> The problem is there is no real secure way of international
> payment short of a money transfer direct to your bank account.
> Cheques (or checks as they are called in the USA) are a good
> as a person's promise

Actually even that is not 100% safe. It requires providing your bank account
number, and a cunning individual can counterfeit checks (cheques for you
Canadians) under that number if the account number you provided is for a
checking (Chequing? Chequeing? :-) account. I keep a separate no-fee account
with $100 in it just to provide to people I don't know who want to send me
bank transfers. Once the money arrives I transfer it to my regular account.
As I said, Western Union is the only 100% safe method for international
payment that I know of. They pay you cash. If there is a way to get that
back out of my pocket, I don't know of it. :-)   As a retailer, I literally
get a few obvious attempts at fraudulent international orders every week
(counterfeit bank checks, stolen credit card numbers or Paypal accounts,
etc..almost entirely from overseas) so I have some experience in this. When
something looks fishy I ask for Western Union, and usually never hear from
the person again.

I also suggested, to the original poster (via email) that he look over
bidpay.com. I used it a few times when it was owned by Western Union, at
which time BidPay literally mailed you a Western Union money order as your
payment. Western Uinion closed the service, and apparantly sold the brand
recently. As far as I can tell (with a cursary glance) the current
reincarnation appears to be PayPal-like but offers their version of Seller
Protection for international shipments as well. (Please check, I didn't read
the fine print.) However, like the original BidPay, it seems to be available
for Ebay transactions only.

> PayPal, Visa, MasterCard etc are not good for the exact
> reasons that Ron described.  I have had one person try to
> take me for about $1800 USD with a charge back to MasterCard
> as the goods I sold them wasn't to their liking - nothing
> wrong with it, they just didn't want it once they got it.  I
> would have had no problem giving them a refund provided they
> sent the item back to me, but apparently according to the
> customer and to MasterCard keeping the item and their money
> is perfectly acceptable.

I had the same experience once.  MC/Visa tend to side with the cardholder at
first, even in cases of blatant cardholder dishonesty. But I keep good
records, and diligently fight these situations with documentation. I have
eventually won every time except once. In that one isolated case (a customer
ordered a product in beige and simply didn't care for the shade of beige),
the cardholder got to keep his purchase AND his money. How fair is that?
:-(

Incidentally, I would argue that this actually IS Vanagon related subject
matter (with the admitted exception of my last comment). Vanagons being a
German product and most members of this list being in the U.S. and Canada
(themselves two different countries), many list members have bought/sold
parts (or even whole Vanagons) internationally. A discussion of safe or
unsafe payment options for international transactions has direct relevance
to Vanagon ownership for many listmembers, even though the original post
happened to be non-Vanagon related.   Of course if Jim disgreees, I will
completely respect his decision and humbly offer my apologies.

- Ron Salmon
  The Bus Depot, Inc.
  www.busdepot.com
  (215)  234-VWVW

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