What I learned from MtGox, Coinbase, Bitcoin-central, etc

[nym]

Hey guys,

We've been interviewing bitcoin exchange sites over the last few weeks. The list includes MtGox, Coinbase, Bitcoin-central, Bitfloor, BitInstant, and more. In a few lucky opportunities, I even have gotten to speak to owners in person. This was all in the hopes of creating a reliable place to find out what you'd want to know when buying bitcoins.

What I learned in the process is:

* Rates vary a lot! So do limits. Buying bitcoins reliably is still hard.
* Bitcoin businesses are booming. Bitcoin-central had a very positive affect on the USD->BTC price.
* Most businesses aren't certified... yet.
* Support is still spotty, but there are actually reputable places to buy and sell bitcoins.

Like #bitcoin-otc, we are trying to establish who the awesome businesses that are out there. You can now sign up, and rate + review these businesses.

http://howdoyoubuybitcoins.com/from/

Please join and give a shout out to your favorite business!

[LightRider]

Hey guys,

We've been interviewing bitcoin exchange sites over the last few weeks. The list includes MtGox, Coinbase, Bitcoin-central, Bitfloor, BitInstant, and more. In a few lucky opportunities, I even have gotten to speak to owners in person. This was all in the hopes of creating a reliable place to find out what you'd want to know when buying bitcoins.

What I learned in the process is:

* Rates vary a lot! So do limits. Buying bitcoins reliably is still hard.
* Bitcoin businesses are booming. Bitcoin-central had a very positive affect on the USD->BTC price.
* Most businesses aren't certified... yet.
* Support is still spotty, but there are actually reputable places to buy and sell bitcoins.

Like #bitcoin-otc, we are trying to establish who the awesome businesses that are out there. You can now sign up, and rate + review these businesses.

http://howdoyoubuybitcoins.com/from/

Please join and give a shout out to your favorite business!

Certified by who? To do what? By what standard?

[Jouke]

Incomplete list

[Lethn]

This kind of thing will be really helpful actually, the one thing internet does pretty well is point out scams etc. you know a company is bad when there are several thousand people calling them out.

[nym]

Incomplete list

Which businesses would you like to see?

http://howdoyoubuybitcoins.com/submit-business/

[hplus]

Certified by who? To do what? By what standard?

exactly my thoughts when reading his post.
pretty hard to find common ground in something like bitcoin,
but that wont avoid someone to start certifying websites i bet...

[davout]

Hey guys,

[...]

Please join and give a shout out to your favorite business!

You seem to have confused Bitcoin-Central.net with InstaWire.org

They're both operated by Paymium but they work very differently.
 - BC.net is a full-fledged exchange (and it's not limited to 100€/day)
 - InstaWire.org is a place where you buy Bitcoins extremely easily by putting your Bitcoin address in the reference field without needing to create an account

[Seth Otterstad]

You should add a section for how to buy if you want a large amount of coins, like $10k+ USD, and point people to mtgox, bitcoin-24, localbitcoins, or one of the services that acts as escrow for huge buyers and sellers like tangiblecryptography
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=87094.0

[wofugang]

Just some feedback for howdoyoubuybitcoins.com

I really like the idea of your site, but I think it should be better promoted in order to have more votes and comments! The most serious problem is that there is no indication if number one is the best rating or number five. The perception of the rating numbers might differ from one country to another! It would also be useful if you indicate the quantity of comments on the main page! On my iPhone there is also a design bug causing the top section of the page to be broken! I hope you appreciate my feedback! If you need any help contact me! I'm a software/web developer!

[postcd]

This is quite usefull when you want to buy a bitcoin, but not that usefull to bookmark it..

[csun]

What I learned about Coinbase today:

This is absolutely the worst service to obtain bit-coins by.

I created an account and attempted to use the debit/credit bank account verification method. I wasn't too comfortable giving my online banking details to a third party.

The verification did not work. Instead, I was debited and never credited. I verified this multiple times with my bank.

I sent emails and posted public questions to their support team, but never received any other response beyond "try using the other verification method".

After an entire month of this back and forth, I finally decide to use the instant verification method.

I create a purchase request, only to find out that it would take an entire week to process. I thought to myself, "well at least I have the rate locked in".

I accepted and tied my funds to this abhorrent service for an entire week.

Then 4 hours before the transaction was supposed to complete, I get an email saying that my order was canceled due to it being "high risk".

I sent them an email, but I doubt they'll let me make a purchase at the same rate. There is absolutely no way to contact them other than email which takes days-weeks to get a response.

I bet if the price of Bitcoins didn't skyrocket the past week, they would have no problems with my "high risk" transaction and would be absolutely thrilled to have me hold their bag in the meantime.

There are many other better services to purchase Bitcoins from. Avoid Coinbase...