Bitcoin Forum

I'm running latest windows client.  Sent 0.02 BTC to someone and couldn't get it to not charge .01 transaction fee.  Found this really odd...If I send 1.00BTC don't get charged a fee, but get charged if its less than 1.00?  Doesn't seem right...

I dont understand that fee system either, I've read the wiki about it and all, But basicly i only want to pay fees if i MUST pay them.
But i cant confirm any transaction without paying that 0.01 fee. Did i do something wrong?

In options you can set fee to 0.00

Can send w/o paying a fee for anything +>1.00BTC but if its less, ie 0.02 I get charged the fee.

Which really doesn't seem right at all...

Maybe this helps a bit:
https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Transaction_fees (https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Transaction_fees)

But: According to that, it shouldn't have charged you a transaction fee, since the transaction is above 0.01 bc:

On the wiki there's another part when you will be charged a fee, based on the kb size of the transaction - but i still don't get that part, so can't explain.

I agree.

If bitcoin is to be usable as an every currency, you have to be able to give small amount without high charge cost.

With the ever increasing value of the coin, you are gonna see small transaction more and more

0,01 BTC is worth about 20-25 cents.  which is huge is you are buying something like a pack of gum. What's the point of getting rid of governement intervention in the money if it's shakel ourself with a "transaction tax".

Maybe a flat 1% fee would be better.

I heard that if you send a bitcoin that hasn't 'matured' for a while, the fee gets imposed. I can't say if this is true or not.

I'm not sure how this system works. Sending something bigger than 0.01 (for example 0.10) it asks for a 0.01 fee (why?). And if I want to send 1 BTC it asks for a 0.04 fee, 2 BTC asks for a 0.05 fee. I've disabled it in options, so it's kind of weird in my opinion... Especially because the fee just will be added on top of the 50 BTC that is earned by finding a block.

The fee system is strange, and not very transparent.  It will probably improve soon.

When you try to spend, your client gathers smaller amounts from your wallet to total more than you are trying to spend, then sends the amount you want to send to the recipient, and the change to a new address in your wallet.  The more transactions it has to gather, the bigger the block will be.  If the block is large, and the transactions are low priority (age increases priority), it will attempt to include a fee.

Other nodes also check incoming transactions, and they may refuse to relay your transaction if it is large (in bytes, not coins) and/or low priority and doesn't include a fee.

Nodes and miners are free to change their own local rules for accepting and relaying transactions, but this isn't currently easy since it involves recompiling the client, or using an alternative client.  Again, this will be improving soon.

Well, the BTC I have are definitely matured, so its not that.

I've read the wiki carefully.  In practice I can send 1.00 BTC or greater with no fee.

Less than 1.00 and I get charged a fee.  

The fee schedule is flexible. Individual miners can refuse to process transactions without fees, and clients can refuse to send transactions paying fees.

The default client has a 0.01 BTC limit. This is in the process of being changed to something like 0.0001 BTC. Bitcoins were worth only about a dollar US 2 months ago.

I've been cashing out my mining earnings a lot, and all are kind of below 0.10. Do you recommend to cashout bigger amounts to prevent the fees? (For example 0.50?).

Also, what is called 'mature'. When it has 1000 verifications? Or 500? Etc.

Thanks for clearing something up though. ;)

I have an incoming transaction for 0.01157234 bitcoins from a mining pool. I guess the mining pool did not put a fee in it to send it out. So now no one is processing this payment and it is sitting there for hours as unconfirmed. I thought bitcoins was an instant transaction system. And now even if I get the 0.01157234 I can not even send 0.00001000 to a friend as test?? Very disappointing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_4wqNLE5TY (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_4wqNLE5TY)

I believe the enforced fee for lower amounts is to prevent spamming the system with large amounts of tiny transactions. The next version of the client will allow the minimum fee to be 0.0005.

As someone mentioned, back when the transaction fee was imposed, 0.01 BTC was a mere fraction of a penny in USD.  You'll have to wait for the next version of the client to come out to send the new 0.0005 free, and I suspect the big pooled miners might also have to switch to the new bitcoind.exe daemon.  The transaction fee issue is one of the growing pains of Bitcoin, so we just have to be patient.

Allocator, the transaction is instantly *broadcasted* and thus we can see it on http://bitcoincharts.com/bitcoin/ right now if we want to.  As it ages, it'll get higher priority, and someone is likely to accept it soon.  For comparison, debit/credit transactions can take several days to confirm, even though the merchant treats it as if it was already confirmed so you can go about your way with your purchase.

I heard you can switch to an older version of the client (0.3.20?) to get around some of the currently imposed transaction fees.

--E

Glad that this is in effect, actually.

yeah, my transaction now has 2 confirms and it shows up here http://blockexplorer.com/address/15tDuX1PnEAT7jL7LJFmJPgSEgmUMQapfK

I tried to send 0.01 to my friend, but it said I need to pay 0.01 fee, because I just got it. Maybe after some time it will work.

One thing's for sure.  I am not going to begin offering anything for bitcoin until the fees are fixed.  It would discredit me because the way it is set up right now is so unprofessional.  I have written before about fees and I'll recap real quick:

* The previous system was awesome, where users could optionally add a fee, and there was a notice about how if you don't pay the fee, you'll have low priority.

* Fees do not prevent an attacker from spamming.  A determined attacker will simply use a different client.  By putting this ineffective measure in the official client, we only punish legitimate users.

* Fees of any size are extremely chilling to micro-transactions.  This defeats one of the huge selling points of bitcoin.  Changing from .01 to .005 or .0001 is just a bandaid fix and doesn't truly address this issue.

* Fees act as an unfair tax on people who use the default client.  We are essentially punishing people for using the frontpage client from bitcoin.org!

* Fees prevent people from "test driving" bitcoins when they first get them.  Many users' very first experience with a real live bitcoin is a scary popup message with a draconian fee rule.

I strongly urge the developers to release an emergency update to the client to remove fees and return to the old optional fee input box.

Please direct me to this other client that can cause other nodes on the network to accept and relay my fee-less spam transactions.

That is not the issue.  The issue is that a determined attacker can broadcast transactions arbitrarily fast.  You are right that other nodes can choose to ignore them, but that's not the issue.  And anyway, that just furthers the case for removing fees as an anti-spam measure.

I assure you there are no broadcasts involved, TCP is a one to one channel.

The standard fee is included so that people don't make spends that never get accepted by the network, which is largely the default client.  As other node software springs up, the rules for both will become far more flexible.

On the wiki it states a workaround to the fee by using a different client (i.e. the 0.01 transaction fee is built in to the standard client). Is there a list somewhere, or can you name any alternative clients that do not enforce the fee?