Bitcoin ATM - Owner lied about the fee

[mskryxz]

I wanted to see what you guys think or what to do?

I'm helping out a new user who just got into bitcoin. He was at an ATM and talked to the owner and said it was a 1% fee to Sell bitcoins. The machine itself didn't have any fee information. Anyhow, when he went to proceed it charged him 20% fee or a little over couple hundred dollar fee when selling 1k of btc. Afterwards, he called the number for support but all they do is hang up even after they just talked.

He's now asking what he can do and if that is even legal? But I am still skeptical as it could have been user error. Normally doesn't it say the fee even on the screen prior to confirming a sell or purchase? However, he says there was no fee warning stickers on the machine and there was no fee % warning while on screen. Any help appreciated.

[Bit_Happy]

A good way to avoid this would be to have sold ~10% first to test the system/fees.

"Is it even legal"
No, it sounds criminal, but...
In theory, if he had a witness and/or video of the owner claiming 1%, then he could win in civil court and also try to press criminal charges.
In reality, civil court costs are too high, and the district attorney is too busy for a criminal case.

[mskryxz]

A good way to avoid this would be to have sold ~10% first to test the system/fees.

"Is it even legal"
No, it sounds criminal, but...
In theory, if he had a witness and/or video of the owner claiming 1%, then he could win in civil court and also try to press criminal charges.
In reality, civil court costs are too high, and the district attorney is too busy for a criminal case.

True, wish there was a recording of the conversation.

Would there be be anything to do since it did not have any fee warnings? Is there some kind of regulation or enforcement that requires ATM's to show what fee they are charging before accepting a deposit or withdrawal? Thanks for the answer.

[AgentofCoin]

A good way to avoid this would be to have sold ~10% first to test the system/fees.

"Is it even legal"
No, it sounds criminal, but...
In theory, if he had a witness and/or video of the owner claiming 1%, then he could win in civil court and also try to press criminal charges.
In reality, civil court costs are too high, and the district attorney is too busy for a criminal case.

True, wish there was a recording of the conversation.

Would there be be anything to do since it did not have any fee warnings? Is there some kind of regulation or enforcement that requires ATM's to show what fee they are charging before accepting a deposit or withdrawal? Thanks for the answer.

No, it is a complicated issue. For you to take any action outside of
sending the owner complaints, would be a waste of time. There are no real
regulations or rules that govern BTMs. Your argument will be mostly hearsay.

Can you tell us where the BTM was located?
What type of device was it?
Is the BTM a buy & sell device?

Sometimes people register their BTMs on sites that provide notice of the fees.
https://coinatmradar.com/

[Yakamoto]

A good way to avoid this would be to have sold ~10% first to test the system/fees.

"Is it even legal"
No, it sounds criminal, but...
In theory, if he had a witness and/or video of the owner claiming 1%, then he could win in civil court and also try to press criminal charges.
In reality, civil court costs are too high, and the district attorney is too busy for a criminal case.

True, wish there was a recording of the conversation.

Would there be be anything to do since it did not have any fee warnings? Is there some kind of regulation or enforcement that requires ATM's to show what fee they are charging before accepting a deposit or withdrawal? Thanks for the answer.

Depending on what country you live in and what information you have, you might be able to open up a fraud court case and challenge the owner in court. But for $1k, as other users have said, it might be too expensive to go to court over it.

[Boosterious]

I wanted to see what you guys think or what to do?

I'm helping out a new user who just got into bitcoin. He was at an ATM and talked to the owner and said it was a 1% fee to Sell bitcoins. The machine itself didn't have any fee information. Anyhow, when he went to proceed it charged him 20% fee or a little over couple hundred dollar fee when selling 1k of btc. Afterwards, he called the number for support but all they do is hang up even after they just talked.

He's now asking what he can do and if that is even legal? But I am still skeptical as it could have been user error. Normally doesn't it say the fee even on the screen prior to confirming a sell or purchase? However, he says there was no fee warning stickers on the machine and there was no fee % warning while on screen. Any help appreciated.

bad action from ATM owner,he should know that bitcoin ATM not put any fee on label,this is should clarified,what the vendor of that ATM? maybe we can aks directly to the company and make this solved.

[franky1]

just wondering.. was he from canada, but was comparing how much canadian dollar he got to the american USD price.. as there is about a 20% difference between USD and CAD

also ATM fee's are meaningless..

i can easily show a price that has 0% fee (using one exchange as a comparison) and also 2% fee (using a different exchange) and the values would be better using the one with the fee's
EG
BTC-e: $439 +2% fee = $447.78
bitstamp: $449 + 0% = $449.00

$1.22 better infact

but i think at a 20% markup. the chances are the person is canadian. but if he is american using an american ATM then thats a bit of a rip off.

just be sure to look at the values before accepting the offer

[European Central Bank]

Name and shame. Scream it all over Reddit too. Even if the guy misheard, 20% is a fuckin joke and people need to warned off it.

[mskryxz]

Hey guys, thanks for all the answers. I really appreciate the quick and detailed responses.

I don't want to name or provide the location just yet as I do not want to give them a bad reputation yet if there is a misunderstanding. I sent an email to the operator to get some answers myself and hear their side of the story. Hopefully they respond.

It is a BTM with buy/sell functionality and it is a BitAccess ATM.

I'm still investigating but another possibility is the user I was helping with may have spoke to the Store Owner instead of the Bitcoin ATM owner. In this case, it's not the responsibility of the Store Owner if he did not know and just said 1% when he did not call the actual ATM owner/operator. Another thing is, I am skeptical about the fee not being shown. From my experience generally the fees are shown on screen. But again, it is also possible maybe its a bugged ATM or some kind of technical issue that didn't show the fee % for whatever reason.

Anyways still investigating. If it turns out just being foul play then I will post the location to warn others from having that happen to them. But if it's a user error who just did not happen to see the screen or went through it too fast, then I will drop this issue.

Thanks again.

[mskryxz]

just wondering.. was he from canada, but was comparing how much canadian dollar he got to the american USD price.. as there is about a 20% difference between USD and CAD

also ATM fee's are meaningless..

i can easily show a price that has 0% fee (using one exchange as a comparison) and also 2% fee (using a different exchange) and the values would be better using the one with the fee's
EG
BTC-e: $439 +2% fee = $447.78
bitstamp: $449 + 0% = $449.00

$1.22 better infact

but i think at a 20% markup. the chances are the person is canadian. but if he is american using an american ATM then thats a bit of a rip off.

just be sure to look at the values before accepting the offer

This ATM and user is located in the USA. So it wouldn't be that. It was a flat out 20% fee for the amount he withdraw.

[Slowturtleinc]

Think this is just the conversion to American,I recall being a little pissed the first time I bought bitcoin from atm. Bitaccess are usually pretty good when I have contacted them for details in the past. Believe they even will meet you in person if you want to exchange larger amounts.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Name and shame. Scream it all over Reddit too. Even if the guy misheard, 20% is a fuckin joke and people need to warned off it.

I second this.  You said it was in the US, and now I'm really curious.  I have yet to meet anyone who's seriously into bitcoin and I've definitely never seen a bitcoin ATM.

[btvGainer]

Hey guys, thanks for all the answers. I really appreciate the quick and detailed responses.

I don't want to name or provide the location just yet as I do not want to give them a bad reputation yet if there is a misunderstanding. I sent an email to the operator to get some answers myself and hear their side of the story. Hopefully they respond.

It is a BTM with buy/sell functionality and it is a BitAccess ATM.

I'm still investigating but another possibility is the user I was helping with may have spoke to the Store Owner instead of the Bitcoin ATM owner. In this case, it's not the responsibility of the Store Owner if he did not know and just said 1% when he did not call the actual ATM owner/operator. Another thing is, I am skeptical about the fee not being shown. From my experience generally the fees are shown on screen. But again, it is also possible maybe its a bugged ATM or some kind of technical issue that didn't show the fee % for whatever reason.

Anyways still investigating. If it turns out just being foul play then I will post the location to warn others from having that happen to them. But if it's a user error who just did not happen to see the screen or went through it too fast, then I will drop this issue.

Thanks again.

In that case you should visit the said atm and to a small transaction to see if it displays a fee on screen or not.You can also verify other details given by that guy if you visit the atm where that happened

[CoinATMRadar]

Hey, I'm running coinatmradar.com bitcoin ATM map.

Can you find this machine on the map and check what the fees are listed now? I think for many BitAccess machines the fees are available

If you don't want to share the machine publicly - send me a pm, I will try to help you and contact operator as well to find out details and try to solve it for you.

I think in your case it was a very simple situation, when owner of the location didn't have the latest updated info, also operator can change fees remotely at any time, so it could be 1% one day and then it could be changed.
However, I think 20% is something strange for the sell bitcoin fee, usually it is lower than buy fee (average sell fee is at 5% now, you can check it on stats page on my site). Maybe in this particular case the operator was low on cash and that's why raised the rate.

Also BitAccess machine UI has sell price displayed during the process - you can see it here in the right upper corner during sell process: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoaviCX4Urw, so I think whoever used the machine was not careful enough to look for details of operation.

[snoovering]

I wanted to see what you guys think or what to do?

I'm helping out a new user who just got into bitcoin. He was at an ATM and talked to the owner and said it was a 1% fee to Sell bitcoins. The machine itself didn't have any fee information. Anyhow, when he went to proceed it charged him 20% fee or a little over couple hundred dollar fee when selling 1k of btc. Afterwards, he called the number for support but all they do is hang up even after they just talked.

OP, sleaze and chicanery are intrinsic to Bitcoin. Better your friend learns this early on.

[bitbite111]

Fees should definatly be posted in plain sight.

[OROBTC]

...

In my city, the few BTMs have a fee ranging from 9% to 14%-plus.  The fees were lower until recently.  It may be that when you add up all the costs (the machine itself, managing it (putting BTC in, taking cash out, electricity, rent, etc.), a very low fee would not sustain such a business.

To my knowledge the machine I have used DOES NOT show the fee either.

20% is very high.  Even the normal 14% I see drove me to using Circle when I want to buy.

[MrBig]

...

In my city, the few BTMs have a fee ranging from 9% to 14%-plus.  The fees were lower until recently.  It may be that when you add up all the costs (the machine itself, managing it (putting BTC in, taking cash out, electricity, rent, etc.), a very low fee would not sustain such a business.

To my knowledge the machine I have used DOES NOT show the fee either.

20% is very high.  Even the normal 14% I see drove me to using Circle when I want to buy.

The one time I checked out an ATM in my city, the price was 15% higher than the market price. I didn't bother with it, as there are much cheaper options.

[es2thekay]

it's maybe why the dude stole the atm and fired in a store last year.

[yenxz]

it's maybe why the dude stole the atm and fired in a store last year.

i never hear that news,is that really happen?
the owner put fee for his own,and maybe for closing maintance cost of that ATM,but that percentage was too high,imagine if each day people use that ATM 100 times,the owner should really make big profit.