New UK GBP User Followed BTC for year and a half just starting to buy coins HELP

[mrmerlin25]

I've followed the BitCoin for a good year and a bit. I think I picked it up just around the bit Boom and Crash so and recovery so maybe a year ago. Started mining realized I didn't have the equipment and would never make back my power usage and at the time (when I had a great job and lots of cash flow sadly LOL) didn't see a lot of need for it and a lot of risk.

Flash Forward to Feb/Mar 2012 and BTC caught my attention again and I was amazed to see how the prices had soared since I looked at buying last time. I was so annoyed I hadn't bought back when I had loads of money to buy it was just so not as simply as I had expected.

Now stupid me started to look into buying back in March when my interest had been sparked again but annoyingly my 30th birthday hit, many drunken nights, and thought I opened a MtGox and Intersango I never got to transfering funds in, and then when I saw 3 day wait it just got lost again until July to my shock to see the BItCoin pass $10 and I just knew I had put it off to long now I would get money in and buy. So now funds are much more limited as I am self employed and starting my own businesses but it also gives me time to pickup projects and my two projects at the moment are iOS development with MonoTouch and AeroShots inhaleable CAFFEINE very geeky tech if you ask me distributing in the UK.

I'm wanting to get much more involved in the BitCoin and now that I have grown my e-commerce business and in doing so my regular UK business with VAT numbers, UK LTD Company, etc it seems like a perfect tie in to help grow my AeroShots business and get involved in the BitCoin which I have been wanting to do for the past year and a bit but never had so many reasons to as I do now.

So This is my newbie post. I am lucky enough to be an Expat from the US, so I have US bank accounts, visa cards and visa debit cards, and family there who can do some local runnings for me, I also have UK bank accounts, business accounts, etc. So I am hoping to leverage this to my advantage to make getting bitcoins faster and easier by using both markets.

Any recommendations on where to start? Is there much good in getting my family there to buy a specific like USD Visa Debit/MoneyPak/Reload-able card that will help in rapid buying and selling of coins?

What about any BiNational BitCoiners doing the same? Any Expats who manage to use both US and UK/EUR?

I am going to post a second post now about the domain I've bought as it's sort of a totally different, though related, newbie post as it's though about the new consumer, it's also focused on starting a BitCoin UK and eventually global service, so answers and talk in here I will for sure apply to my site, it's also very different information than just a general new UK user would want!

Thanks everyone, so far the 4 people I have dealt with on various sites have been extremely helpful, straight forward, frank, and it's been really appreciated and I look forward to being a part of this!

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[muyuu]

Plenty of UK users around.

Check:

https://intersango.com/   however withdrawals may take a while, see https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=63877.msg1122824#msg1122824
Intersango thread https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4984.msg1126069

Bitcoin Conference (London, Sept.15-16 2012)
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=67199

The biggest exchange is https://mtgox.com/ in USD (Based in Japan).

[Stephen Gornick]

Plenty of UK users around.

In addition to those:

You can deposit cash into Mt. Gox's account with Barclays:
 -  http://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mtgox#UK_.28GBP.29

There is a site called London Bitcoin Exchange, though there is not much about them yet so if you do trade, perhaps use an escrow.
 - http://londonbitcoinexchange.wordpress.com/

You can send cash (GBP) or check to Bitcoin Nordic, by mail, to purchase bitcoins:
 - http://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Bitcoin_Nordic

You might find a local trader (or place an buy order and see if anyone is selling):
 - http://www.LocalBitcoins.com

There are a number of methods:

 - http://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Buying_bitcoins

[markodude]

Also in UK and fairly new to Bitcoin but mining LTC (Litecoins) at equivalent of around 8BTC per week.

Couple of guys in the UK that may be doing meetup some time, PM me for more info or if you need any help.

You should def. start looking at selling your product for Bitcoins (or Litecoins) as this will strengthen the currency.

Worth looking at the bitcurex visa as a withdrawl option, its a new thing but seem like a great idea.

For trading as mentioned, MTgox and BTC-E.com are good ones.

Edit: just found this http://www.ukash.com/uk/en/home.aspx and this http://mercabit.eu/

[matthewh3]

Yeah as well as Intersango is MtGox which have a UK Barclay Bank to make deposits.

[Stephen Gornick]

Yeah as well as Intersango is MtGox which have a UK Barclay Bank to make deposits.

Oh ya, I forgot about that method.  There is a 1.5% fee.

 - http://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mtgox#UK_.28GBP.29

[dancupid]

Intersango seem to be having problems with their UK bank account (statement says they will be closing it at the end of the month) so perhaps best to wait until they have a solution.

https://support.intersango.com/status

[muyuu]

Intersango seem to be having problems with their UK bank account (statement says they will be closing it at the end of the month) so perhaps best to wait until they have a solution.

https://support.intersango.com/status

Yep, I mentioned that. Only a problem if you plan to make cash withdrawals through them, which should be easy to avoid if you have an account in MtGox as well for instance. Intersango's GBP market is about as liquid as MtGox-GBP, maybe more.

[troc]

Intersango seem to be having problems with their UK bank account (statement says they will be closing it at the end of the month) so perhaps best to wait until they have a solution.

https://support.intersango.com/status

talking of which.

1. Intersango should make this banking issue more prominent on their landing page. Had I not been browsing the forums I would not have come across this.

2. Intersango should post more updates with regards to the issues and progress they have made in this regard.

[phantomcircuit]

Intersango seem to be having problems with their UK bank account (statement says they will be closing it at the end of the month) so perhaps best to wait until they have a solution.

https://support.intersango.com/status

talking of which.

1. Intersango should make this banking issue more prominent on their landing page. Had I not been browsing the forums I would not have come across this.

2. Intersango should post more updates with regards to the issues and progress they have made in this regard.

There is a very clear message on the first page once you've logged in.

It would be kind of silly to post "no news" every day.

[mrmerlin25]

Thanks for all the responses and tips. That mercaBit.eu looks like it will be interesting when it opens. I would like to copy that sort of a service for UK.

My problem with MtGox and Intersango have both just been times, I hate the wait. Transferring from my account to their account which is instant in the UK still takes DAYS for the money to show up.

I currently have £60 UKash GBP voucher which I am hoping to find a fast safe way to convert to either BTC now. I would eventually like to find a good way to convert UKash vouchers to like MtGox where I can control my Buy orders.

Could anyone help me now with a good, fast, safe conversion for £60 GBP UKash voucher. The one site that I found through UKash I tried to sign up for, and got to account verification and they rejected EVERY document including my passport scan asking for a Driving Licence instead. In a test I did with a small voucher trying to get to LR as I know I can get that into MtGox the company simply ate my voucher lol so glad it was a small test.

[Stephen Gornick]

The one site that I found through UKash I tried to sign up for, and got to account verification

If that wasn't Bitcoin Nordic, they accept UKash through CashU:
 - http://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/UKash
 - http://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/CashU
 - https://bitcoinnordic.com

Here's an individual looking for UKash:
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=103135.0  (Normal caveats about trading OTC apply)

[Stephen Gornick]

Blockchain.info just added the ability to use Barclay's Pingit to buy bitcoins:

 - https://blockchain.info/wallet/deposit-pingit

[mrmerlin25]

I saw that last night and nearly fainted but then all night it would just let you type the amount and take you to a blank screen! Thankfully the problem resolved itself and today it appeared so I've sent over a test amount to buy 2 BTC and just waiting for it to appear in my wallet.

I sent the PingIt to BlockChain.Info at 5:37am and it's now 6:50 so almost an hour and a half. I will try and update with the full details of exactly how long it took and how much BTC for GBP was received.

[mrmerlin25]

The £16 hit my BlockChain.info Wallet this afternoon from Barclay's PingIt app!

To convert GBP to BitCoin using PingIt I spent £16 and received 2.08 BTC or £ 7.69 per BTC. Looking at the trade history of MtGox GBP when the PingIt was sent around 5:30am the trade history between 3:30am and now nearly always traded at 7.69 or higher, only a few trades dipped down to 7.6 (about 9 trades) but the majority were all 7.69 or above peaking at 7.75 so overall a very good price for the BitCoins themselves. At the moment they are also not charging any fee.

The time was very fast, one of the fastest ways I have been able to electronically purchase BTC in the UK at such a good rate. Sent the money with PingIt at 5:35am and the BitCoins reached my wallet at 12:25 so under 7 hours on a Saturday early morning. This is also after the site wasn't working for many hours so I'm not sure if this made the time any slower because of a back log, I'm also not sure how automated the system is to know whether or not the fact it was such a weird time and day. I will be interested to do another transaction during normal working hours during the week and see if the turn around time is any faster.

Well done BlockChain.Info this is such a HUGE step forward for the UK I have struggled to get coins since I started and have been so jelous of the US and how easy it is to get BTC and get it fast.

I would still love to see a Dwolla/UKash/Voucher system roll out over here so that you can pop to a shop no more than a few miles away hand over GBP for a code that MtGox or another major exchange could simply take and give you funds to then put offers for coins on. When the UK hits that level I will be very pleased.

As I've seen stated by some other users before, the UK is lagging behind on this but the adoption is growing and once it catches on is going to be a huge market here. If I had the money to invest and fund a company that could roll out an infrastructure here I would in a second as it's growing fast here and is only a matter of months before this market has company's that are capitalising on this growth and unlike BlockChain.Info who have no real competitor to their PingIt funding method and yet aren't charging huge fee's and making a fortune as UK users will pay it as they have no choice!

Great job BlockChain.Info I look forward to seeing other UK entities step up and create solutions as fast and competitive! Anyone want to share with me what is holding back solutions such as the UKash style cash to a shop for a voucher redeemable for BitCoin Exchange funding. I would absolutely love to be a part of getting something like this going over here, even if on a small scale, targeting maybe just a few key central london/city shops.