Protecting yourself as a buyer

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Posted By: Dave F

I have a BIN I am looking at on ebay. It is in the neighborhood of about $800. Paypal is not accepted...usually thats how I'd just go ahead and pay. The payment method of choice is money orders. It is a fairly big time dealer...good feedback and all. I'm not too concerned in it being a huge risk....but at the same time, I've never sent a $800 money order before. Is there something I should do to protect myself with that? Should I have the money order delivered with a delivery confirmation or something?

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Posted By: Mark T

has a way where you can see if it was cashed. I would go by his feedback, if its great then go for it.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

I just send money orders with an envelope and a first class stamp. Never had a problem.

Edited to add I always use postal money orders as there is some protection with those.

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Posted By: Adam

I have only had one bad experience on eBay and it involved a seller who wanted payment by money order (it was for a high priced Mickey Mantle card). I bought a post office money order and, after waiting a solid month for the card, I contacted him since I still had not received the item. He claimed he never received my money order and thus he never sent me the card.

So I went to the post office and filled out a "missing money order" form, paid something around $2.00 for the post office to process the form, and then in a few weeks the post office sent me a photocopy of the back of the money order with the guys signature on it. Once I scanned that in and emailed it to the seller, he appologized for his error and sent me the card the next day.

So the lesson I learned is it is ok to pay with a money order, but use a post office money order and keep that little money order stub with the sereial number in case you have to fill out a missing money order form later down the road.

p.s.- I must admit, I now rarely, rarely bid on anything if they do not accept paypal . . . it's just such a more efficient way of doing things in my opinion.

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Posted By: Lee

It may have been $2.00 for a missing money order form processing a few years ago, but it is $25 now. $25 is better than loosing a lot more nowdays!

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Posted By: John E

Use the checks that come with your credit card. They offer the same protection as if you had actually used your card. You may want to review the terms of your credit card however because it probably will be treated as a cash advance.

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Posted By: Scott L

a few weeks ago and sent it with signature confirmation just to be sure. I had the same concerns you did.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

It's odd that I sometimes worry about a money order getting to its destination, but I never worry about my mortgage check or any bill payments getting to their destination.

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Posted By: Joann

So what exactly is the difference between postal and bank MO's? I don't use MO's often, but when I do I go to the bank just b/c it's closer and more convenient.

Is there something about postal MO's that makes them preferable that I'm missing?

Thx,

Joann

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Posted By: Dave F

I've always gotten mine in the past at the grocery store...(Kroger)..which I think carries Western Union or something like that....and if this was $100 or $200 it would be different..or even a member here off the board..but just never know when dealing with ebay...strange things happen.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Postal money orders are cheaper than my banks - 85 cents at the post office, and $2.00 at my bank. I just feel better knowing that I can check to see if a postal MO has been cashed and I have recourse in case it doesn't get there. I have no idea how my bank backs up their MO's.

The other advantage of a postal money order is you can mail out the money order immediately after buying it since you're already at the post office.