Bitstamp is a regulated and licensed exchange. They are extremely keen to protect this accreditation and will almost always comply with the standards imposed by Luxembourg regulators. For big deposits, expect these transactions to be checked and vetted. Even if you have a fully verified Bitstamp account, they will still delay certain transactions and refer them for in-depth querying.

Good EU based BTC exchanges are compliant exchanges and will do the same checks and vetting of transactions. They will also review and look into your KYC credentials when large fiat and coin movements are detected and flagged by their system.

Based on the experience of several here who encountered the same issues, Bitstamp will likely give you the silent treatment while they investigate or check the funds. Your patience will be tested. They don't reply  for days and weeks at end while they do these checks.

Cryptocurrency crime is something new for the police. Even cybercrime detectives are vaguely familiar with the methodologies behind these types of scams. You can report the incident, yes, but I doubt your friend will recover his bitcoins, let alone 0.01 btc. Depending on your jurisdiction and if the perpetrator is identifiable, the police will usually proceed with an arrest and will submit the matter for prosecution if there is a realistic prospect of conviction. Balancing public interest and the costs involved in prosecuting a 0.01 btc theft, I don't think you will see any thief put behind bars for this scam.

Advise your friend to be more careful in the future. That would be the best and only way to resolve this. The money is gone.

Another thing I can advise is to report the Youtube video. Removing it will prevent others from being scammed.

I love it when they discover what the red trust was about and finally plead and beg to have it removed. They only notice it somewhat later when they realize absolutely nobody has taken an interest in their over-ambitious offers.

It seems they just post here without actually reading the golden rule stickied on this lending section. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, a sort of karma for the inability to read and digest the contents of that stickied thread.

Learn and live. That red is an eyesore, yes, but that's the consequence of posting without thinking.

They are not crooks. They correctly and appropriately responded to an American who was too idiotic and illiterate to understand the simple phrase "Americans are not welcome".

Americans are not being burned by Cryptopay. Ask your own government about their over-pregnant policies about meddling in the financial affairs of Americans which is why most financial institutions beyond the borders of the United States would rather not deal with such cumbersome bureaucracy.

You're just feeling so hurt and mentally traumatized by the fact that cards issued outside the U.S. are off limits to American citizens. Get over it. The rest of the world are equally ineligible to open accounts in the U.S. without a valid SSN or TIN. An eye for an eye.

It normally takes a week or a few days but it can take longer if Bitstamp decides to first do some checks on you or if you have missing KYC information which needs to be updated. For example, if the ID they have on file is no longer valid or is expired.

If you will withdraw a large amount of money, be prepared for some delays while they do extra checks.

Why are you buying accounts in bulk? To scam people? To misuse signature campaigns? DTs should auto-neg members offering or trying to make such deals. It is a precursor to most scams perpetrated on this site. Newbies know they lack the reputational credibility to successfully lure people to send fiat or coins first. These sold accounts should be negged and red tagged too. The seller, the buyer and the sold accounts. All of them. Red tagging the sold accounts will render them useless and is a deterrent for future sales of such accounts.

Looking for investors for your project is akin to asking for a loan. And for any attempt to source loans on this forum (even in the form of an investment or an ICO) past experience has shown that lenders and investing parties are best protected when the contract is collateralized. Unsecured loans or investment procurements here are rare and will only be filled if you can very clearly and professionally present a business model which is highly likely to succeed and generate returns. There have been so many fly by night projects introduced by dodgy characters who later did a runner with the entire funds injected by naive investors.

I suggest you source your funds locally and give local investors a first-rejection priority. On this forum, present your project professionally with an outline about how funds are to be used and you might find interested investors. Still, a proper funding roadmap will lend credibility to your project and it should be a collateralized loan.

Your best option would be Localbitcoins. By paying cash in GBP, I'm assuming you want to meet and conclude the deal in person. This is best achieved and arranged on a site such as Localbitcoins where the bitcoins are held in escrow during the transaction.

If you do find some someone willing to sell coins, irrespective of where you found that offer, the golden rule is to meet up in a safe and very public location, preferably where there is quick access to security services. Don't be lured to deal inside a hotel room, a private office, a quiet road, an isolated area, especially if you are alone. There are criminals who lurk on this forum trying to invite people to transact large amounts and the pattern so far shows that these incidents mainly happened in Europe. The modus operandi is to meet up in an isolated location and to assault and coerce the victim to transfer the coins or to give the cash.

There is another sinister angle to this criminal enterprise which is to do it in a public place, usually a woman does it, and she then alerts the public immediately after the transaction to create an alarming situation, taking advantage of most people being not familiar with bitcoin and usually leading to the money being repaid to her. This happened in London at a busy cafe so be careful.

I believe they are busy with the card transition process. As you know, Wirex (like most bitcoin card providers) are transitioning to a non-Visa system. Visa International recently acquired Wave Crest. As a result of this merger and acquisition, radical changes were introduced in line with Visa's policies, one of which is to stop distributing the cards to non European residents.

Your Wirex card will be valid until midnight of 15th October 2017. Beyond this day, if you are a non-EU resident, you can consider your card a souvenir piece or just a useless space taker in your wallet.

if your tickets are being ignored, try posting on their Facebook and twitter pages.

IBAN is the European bank account nomenclature system. In the IBAN/account number box, put your Bank of America account number. When you withdraw, their system will first query the SWIFT/BIC code you provided and because it resolves to a non-IBAN institution, the account number you provided will be accepted.

I have withdrawn countless times to my non-IBAN account so I know this is definitely the solution. Here, have a look at mine:

http://imgur.com/SBs4bCz

Hoping to scam someone by using that pathetic reason about fiverr being a prominent company? Have you forgotten what escrow is about? It's a procedure meant to protect both sender and receiver.

You also might have forgotten that your PayPal funds are extremely reversible. It is a high risk payment method. You can charge back anytime up to 180 days in the future. Why do you require the OP to send first? So you can scam him? You have the nerve when you know very well that you are a newbie paying with PayPal. You have no trust and trade history on this forum which makes you a high risk trader.

I suggest this transaction be completed with escrow mediation only. No exceptions.

Bitstamp is a licensed and regulated exchange so you can be assured without a grain of doubt that your funds were not stolen. It might take time before you can sight the coins on your account and I believe the reason for this is that all inbound and outbound transactions on the Bitstamp system undergo a vetting process. Checks are done to ensure coins and fiat are properly accounted for and this might include passing blockchain analysis to ascertain origin and taint if any and also to check if they come from sources sanctioned by Bitstamp or the EU.

With patience and relentless querying, you will eventually see your coins. They are known to give their customers the silent treatment when something is being checked or investigated. This can be unnerving but if you have a clean conscience and if you are convinced the coins were obtained without any Mickey Mouse games, they will be credited to your account soon.

PayPal will ruin anyone's bitcoin trading experience. Escrow protection gives the bitcoin seller a false sense of security. There is in fact no protection when one is paid by PayPal and the risks are exacerbated when such payment was paid by a complete and total stranger. When the amount involves thousands of dollars, it's almost akin to 90% donating your bitcoins and 10% chance of a miracle that PayPal might not allow the sender to charge back, irrespective of the deal involving bitcoins.

No legitimate escrow provider will escrow a transaction where the PayPal sender has no prior established history of paying securely and honestly.

With or without escrow the risks are almost totally absorbed by the PayPal receiver. The sender can reverse the payment up to six months from payment date, an incredibly fatal flaw in the PayPal transaction process. While this might be good for other non-bitcoin scenarios, I believe 6 months represent an excessively relaxed chargeback privilege. It indirectly implies that merchants or people receiving PayPal payments might have a criminal predisposition. A predisposition to defraud or scam. An insulting assumption.

This is a payment method to avoid when transacting with strangers. Imagine having sent bitcoins, see those coins confirmed more than a hundred thousand times after 5 months, then out of the blue your PayPal reflects a reversal or chargeback for a trade you did ages ago. This is a payment method with evil written all over it.

I feel bad when I read stories of people being shafted by rogue exchanges. 50 days is unacceptable and unforgivable. This is not just a case of something having been overlooked unintentionally. Dishonesty is at play here. Fraud. Intentional and dirty fraud.

Can you please pm me the transaction details and I will try to help by using my time-tested harassment methods. Thanks

Edit... just saw the ticket number. Let me see what I can do.

When dealing with strangers, always use escrow protection. A trusted mediator or middle man should hold the bitcoins during the transaction. Ensure the escrow provider is one listed on the official escrow list and not someone outside that list, regardless of rank and age on this forum. There are well-aged accounts being peddled and sold by some entrepreneurial scammers.

Apart from the above, also take steps to verify and confirm that funds are not MITM sourced. Bank transfers can be reversed so be particularly aware of the risks of fraud-related transfers. Banks can and will recall transferred funds if the sender claims it was paid anomalously.

Going forward, if meeting up in person is challenging, try to reach a convenient and safe compromise such as depositing cash which should be checked to confirm it wasn't a cheque (especially a postdated cheque).

Stay safe.

You seem to be the type who can be defined as an idiot. An illiterate idiot which is even worse. All you do is post single-sentence nonsense and garbage all day. You want to enjoy using cards at full limit feature but "no thanks I'm an idiot whose identity was stolen enough times for one lifetime because of me being too stupid to discern the difference between legitimate and non-legitimate services". No wonder your identity has been stolen countless times, as you claim, but I am more convinced that no identity was stolen and you simply want to use these cards and accounts for criminal purposes.

http://imgur.com/iLneR9U
http://imgur.com/xXajpaQ
http://imgur.com/e852Ger

You will need to provide standard KYC documents such as a valid passport or government-issued ID. You can do it all on their very intuitive app.

The account works flawlessly. You can load it with SWIFT or SEPA funds and more conveniently with bitcoins. You will get your own bitcoin address linked to your IBAN account.

It's a legitimate company licensed and regulated by the Lietuvos Bankas, Lithuania's central bank.

I would not use the account for large amounts because they might suspect you are doing money laundering or scams. You might be asked to provide documents about the source of funds if you transact extremely large amounts.

I use the account to convert some of my bitcoins into Euros, then I distribute the money by SEPA transfer to my German account. It's really good because my German bank sees the origin as an IBAN account in my name and not something like Kraken or Bitstamp or other exchanges whose accounts might be on a pan-European watch list.

This is dangerous. When the account is funded you can have the user access credentials reset in your favor. There is nothing the buyer can do to restore his access or to claim his money. You are the owner and the bank will recognize your ownership unequivocally.

Escrow protection is mandatory when dealing with strangers. Ironic to see you open you post with "hello strangers" and yet fail to think about you being a stranger too. Being strangers it follows that the transaction must be secured both ways. If you refuse to use escrow, then your intentions are suspicious and I would urge everyone here to proceed with caution.

Even if one does use escrow, using the card and loading the account with funds comes with risks.

Indians always do that. Very calculating and manipulative people. Most are dishonest. I'm always extremely cautious when visiting India as there are times that I do not have a choice but go there for professional reasons. For anything you give them, there is a calculated purpose and a calculated return expected.

In your case, this is another classic example of why one should be extremely cautious when dealing with strangers but even far more extremely cautious when dealing with strangers from certain countries such as India and those in the African continent.

True, scammers are everywhere on this planet but Indian and African scams are some of the most pernicious ones you will encounter.

Harsh as the above may sound but it represents the reality of the situation. Transacting with such people is a major PITA. They always try to get one message across: we Indians are to be trusted while you and everyone else are not. The symptoms are common: they always begin conversations with brother, dear, love, kitten, honey, sweety pie and similar nonsense and proceed with trying to dissect you financially. 150 Euros may not be much for Europeans but in India this amount converts to enough Rupees to buy them a whole month' worth of curry food.

Always use escrow.