearly not referring to you.
” … because banks and other financial firms often DO engage in conspiracies to cheat their customers. Wells Fargo, incontrovertibly, is a case in point.”
I’ve been involved in the financial industry for 20+ years, I’ve worked on many corporate frauds and mismanagement cases and let me tell you that Wells Fargo is just one of the many cases, just the tip of the iceberg, nothing new under the sun for how I know the business. Unfortunately fraud and scams, in different forms, are a widespread practice.
I’ll let competent authorities to “make a case” in due time.
Peace 🙂
What are you whining about, he spoke the truth.
In America you just can’t seize an escrow account, because they have an inaccurate address, those funds need to source back to where they came from.
You act like a whiny teenager when you don’t understand things or get your way, seriously relax.
Unlike you, Ron, I don’t use an anonymous nick, so before judging people put your “face” on the things you say.
I’m fully relaxed, I think it’s you who are talking abut things you don’t know or without understanding what I wrote above.
I believe Andrew Alleman is being a good journalist by covering this issue.
Most other blogs are silent or some post fluffy-fluff pieces about how great escrowdotcom is like the man with a clothing fitting startup just did by posting fluffiest fluff I have seen in a while.
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Andrew Alleman is right that there is no benefit to doing this for escrowdotcom because they can’t touch the money in escrow (whereas freelancer can take money from freelancers and buyers of freelance services and not return it depending on their terms)
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The internet is full of people complaining how freelancerdotcom did them wrong and took their money so the business smarts of freelancerdotcom leadership is questionable.
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I am thinking escrowdotcom probably lost the good connection they had with Bank of America by getting rid of Brandon Abbey and topped this up with bad attitude from leadership towards BOA.
(When current escrowdotcom employees act cluelessly or show wrong kind of attitude and behavior in customer service jobs the failing has to come from the top because successful companies with good leadership either re-train employees or get rid of people who give bad customer service).
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Then escrowdotcom made the techy and cool move to San Francisco in order to lure start-up types to work at the company that was all about funds transfer and customer service with the least amount of hassle and complications under Brandon Abbey.
Results:
Nicer interface but otherwise speed has dropped and there are complications in even simple things on basic escrow due to hiring people who seem to not have a clue about domains.
The concierge service is a joke which adds complications when one uses it.
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Inability to process complaints and improve operations based on complaints leads to failing organizations.
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The move to San Francisco was probably the last push to losing Bank of America OR then escrowdotcom leadership decided to go with shady Wells Fargo (who is under a microscope for creating fake accounts for their customers) to save a few dollars as a business decision.
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Now escrowdotcom is demanding copies of ID’s and utility bills from all it’s 1 million customers probably due to a bureaucratic over-reach inside escrowdotcom or they were demanded this over-reach by Wells Fargo because they know they are under a microscope for past wrongdoing.
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Is escrow.com storing and verifying the 1 million customer ID database in their office in San Francisco OR in The Philippines at their Manila office?
You know sometimes Escrow doesn’t even bother answering emails.
How a company like that does not have ticket #’s eludes me.
Jackson — I’ve been using Escrow.com for over a decade; always with great service and results. And while I miss working with Brandon and the others who are no longer there (a terrible mistake), I’d like to continue to do so.
However, if you don’t specifically address the many valid questions and concerns of my fellow domainers above, I will have no choice but to join the many others who are moving their business to other providers like Payoneer and/or Sedo escrow.
As others have pointed out; while as a frequent, legitimate seller I have no problem supplying this information; many buyers — especially one-time-only buyers — absolutely will not agree to such onerous ID requirements. If this “requirement” of yours doesn’t go into effect until 2018 (if ever for domain-specific sales), you should wait until them to implement it.
I’m currently involved in negotiations for a very large, high value bulk sale from my availables portfolio.
Assuming a successful outcome, will it be Escrow.com who handles the sale or someone else?
I absolutely refuse to lose any sales over this.
It’s nice when other people are willing to speak up and speak out too. For instance, I’m confident I’m hardly alone in this despite being the only one to say something so far: https://www.thedomains.com/2017/01/13/good-bad-ugly-namecheap/#comments
Further up I posted that I don’t like Escrow.com anymore. Never thought I’d ever feel that way, and always regarded them as something great in the industry before the big transition.
To be a little more expansive, it’s not merely that I don’t like Escrow.com anymore.
Upon a little further reflection I can honestly say that I actually hate Escrow.com now.
They lost another new deal with me just yesterday, by the way, as my buyer first suggested using them, but I persuaded him to use PayPal instead.
This latest onerous hassle involving ID’s and documents – which does not even appear to be a true legal requirement but rather merely their own imposition of their own requirement – is merely the latest reason.
I won’t elaborate, but the main reason which led to how I feel about Escrow.com now involves a long, protracted, and last I checked, unresolved support issue, and the attitude and treatment of the support staff involved. And it is over something so basic, simple, and fundamental to such systems that one can hardly even believe such an issue should be going on at all. The lack of resolution alone is appalling enough, but the whole attitude and types of communication (or noncommunication) I have experienced in addressing it is both appalling and insulting.
Now Payoneer actually appears very promising, and I recommend people give Payoneer a chance.
Yes, I was a bit confused and surprised about the two accounts thing. For instance, I first opened a Payoneer account and thought that was it. But then some time later, days perhaps, it was only by “accident” that I even discovered that was not enough and that I also had to open a Payoneer escrow account on a subdomain. That was awkward and bit concerning, but nonetheless their service still appears very promising, and their customer UI appears very promising too.
I added some funding sources to my new Payoneer account. The process went as smooth as silk, and was completed in minutes. So if this onerous demand Escrow.com is imposing regarding ID and documents is a true legal requirement, why didn’t Payoneer demand this too? Payoneer didn’t even require the days of waiting for something like two little deposits to the funding source to be verified. They simply emailed back minutes later saying my funding sources had been confirmed. And when I searched about whether Payoneer requires the items Escrow.com is now demanding, the most I found on their site is that they may ask for something like that at some point. Okay, that’s not too bad even though it would be preferable to have more clarity.
Has anyone used Payoneer yet?
There is also another escrow option which people should look into and consider, which I haven’t used yet: Epik.com. I haven’t used their escrow yet, but I can tell you it is a spectacular registrar with spectacular service and a spectacular account management system with great features.
Thank you for a very informative comment.
I will be trying Payoneer escrow.
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What is the signup link for Payoneer escrow?
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I just need escrow.
I already got enough creditcards, debitcards,bank accounts and paypal so I need just the escrow service and not the other services payoneer provides.
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escrowdotcom is no longer an option with the ID and utility bill demands from all sellers AND buyers being the final push to move away after freelancerdotcom got rid of previous escrowdotcom employees, started providing clueless customer service at escrowdotcom with some employees having an attitude that customer service employees should never have.
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Sending of closing statements at escrowdotcom started taking longer and sending funds started taking longer after closing statement and concierge service was NOTHING like it was advertised as and using Concierge instead made transactions more complicated due to the incompetence of escrowdotcom employees and escrowdotcom employees attitude was that they do everything right and there is no reason to complain (about the slow basic escrow or the useless concierge escrow) since I get the funds in the end.
Thanks Jan. The escrow service is on their subdomain (spaces added here to avoid the moderation queue):
https : // escrow . payoneer . com /
I actually still don’t know if you have to have a regular Payoneer account in addition to an escrow account because I got the first one first thinking that was it originally. However, you can link them, and the customer UI and the linkage appears to be good, clean, and very promising in terms of quality. One account would certainly be preferable but I’m glad to have them anyway and don’t feel overburdened at the moment. I think it’s possible you may need the main account for dealing with funds, but frankly I’m not even sure yet.
Would love to hear from anyone who has used them for domain escrow already.
There’s also Epik.com I mentioned above too.
P.S. In case I’m slow to reply, FYI I don’t get the automated comment update emails anymore, so I don’t see any replies on the blog unless I personally revisit the threads. Appears to just be a plugin issue.
payoneer no longer does escrow. fyi
P.S. When adding a funding source, you may get a follow up email asking some questions for clarification, but that process went as smooth as silk too.
(Folks be sure to check back later because I just left a huge post which is awaiting moderation.)
FYI I’ve just found out that someone from Escrow.com has accessed without authorization our account and has modified some of our Personal and Security Information settings …
That’s totally unacceptable, no way we are going to do business again with them.
We’ll close our account very soon.
Beware people …
Could you give more details, like why they did that ?
I’LL USE UNIREGISTRY AND AVOID ESCROW.COM LIKE THE PLAGUE. SMALL BUSINESS OWNERS ARE NOT HAPPY ABOUT SENDING THEIR ID, UTILITY BILL AND FORMATION PAPERS TO STRANGERS THAT MAY BE OUT OF THE COUNTRY.