Bitcoin Forum

I'm considering switching to OKpay (from Dwolla) for executing USD monetary transfers between my bank and exchanges like Mt. Gox.  I noticed, however, that to avoid the low 300 EUR limit for daily withdrawals on OKpay, you first have to verify your account, which requires giving OKpay all your personal details including photo IDs, etc.  I'm generally leery about giving this much information to an institution unless it is highly reputable; you don't want to risk that at some point they might cut and run after selling all of their customers' ID info to identity thieves.  If your identity gets stolen, it can be a huge hassle and take you a long time to recover from that event.

So my question is, do you personally think that OKpay can be trusted well enough to give your photo IDs etc. to them.  If so, why?  Do you know for sure that the individuals who run the site could be held accountable by some government if some event such as mass identity theft of their customers were to happen?  Or if not, why not?  Do you have any reasons to be suspicious of them?

Thanks very much for any opinions...

Risk of OKPay scamming you / being irresponsible with either your money or your identity?  Relatively low.  
  OKPAY Inc - Founded 2007 by industry veterans.  Based out of the British Virgin Islands.

Risk of your identity provided to OKPay being accessible as part of standard reporting to financial regulators, or ending up in the hands of auditors, staff, janitor who happens to be very fond of a laptop that was left unsecured overnight?  Very high.   [Edit: Well, high for the "reporting to regulators".  Hopefuly the risk of the janitor getting your records is low.]

If you do not want your identity and your associated transaction history to some day end up in the hands of others (or "out in the wild" if the result of a hack) then don't use the banking system.   There's just no other way to say it.  There is no "safe"  method of using the banking without the risk that your identity will be exposed.

If you are willing to "chance it" by using them without providing identity, and then for whatever reason they lock your account until you provide AML documents, then that's something you can do.  But know that with every additional transaction you make through them comes an increase in the likelihood that you will be asked given the option to either provide identity or abandon the account and any funds held.

Thanks for your perspective, that is helpful.  I also found this review:  http://www.ptc-investigation.com/pages/okpay.aspx (http://www.ptc-investigation.com/pages/okpay.aspx)

P.S.  I did also see a couple of reports online from people saying they got locked out of their merchant accounts after building up large balances... So maybe they are not trustworthy to hold large amounts.

Hi guys, let me assure you that the only ones complaining are real scammers that got busted by our security dept. As you know such people will do anything possible to discrete our name except providing required documents/proof/etc. Nothing to do with bitcoin thought. You can stay unverified as long as you use your 300 EUR monlthy limit or approve your account and get full access.
Don't understand what's the deal with http://www.ptc-investigation.com/pages/okpay.aspx website anyway. Does it look legit? Nope! haha. most of the info is outdated there and why even trust such resources? When you can get all the information from the first source.
Stephen Gornick is right, identification is required if you are going to use bank or related services.

I'm thinking of using OKPay as it seems to have the only debit card available that is loadable by BTC.

Hi
Just wanted to say I m disappointed with OKpay.
They advised me to reupload different documents to get my account validated. No problem. I did
Weeks passed and I received no replies to my support tickets.
So I removed my docs and gave up.

Regards

OKPay is pretty cheap and works great sending to BTC-E (trigger from BTC-e side)

mt gox to OKPay was slow since Mt Gox needed to put money in reserve so it was a hassle.. but that might be the case with all exhanges with $$ leaving them.

I didn't try the other way around..  I was making money on the 10$ arbitrage that was around for a while but the gap closed which means everyone is using it

I have two tickets about my $20000 hold since April 24th, and verified document, now I have prepared all but this ticket is not responced, please give an explanation today, and I have paied $10 for fast verification, why it delayed so many days? This is not a small problem.

SR13040032435 Apr 29, 2013
by OKPAY Support i have send 2 wire transfer to OKPAY Funding

SR13040037860 Apr 29, 2013
by OKPAY Support OKPAY Account Verification * Account Paid

I've been moving six figures around okpay for months without issue. They're picky when it comes to verification but. Once you've been verified things seem smooth enough.

Please do note that these guys are semi-located in Cyprus.

Yes I read they were affected by the confiscation/capital controls

https://www.okpay.com/en/company/news/cyprus-bailout-impact.html

Also, I dont mind them being picky. I do mind being totally ignored though.
I ll skip this site

I dont think Okpay is "okay" AT ALL!


Coins are loved by many because they are private P2P, Photo ID?

Where is the anonymity in that?

Unfortunately due to the reversibility of most payment methods for fiat currencies, I'd verification must be taken very seriously - this is good for us and them.

 If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquillity of servitude than the animating contest of freedom—go from us in peace.
 We ask not your counsels or arms.
 Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you.
 May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!- Sam Adams

Use bitinstant and pay higher fees for your annomity then use localbitcoins to get cash back if you need but you'll pay more each way

All I can say about OKPAY is really OK! Like it, already using more than 2 years without any problem. Even they improved the support that was a little slow in the start.

Only problem is I can't send funds to BTC-e now.

Where you guys buying coins with OkPayUSD now?

be careful with the verification docs, these guys are the pickiest swines out there on what they accept....o and there slower to verify than mtgox...

after many a support argument, i gave up....mostly because I dont see why they need to see how much I pay for my gas supply, when everything else they needed was on the scan.....which was fine for everywhere else

So...ill not be using okpay....ever, life is too short

I too found them to be a bit picky, but once your up and verified (multiple times) they seem to leave ya alone for good. Not to mention the limits are 1,000,000 EUR/month.

i've been using okpay for several weeks now without problems at gox and btce.

btce okpay deposits will be back next week, promised for may 20th.

there's a withdrawal delay sometimes when gox is out of reserves, though, while btce okpay deposits are usually instant.

wire transfer in to okpay usually also ok, sometimes takes longer if details not exactly correct -- had one that went through an intermediary bank that somehow changed the transfer details (amount, comment), and that took some time for support to track down. all other wire transfers (10+) arrived at the expected (bank delayed) time.

okpay support is ok, not the fastest, but much better than gox itself.

i've found the okpay verification process much quicker and easier than on gox (with the same documents)... just be sure not to edit the scans/copies in any way.

there's also a nice debit card option for getting money out of okpay again.

tip jar referral signup link for okpay if someone feels like it ;)

https://www.okpay.com/?rbp=okp4815162342 (https://www.okpay.com/?rbp=okp4815162342)

Thanks for the info. Is there a link to this announcement? I don't want to go through the hassle of verification if -->btc-e isn't available.

Funding btc-e seems to require MacGyver like creativity.

the info is from this link: https://btc-e.com/news/153 (https://btc-e.com/news/153) , which states

Much obliged!

Can anyone who has used OKPay explain the fees to me?  I see if I send money from BTC-E to OKPay BTC-E says there is a 1% fee.  Is that total, or is there also a fee on the OKPay side as well?

I've found OKPay to be really good. Verification was hassle free, didn't take very long at all. Moving money around is quick too - the only delay I get is moving USD from MTGox to OKPay, because MTGox seem to allow their OKPay account to run out of money regularly. So that's not OKPay's fault.

Debit card has worked flawlessly for me.

My only gripe is when I joined OKPay I could convert Bitcoin to USD directly on their site - but since mid-April when the bitcoin price erupted they removed that feature so I'm forced to use MTGox.

withdrawals from mt.gox or btce cost a 1% fee and that is the total fee you will pay.

deposit at btce costs 2% on btce side, and a maximum of $2.99 on the okpay side, depending on the amount.

when you send/withdraw money from okpay, you will usually pay their fee, but this is capped at $2.99, so for most transactions it's not an issue.

okpay itself usually works instantly, but as mentioned above and elsewhere, mtgox often depletes their okpay account, so mtgox to okpay withdrawals take anywhere from 1 hour to 3 days...


tip jar referral signup link for okpay if someone feels like it ;)

https://www.okpay.com/?rbp=okp4815162342

that feature is still available -- you can deposit bitcoins directly to okpay usd/eur. but the 6% commission is a high price to pay for that convenience...

I am a victim of OKPAY.

It has been 15 days since i made a wire but i haven't receive my money untill now.

No one answers the phone(+442081232193), you can go to okpay's web and try to make a call .

it's totally a scam!

well its now dec. of 2013 and myself and a number of victims have lost or still waiting to get funded of our thousands of usd from this scammer company okpay.com

we all have something in common, we wanted to fund our bitcoin accounts in btc-e or mtgox, okpay is an option to deposit funds, very low commission, quick to answer inquiries

once you sent your money however, goodbye funds, goodbye customer support, okpay will ignore you, DESPITE MANY ANGRY SHOUTING AND CURSING

i have waited 30 plus days already but at this point i am considering this a lost, thousands of dollars lost from okpay who suddenly became silent after i wired my funds to them

call them you say, its an answering machine in london

go to them, right, go to british virgin islands

write a post in their forum.okpay.com - it will be deleted after a few hours

i hope the police go after okpay

are u in uk?

I'm very far away from the UK

okpay's phone no. is based in the UK however

if you are in the UK you may alert the police anti fraud anti scam unit to go after okpay using their published london phone no.

maybe the police can get the perpetrators from that phone no.

in case okpay deletes their phone number, here it is: +44 20 8123 2193

i like to update this post, today is dec. 9, 2013 -- AVOID OKPAY, DO NOT SEND MONEY TO OKPAY!!!

i lost a total of $2000 from this scammer company okpay.com - who was introduced to me by btc-e.com (thanks a lot btc-e.com)

i sent my funds to them 36 days ago and to this day - NOTHING

their customer support have since plunge to hell once i sent my wire transfer (meaning they ignore me, they delete new support tickets, they delete negative post at forum.okpay.com)

this is a scammer company who lures customers by offering low commissions to fund your bitcoin account at btc-e.com and mtgox.com

now why would btc-e.com and mtgox.com introduce okpay to its customers????  VERY GOOD QUESTION

maybe they have a cut on the scam

How did you send the money?

How about a little more information.

i wire transferred $2000 last nov. 4, 2013

my local bank confirmed that it went through

it is now dec. 12, 2013 and i am still not credited for this money in my okpay account

i made many many support tickets to okpay and they are largely silent after i told them i sent the wire last nov. 4, 2013

i only got 2 responses and it says something like this: "our finance department is checking an issue...." --ITS ALREADY 38 DAYS NOW SINCE I SENT MY MONEY!!!!!

they did not tell me what is wrong, no details, NOTHING!!!!! after i wired my money that's it, okpay fell silent except for 2 instances of a vague response

then i investigated okpay, called their phone no. listed in their website - THAT TURNED OUT TO BE AN ANSWERING MACHINE!!!!

checked their address - ITS A P.O. BOX IN THE BRITISH VIRGIN ISLAND!!!!

okpay have many negative feedbacks in reddit.com

i know i checked this when its late already so i am doing my best to warn others from this scammer company

what really puzzles me is that btc-e.com and mtgox.com introduces okpay to its clients as a means to transfer funds.......

no honest company will endorse okpay to its clients....

recently
they began to
mess up.

OK Pay - DO NOT USE THEM AT ALL

Made swift payment from Metro bank into OKPay wallet and now over 5 days and no funds showing, like others have created many tickets asking for what is going on etc and to date nothing - no reply rom OK Pay whatsoever.

They are using Mayzus Financial services - however contacting them is no use - they just respond back with - contact okpay.

Not going to let this go and have these scammers disappear with my funds and no response.

We can report Mayzus to anti-fraud in UK and FSA I believe, if Mayzus is stopped from handling OKPAY transactions that will then maybe lead to OKPAY responding.

We can do this individually - however my suggestion is to make a group of us who have been scammed by these guys and then take this onto anti-fraud / fsa - as a group we have more chance of getting noticed by the investigators and bringing some action to Mayzus / OKPAY.

If you are with me on this then post reply and lets start a group and get some action going.

I work in the media industry and will be talking to some journalists to investigate and write up some news on these companies to at least warn new people not to deal with these guys.
 

No longer. They stopped it in May 2013.

You can still transfer € or $ from BTC-e directly to OKPAY—it is one of the few options there—but then you are stuck, because they refuse to give you their prepaid credit card or recharge it, as long as you have any bitcoin-tainted cent in your OKPAY wallet. Their demand is that you empty your wallet by other means, then load it from non-bitcoin sources only, before you can use their credit card.

Apparently Mastercard pressured them into this. What I also don't know is how the bitcoin-taint moves. For example, if I transfer € or $ from BTC-e into one OKPAY account, then transfer it into another OKPAY account (which is a quick and simple operation), can the owner of that second account then use them to load his prepaid OKPAY credit card? Or is the bitcoin-taint sticky and stays with the €$?

Obviously, if you send money from BTC-e to another bank or money changer and subsequently to OKPAY, those €$ would no longer be tainted, but that would defeat the expediency advantage and cause additional fees.

If anybody knows the most convenient way to get cash out of BTC-e, please describe it here.

I want to say that I have good experience dealing with this company, but now they compromised themselves as a financial company.

1. I ordered a debit card from Okpay and funded it with 5000$ (from 13000 total on my account). Cached out 4000$. 1000$ left untouched without possibility to cache out. ATM gives 0 balance.
2. Further funding of OKPay card is impossible because OKPay decided that my money were obtained by trading BTCBitcoin and thus I can't use their card to withdraw them. Having that they've never bothered rearranging this with their customers nor changing existing policies/TOS. This violates existing agreement between me and OKPay
3. Support never responds (see attached screenshot. In Russian but does it matter?)
http://i42.tinypic.com/eqcr38.png
4. Topics with complains about their QoS on their forums are removed shortly after being created. Some of folks can even comment in that kind of thread about the same situation

Summary: now I strongly recommend to stay away from OKPay in general and for operations related with BTCBitcoin in particular. You may end up without your money and without BTC's

Sorry OKPay, but I should warn folks to avoid dealing with you because there is no way for financial company to make business this way

UPDATE:
The bank was more helpful than OKPay and I was able to get the rest of my money from OKPay thanks God. No more penny for OKPay

okpay should be reported to a government authority, every day they are scamming people of thousands of USD - this has to stop

DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!

I deposited £5k with OKPay 11th Jan 2014 and it is still not showing in my account. Customer support tickets are unanswered and it looks like they closed their forum down - there is no OKPay customer service number listed. I did call Mayzus Financial Services on the London number from their website (+44 (0) 208 956 2251) - this went to an answer machine but I pressed '0' and got an operator who did put me through to a human. She said I must email OKPay (presumably she meant via support ticket as there is no email address) but I pressed her and she said she would go talk to them! Shortly after I got a response to one of my support tickets, but only to say, again, that payment had not been received. I am going to ring them again on Monday, but I doubt if anything positive will happen. My bank have also offered to speak to them directly so I may try that also. If all else fails I am going to go up to London and pay them a visit and if THAT yields nothing I will involve the FSA and the police. Anyone want to join me on a visit or attempt to represent their claim?

OKPAY is an ongoing fraud. i have lost over 2,000usd there.

Philosophically speaking it has been a learning experience. the money lost is my harsh teacher in dealing with money matters, i will be more cautious from now on.

What puzzles me is how this is not big news in the BTC community. That fraudster company is raking in money from all over the world right this minute and it has not reached any of the BTC news outlets.  Due diligence is absent. Shame.

Jeez I should have read this thread before sending them money through Sofortbanking which is now "on hold" (even though Sofortbanking is instant).

So glad I found this thread before I gave them too much of my info and/or any money.

I became convinced OKPay were scamming because I could not get any information from customer support regarding a £5k deposit. It seems my money got left behind when they changed banks for processing GBP payments but they never told me this. Eventually I got my money back when my bank made some calls for me. To be fair to them, I don't think they were scamming me now but the level of information from customer service was very poor. This was a lot of money for me and they just could not tell me where it was!

Good to hear you got your money back, but yeah, that would scare the crap out of anybody. I've read so many bad things about them and since there seems to be sooooooo many scam sites.  I'm nervous about putting money in that I may never get back.

Update:  i finally saw my 2k usd in my account. I conclude it is not a scam... Took them a month to sort things out. way too much fro normal operations. Will keep the account for emergency purposes only and to see if they polish their act moving forward.

This way, 1/2 apology proffered to okpay. the other 1/2, not since it is inexcusable to not be able to sort things out with due diligence.

i know okpay has a lot of seo personnel doing the good deeds they need to cloud their real quality - that quality is the most bad customer service in this planet and oh they keep your money for x number of days probably trading bitcoin with them

Necropost  ;D
Guys, anyone fund OKPAY with bank wire ?

Good day, i can help you with some information abont it. Please specify which information do you need.

I have to agree with the customer service i have never been so annoyed opening an account with anyone like i was with them, i believe they trade threw moneypolo's name/reputation and i was able to get my account verified with them first attempt but when it came to OKpay i was run around repeatedly saying my id what got me verified on moneypolo and other sites was not good enough and was declined this happened about 3 times then i told them how i felt about them and moved on after closing my account! Then they continue to send me emails but i cannot see what they are saying because i closed the account because the lack of customer service and impossible verification, i was close to offering them a few dollars to sort it and i am sure that would have worked. Would not bother wasting your time with them.

It's a good company, trustworthy if you want to have your funds locked indefinetly and enjoy masochist pleasures.
It's trustworthy if you want confuse instructions how to unlock your account and even after providing them with all the documents, including apostiled copies the invent another excuse to keep your funds a little more.

It's the same text but because I posted in the wrong section in bitcointalk it probably is better to have a backup link provided.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=973924.0 or http://www.talkgold.com/forum/r432999-.html

So why not give them a try and then maybe return here and say with me that okpay.com is a scam?

Don't worry there's more. They don't even stick to their own terms and conditions.
They share your information with 3rd parties, contrary to what they say.
I was told that the documents are shared with the bank and it was the one that didn't approve but how can that be possible?
I never sent a wire, received a wire and had no relationship with any bank.
This sounds to me that the bank is a third party to me and it's against what they say:

"Unless ordered by a ruling body of competent jurisdiction acceptable to Issuer, Issuer shall not reveal User’s contact or identifying information or transaction history to any third party." - so in my case the bank is a third party.

A second update is that they now added one more country on the approved apostile and notarization list. Does this mean their terms and conditions are negotiable? At first there was no specific request, then only UK, now UK and Germany. Maybe more countries will be added soon?
I'll keep you posted.

Another proof of why not accepting my apostile because it's not issued in a certain country is not according to the Hague Convention rules.
Please refer to the http://www.hcch.net/upload/abc12e.pdf - Question 13 and you'll see it's not a legal reason of denying an apostile the fact that it's not issued in a certain country.
This information is from an official site.

They are document scammers in my opinion.

To verify my account I've chosen my drivers license - uploaded address proof & DL scan. Then waiting and waiting and I've got this response:

So I was like WTF OMG? If they *give* me the choice to upload EITHER DL OR ID card OR passport, and now they change the rules.  Finally I agreed to upload my passport scan (I do not feel safe with that, too much ID!).

So finally the verification went through and I was testing what I can do with this wallet, I topped up BTCe and then received small quantity back. Then I tried to apply for the prepaid card, but realized the application was blocked because I've received from BTCe - what a crap is that? After long conversation they finally explained you can EITHER have a card OR receive funds from BTCe - mutually exclusive. (sending funds to BTCe seems to be no problem). What a bad and deceptive service is that............  :-* :-* :-*

So, I cleaned up my account to have 0.00 in the wallet and started from scratch - my funds went to BTCe to have 0 "dirty" USD in the wallet. Then I topped it up again with "clean" USD - and tried to apply for the card. Then they started to scam me for NOTARIZED copies of documents - WTF is that? They even do not have an address of them own given on their page - you even do not knwo to whom you are talking. Their domains and info are using anonymizer service to hide the true owner of the domain. So basically you have no clue to whom you are talking to.

here is the conversation:


So, I even offered them I'll send my documents directly to the bank issuing the card - which should be ok. But what the hell should I send NOTARIZED copy (that can be used to open bank accounts etc in my name by them etc) to OKPAY who even does not want to provide THEIR address on their own site? For me it is a total document scam.

I'll report them to FBI for document scamming and the local consumer QC (when I find where is their registered office really).

If you have experienced similar problems, you can fill an online complaint here against them, if you believe you were scammed:

http://www.ic3.gov/complaint/default.aspx

I'll research their legal offices and will complain to consumer protection bureau in their country too.
Guys do not hesitate to go for that . you can only win! Go FULL IN and lets see their poker face - they have no cards in the hand I tell you. Otherwise they would tell me "ok this is the bank that will issue your card send your documents to bank XXXX,YYYY".

my opinion.

I would say no!

They once froze my account after I sold some BTC for OKpay. They didn't give me any updates and when it was finally open they deducted the whole amount I got sent and never told me what exactly happend. The buyer sent me the BTC back, so all was fine, but fk OKpay.

Their host their servers in the Netherlands - perfect. As I have a contact at the EUROPOL in the Netherlands - perfect for me.


As you probably see from the whois info, the registrar is also a dubious one - the physical contact address is an anonymizer address in Utrecht - Postbus 19115 - I won't be even surprised if same people are behind OKPAY and WEBAZILLA. Cyprus connection = likely Russia. If you uploaded your documents to OKPAY I would say they are now in Russia (whatever it *means* to you guys).

A serious domain registrar provides y physical address and real contact, not fake anonymizer PO. E.g. german Schlundtech:

you notice the difference?
cheers.

Hi,

Well the issue is that even sending them official documents, notarized and apostiled as they request ( prior to doing bait and switch ) will get you nowhere. I have gotten confirmation even from an official Ministry but they decided to ignore:

Post from another thread:

 I GOT THE FIRST OFFICIAL ANSWER REGARDING MY APOSTILLE SITUATION:

I have ommited the countries and full names but I can show the original email if someone needs confirmation. It originates from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Y  ( the country where I was asked to send the documents )

Hello Mr P R,

In reference to your email, I wish to convey to you the following
information:

1. If your documents have made apostile in X you can use them in
Y.
2. To check the number of apostile should contact the X authorities
responsible for apostile.

Best Regards,

P E

OFFICIAL PROOF ONE OKPAY IS CLEARLY A SCAM BECAUSE THEY LIE ABOUT THAT INVENTED REQUIREMENT OF A CERTAIN COUNTRY !
MORE TO COME AND WILL POST ALSO STATUSES OF LEGAL COMPLAINTS AGAINST THE COMPANY !

Also I noted you were asked to send documents to Prague?
I've sent them to Cyprus?

So I've got money locked and my identity stolen...

Recently I've noticed that OKPAY is starting to work under EU Cyprus supervision: https://www.okpay.com/en/company/news/we-are-becoming-a-eu-regulated-company/. Will this effect somehow on wire transfers processing ?

I'm am complaining and I'm not a scammer, just check the blockchain information

It took me more than month to get verified in okpay, a very very frustrating process, I was about to give up but I'm finally got registred. So I started testing the system with small amounts of money, sending money from moneypolo and vice versa, I even uploaded my account with bitcoins. But when I tried to withdraw 20 dollars in bitcoins they debited the amount and my wallet detected a transaction but no confirmation after 72 hours. I chated with support and they only told me "the transaction was sent, wait, is the blockchain's fault". Interesting way of scamming some one. You set the miner's fee low, transaction is sent, but not confirmed, and then you get to keep your client's money and the bitcoins. Smashing, how klever these lads are. It's the blockchain's to blame, or maybe isis, north Korea or just Mickey mouse.

My account I'd is 952011981
Transaction I'd 20062552
And this is the blockchain information:
1HRysKiRTpgRAQEytxFPcxF4SrCh57FNGf
External transaction 3448f3faa483d08a9387bf49808bb762b8be93b3780b657cb947d5707e477a38

They are not british they only use the uk as image, be aware.