Bitcoin Forum

Hey there, Bitcoin experts. Need some advice from you:

My needs are fairly simple; I need a reliable vendor that will allow me to purchase BTC using USD in a straightforward way. I've been using CoinBase successfully for the last few months. My typical monthly usage pattern is:

- Purchase $2,000 - $5,000 of Bitcoin using an ACH link to a USD-denominated account at Bank of America.

- Once Bitcoins are delivered 2-3 days later, they're immediately sent to a mixer which then forwards them to some external wallets that I control.

..and that's about it. I never need to sell the BTC for USD. The BTC I purchase are typically used to pay vendors and other parties with whom I do business. Unless I'm in a midst of a transaction, my USD and BTC balance at CoinBase is kept at zero. Pretty boring stuff. Anyway, CoinBase seems to struggling as of late.

A few days ago when attempting to execute a relatively small purchase ($1,000) I got an error message stating that I need to fill out an extended due diligence form. Not a huge deal, just standard KYC (know your customer) kind of stuff. I provided the necessary documentation but it was never acknowledged. The ACH link seems to be permanently disabled and continually shows this same error message.

I tried linking to other accounts at major banks and although I never received an error message, the micro-deposits used to verify account ownership never arrived.

Posting messages to their support forum yields, "A moderator must approve of your message." And it's never approved.

Messages to their email support have gone unanswered for days.

Creating new support incidents in their help system appears to work but no one ever responds.

In parallel with these problems, there were two other major red flags unrelated to my specific support incidents:
(1) Searching #coinbase on Twitter today yielded an article about a site hack at Coinbase (no balances were stolen).
(2) Today when once again attempting to add an ACH link to a major US bank, instead of simply asking for a routing number and account number, it actually asked for the username and password for my bank account. What's worse, it asked that the extended security on my bank account (i.e. two-factor authentication, etc.) be disabled... HUGE RED FLAG.

I'm not sure what's going on at CoinBase but I'm worried enough at this point that I'm closing out my bank links and changing all of my bank passwords.

What would be a suitable replacement for me given the information I provided about my typical usage scenario? I did a bit of digging and others who are concerned about the situation at CoinBase brought up BitStamp as an alternative. What's your opinion on BitStamp and more importantly, are there other vendors that you feel might be more suitable for me? I'd love to hear your take on the pros/cons of various vendors or exchanges.

Thanks in advance.

Best,

Nostril

That'sinteresting to hear your experience with coinbase. it seems like none of the exchanges are anywhere near problem-free, including coinbase. I've had troubles with them myself, and they cancelled my account after about three months.I can't say I would recommend any other exchange necessarily.  Obviously I'm wearing a yobit signature and I've had a gilood experience with them. You might be able to work out a deal with any one of the trusted members on this forum, but watch out. There are scammers everywhere.

check out http://circle.com

circle > coinbase

Can anyone else validate the claims made by the OP?

This member is new and with his/her first post has discredited a major online wallet player. I'm skeptical that the claims about Coinbase are valid...can anyone confirm similar troubles? If not, I think we need to dismiss this as bogus or user (OP) error.

@HabBear: All you had to do is search Twitter and you could've seen the notice I was referring to. But here, let me take care of that for you:

http://forklog.net/hackers-brought-down-coinbase/
http://www.techworm.net/2015/12/hacker-ddos-coinbase-website-down.html

Seriously dude, it must be exhausting living life afflicted by such paranoia about the motives of random forum posters.

To everyone else who actually provided me with useful suggestions here and on Reddit, thank you very much. I'm going to check out each of the sites you recommended. Bitstamp and Kraken seem to be the favorites. Will check out Circle as well.

Best..

If you're in the US use Itbit. Your money will be fully insured and once the KYC stuff is out of the way there's no reason for them to ask you again. I get the impression Coinbase is a lot more paranoid because they're more of a retailer.

I also would like to suggest you to use itbit to purchase btc from USA because it has more secure and has much safety for you amount than coinbase so you must give try to itbit there.