Bitinstant investigation - community effort.

[URSAY]

Personally I do not have any money outstanding with BitInstant, but they're complaining about growing pains, but that complaint is getting old now. To me it starts to look like incompetency, or a scam. If it's a scam or a ponzi, it's not sure everybody that works for BitInstant even knows this at this point in time.

The way I see it, their operations are not complicated. All payments leave trails. And their aim is to move money from A to B. A customer complaint should be able to be investigated in 15 minutes, if all the info required could be extracted from available resources, now if there's only one person having access to exchange-accounts, bank acocunts and so on, and everything is just forwarded to him (Charlie ?), then it's understandable that people complain because things are resolved slowly.

What there need to be: A ticket system that is updated by the support representatives where a customer can follow his case. There should also be some information about just how many unresolved tickets there are in the system, so customers can get a sense of that something is actually done.

When a customer submits a ticket, he should get a response as quickly as possible, and if his order cannot be resolved there and then, it should clearly state why this is the case, and what's further done with his order.

Also, it's technically trivial to check for available balances on exchanges, and deny customers business (ie. not letting them put in new orders) when and if this is the case.

I would advise all customers to give Bitinstant 14 days to resolve their case, if after this time, the case is not solved, then criminal charges should be brought towards Bitinstant, and complaints should be filled with any relevant trade and consumer organizations. As enough complaints starts coming in, these organizations WILL take action, and Bitinstant WILL face consequences.

If I ran or worked for Bitinstant, I would do my best to ease all the worries of customers, and even limit the incoming order volume until things calm down and the backlog is cleared. At the moment Bitinstant is running their own reputation down the drain.

Our new website which launches soon will address many of the concerns you address here.  In the meantime I need to continue supporting the old website.  Most transactions are not as simple as point A to point B as you state but rather they involve more steps with many other companies.  Thanks for your concern.

[1713566772]

1713566772

[1713566772]

1713566772

[Welsh]

I hope you can actually sort out all these issues.


I have seen many threads in the forums about bitinstant 'scamming', at first I thought it was because was not patient enough. However I have read loads of different threads stating the same as this one.


I would like to hear from anyone who have had any past experience with bitinstant and if they resolved the issue.

[URSAY]

I hope you can actually sort out all these issues.


I have seen many threads in the forums about bitinstant 'scamming', at first I thought it was because was not patient enough. However I have read loads of different threads stating the same as this one.


I would like to hear from anyone who have had any past experience with bitinstant and if they resolved the issue.

Look thru this thread and you will find plenty of resolved issues!  

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=128314.0;topicseen

[Herodes]

Our new website which launches soon will address many of the concerns you address here.  In the meantime I need to continue supporting the old website.  Most transactions are not as simple as point A to point B as you state but rather they involve more steps with many other companies.  Thanks for your concern.

It's still A to B, with intermediaries. Still not rocket science.

What about halting new orders until you've cleared the back log, and then when you start accepting orders, only take a volume you can handle in a reasonable time frame?


You're welcome, and best wishes!

[URSAY]

Our new website which launches soon will address many of the concerns you address here.  In the meantime I need to continue supporting the old website.  Most transactions are not as simple as point A to point B as you state but rather they involve more steps with many other companies.  Thanks for your concern.

It's still A to B, with intermediaries. Still not rocket science.

What about halting new orders until you've cleared the back log, and then when you start accepting orders, only take a volume you can handle in a reasonable time frame?


You're welcome, and best wishes!

Still A to B with many complexities and options.  Many times the customers themselves make mistakes in their orders which slows their transaction down.

We are a technology company which logs and solves support issues everyday just like any other technology company. 

[Herodes]

Our new website which launches soon will address many of the concerns you address here.  In the meantime I need to continue supporting the old website.  Most transactions are not as simple as point A to point B as you state but rather they involve more steps with many other companies.  Thanks for your concern.

It's still A to B, with intermediaries. Still not rocket science.

What about halting new orders until you've cleared the back log, and then when you start accepting orders, only take a volume you can handle in a reasonable time frame?


You're welcome, and best wishes!

Still A to B with many complexities and options.  Many times the customers themselves make mistakes in their orders which slows their transaction down.

We are a technology company which logs and solves support issues everyday just like any other technology company. 

At the moment, you're hurting the image of Bitcoin, that's why I care. You don't seem to have a complete overview of what's going on, and therefore you should rectify that situation, by regaining control. That's all.

When customers do an error, which does happen, a delay should be expected, but all issues should still be resolved within 7 days in my opinion, when several issues are taking longer than that to sort out, then here's some serious issues that needs to be ironed out.

Cheers

[URSAY]

Our new website which launches soon will address many of the concerns you address here.  In the meantime I need to continue supporting the old website.  Most transactions are not as simple as point A to point B as you state but rather they involve more steps with many other companies.  Thanks for your concern.

It's still A to B, with intermediaries. Still not rocket science.

What about halting new orders until you've cleared the back log, and then when you start accepting orders, only take a volume you can handle in a reasonable time frame?


You're welcome, and best wishes!

Still A to B with many complexities and options.  Many times the customers themselves make mistakes in their orders which slows their transaction down.

We are a technology company which logs and solves support issues everyday just like any other technology company. 

At the moment, you're hurting the image of Bitcoin, that's why I care. You don't seem to have a complete overview of what's going on, and therefore you should rectify that situation, by regaining control. That's all.

When customers do an error, which does happen, a delay should be expected, but all issues should still be resolved within 7 days in my opinion, when several issues are taking longer than that to sort out, then here's some serious issues that needs to be ironed out.

Cheers

At the moment I am doing my best with the tools that I have available.  I'm sure I have a much better understanding of our systems as I actually work here.  We are working on regaining control over support times and escalating volume.  This requires many things to be done by many people.  It's unrealistic to think we are not working to resolve outstanding issues.  If that were the case, I wouldn't be here.

[Herodes]

At the moment I am doing my best with the tools that I have available.  I'm sure I have a much better understanding of our systems as I actually work here.  We are working on regaining control over support times and escalating volume.  This requires many things to be done by many people.  It's unrealistic to think we are not working to resolve outstanding issues.  If that were the case, I wouldn't be here.

I'm aware things cannot be fixed quickly over night, but I hope that your organization will adapt, and that the current situation will be a thing of the past in the near future.

Thanks for communicating, that's always a plus in my book.

[Epicblood]

It's been over a week since I submitted a ticket through there contact page. I have since gotten no response other than their automated message thing. Seriously starting to consider joining this one guy in his class action suit against them.

OrderID: 0cc1b652-da77-438e-9192-d1aa5d81e62a
EventID: d5145f94-c0df-41ff-b8e3-874b2133df3d
QuoteID: 7ed558b9-4236-417b-8008-16547b02d97a

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

It's been over a week since I submitted a ticket through there contact page. I have since gotten no response other than their automated message thing. Seriously starting to consider joining this one guy in his class action suit against them.

OrderID: 0cc1b652-da77-438e-9192-d1aa5d81e62a
EventID: d5145f94-c0df-41ff-b8e3-874b2133df3d
QuoteID: 7ed558b9-4236-417b-8008-16547b02d97a

Hey,

Processed! Sorry for the delay.

The guy doing the class action suit is a scam, if he (or anyone involved) actually has an order with us, I'd love to get in touch and resolve it.

At this point, Ive yet to hear from anyone

Charlie

[Epicblood]

It's been over a week since I submitted a ticket through there contact page. I have since gotten no response other than their automated message thing. Seriously starting to consider joining this one guy in his class action suit against them.

OrderID: 0cc1b652-da77-438e-9192-d1aa5d81e62a
EventID: d5145f94-c0df-41ff-b8e3-874b2133df3d
QuoteID: 7ed558b9-4236-417b-8008-16547b02d97a

Hey,

Processed! Sorry for the delay.

The guy doing the class action suit is a scam, if he (or anyone involved) actually has an order with us, I'd love to get in touch and resolve it.

At this point, Ive yet to hear from anyone

Charlie

Thank you, and thanks for the warning as well.
Have yet to receive any email/funds though, will update when I do

[Gareth Nelson]

It's been over a week since I submitted a ticket through there contact page. I have since gotten no response other than their automated message thing. Seriously starting to consider joining this one guy in his class action suit against them.

OrderID: 0cc1b652-da77-438e-9192-d1aa5d81e62a
EventID: d5145f94-c0df-41ff-b8e3-874b2133df3d
QuoteID: 7ed558b9-4236-417b-8008-16547b02d97a

Hey,

Processed! Sorry for the delay.

The guy doing the class action suit is a scam, if he (or anyone involved) actually has an order with us, I'd love to get in touch and resolve it.

At this point, Ive yet to hear from anyone

Charlie

Thank you, and thanks for the warning as well.
Have yet to receive any email/funds though, will update when I do

Just been going through our orders and checked on yours, it was sent to virwox for delivery and is on the standard manual hold (this is done by virwox, not by us, future orders should go through straight away).

[Epicblood]

It's been over a week since I submitted a ticket through there contact page. I have since gotten no response other than their automated message thing. Seriously starting to consider joining this one guy in his class action suit against them.

OrderID: 0cc1b652-da77-438e-9192-d1aa5d81e62a
EventID: d5145f94-c0df-41ff-b8e3-874b2133df3d
QuoteID: 7ed558b9-4236-417b-8008-16547b02d97a

Hey,

Processed! Sorry for the delay.

The guy doing the class action suit is a scam, if he (or anyone involved) actually has an order with us, I'd love to get in touch and resolve it.

At this point, Ive yet to hear from anyone

Charlie

Thank you, and thanks for the warning as well.
Have yet to receive any email/funds though, will update when I do

Just been going through our orders and checked on yours, it was sent to virwox for delivery and is on the standard manual hold (this is done by virwox, not by us, future orders should go through straight away).

Alright, what is the usual wait time for this?

[Epicblood]

Just got my Money
thanks guys.

[Luckybit]

I am finally convinced, Bitinstant is a scam.

They claimed to have resolved my issue on April 27th, and sent my coins apparently to an address on blockchain (which wasn't mine) but which blockchain claims is some sort of forwarding shared address for privacy reasons. Long story short, I never received the coins or a refund. I don't expect to ever receive the coins from Bitinstant and regretfully I have reached the conclusion that Bitinstant is a scam company.

Blockchain.info has a feature called oa shared wallet privacy. Do not use this feature. If you lose this feature the same situation that happened to me will happen to you. If Bitinstant forgets or due to technical reasons cannot send you your coins at the time it's expected and you used the shared wallet feature you will not receive your coins. Instead it will go to a random address.

In my case the coins went to that random forwarding address and probably was sent to someone else or got lost in the block chain. The lesson here is and which should be spread is that this feature is broken when used in combination with Bitinstant. In fact, I would say this feature doesn't work period as there is very little detail on how it works and on how secure it actually is and in my case it is now proven that its technically possible that your transactions can be lost.

Here is a copy of the emails I sent to Blockchain.info ---

https://blockchain.info/address/1CghGBzMDPVqPGb63Vyf9uWAh3JGwco9Un
In this most recent blockchain.info it's saying the Bitcoins 3.69843968
BTC were sent to that address.
1JQ4eo82X9YQW3Mu1TbHADCpSAmWwYutUT --> 1Hh54JkZRbSCom3ddsbJuVgACpy4dwbTXg
Which are supposed to be forwarded to my address at -->
1D71ihfwJdY99AxGPdtQd1Zu2L6szUMZTj
were instead forwarded to 1CghGBzMDPVqPGb63Vyf9uWAh3JGwco9Un ??
Can you tell me whats going on here? Does the oa shared wallet feature
even work?

------

I received no response after sending several emails to their Zendesk support. It's safe to say that oa shared wallet does not work as I received no response and merely a "closed".  See it for yourselves
But they never sent me my coins, never responded to me, and solved nothing, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. It's safer to buy your coins from localbitcoins. Dealing with corporations at this point is more of a risk than dealing with individuals in the community.

[URSAY]

I am finally convinced, Bitinstant is a scam.

They claimed to have resolved my issue on April 27th, and send coins apparently to an address on blockchain (which wasn't mine) but which blockchain claims is some sort of forwarding shared address for privacy reasons. Long story short, I never received the coins or a refund. I don't expect to ever receive the coins from Bitinstant and regretfully I have reached the conclusion that Bitinstant is a scam company.

Blockchain.info has a feature called oa shared wallet privacy. Do not use this feature. If you lose this feature the same situation that happened to me will happen to you. If Bitinstant forgets or due to technical reasons cannot send you your coins at the time it's expected and you used the shared wallet feature you will not receive your coins. Instead it will go to a random address.

In my case the coins went to that random forwarding address and probably was sent to someone else or got lost in the block chain. The lesson here is and which should be spread is that this feature is broken when used in combination with Bitinstant. In fact, I would say this feature doesn't work period as there is very little detail on how it works and on how secure it actually is and in my case it is now proven that its technically possible that your transactions can be lost.

Here is a copy of the emails I sent to Blockchain.info ---

https://blockchain.info/address/1CghGBzMDPVqPGb63Vyf9uWAh3JGwco9Un
In this most recent blockchain.info it's saying the Bitcoins 3.69843968
BTC were sent to that address.
1JQ4eo82X9YQW3Mu1TbHADCpSAmWwYutUT --> 1Hh54JkZRbSCom3ddsbJuVgACpy4dwbTXg
Which are supposed to be forwarded to my address at -->
1D71ihfwJdY99AxGPdtQd1Zu2L6szUMZTj
were instead forwarded to 1CghGBzMDPVqPGb63Vyf9uWAh3JGwco9Un ??
Can you tell me whats going on here? Does the oa shared wallet feature
even work?

------

I received no response after sending several emails to their Zendesk support. It's safe to say that oa shared wallet does not work as I received no response and merely a "closed".  See it for yourselves
But they never sent me my coins, never responded to me, and solved nothing, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. It's safer to buy your coins from localbitcoins. Dealing with corporations at this point is more of a risk than dealing with individuals in the community.

If you want attention on your issue then it must be logged at bitinstant.com/contact

Log your issue there and we will start looking into your problem right away.

[Luckybit]

I am finally convinced, Bitinstant is a scam.

They claimed to have resolved my issue on April 27th, and send coins apparently to an address on blockchain (which wasn't mine) but which blockchain claims is some sort of forwarding shared address for privacy reasons. Long story short, I never received the coins or a refund. I don't expect to ever receive the coins from Bitinstant and regretfully I have reached the conclusion that Bitinstant is a scam company.

Blockchain.info has a feature called oa shared wallet privacy. Do not use this feature. If you lose this feature the same situation that happened to me will happen to you. If Bitinstant forgets or due to technical reasons cannot send you your coins at the time it's expected and you used the shared wallet feature you will not receive your coins. Instead it will go to a random address.

In my case the coins went to that random forwarding address and probably was sent to someone else or got lost in the block chain. The lesson here is and which should be spread is that this feature is broken when used in combination with Bitinstant. In fact, I would say this feature doesn't work period as there is very little detail on how it works and on how secure it actually is and in my case it is now proven that its technically possible that your transactions can be lost.

Here is a copy of the emails I sent to Blockchain.info ---

https://blockchain.info/address/1CghGBzMDPVqPGb63Vyf9uWAh3JGwco9Un
In this most recent blockchain.info it's saying the Bitcoins 3.69843968
BTC were sent to that address.
1JQ4eo82X9YQW3Mu1TbHADCpSAmWwYutUT --> 1Hh54JkZRbSCom3ddsbJuVgACpy4dwbTXg
Which are supposed to be forwarded to my address at -->
1D71ihfwJdY99AxGPdtQd1Zu2L6szUMZTj
were instead forwarded to 1CghGBzMDPVqPGb63Vyf9uWAh3JGwco9Un ??
Can you tell me whats going on here? Does the oa shared wallet feature
even work?

------

I received no response after sending several emails to their Zendesk support. It's safe to say that oa shared wallet does not work as I received no response and merely a "closed".  See it for yourselves
But they never sent me my coins, never responded to me, and solved nothing, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. It's safer to buy your coins from localbitcoins. Dealing with corporations at this point is more of a risk than dealing with individuals in the community.

If you want attention on your issue then it must be logged at bitinstant.com/contact

Log your issue there and we will start looking into your problem right away.

Okay I will give Bitinstant a benefit of doubt because you do seem to be trying to resolve the issue. If it gets resolved I'll delete my post about Bitinstant.

[Gareth Nelson]

Hang on, are you claiming we literally sent your funds to a random address and not the address you specified?

Give me your OrderID and the address you wanted the funds sent to and i'll check where they were sent - if you specified the wrong address however that is hardly our fault.

[URSAY]

Luckybit...

Is this issue unrelated?

zipzap 785119595
This processed successfully on April 2nd. See here: https://blockchain.info/address/1Hh54JkZRbSCom3ddsbJuVgACpy4dwbTXg

[BitcoinPappi]

Hi Guys,

I think I might have been scammed by BitInstant as well. Encountered issues when withdrawing funds from my account. Resulted in Bitinstant  having a larger withdrawal  than the cash received.

I have tried to go through support but it has now been 1 month . Please let me know what information I can provide to get help or to expose the fraud to prevent it from happening to others .

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=229098.msg2412100#msg2412100