[ANN] Purse.io - Bitcoin Amazon Marketplace - Save ~10-25% on Amazon Wishlist

[fcode]

I'm wondering what happens if someone scams Amazon then it comes back on you because you received the product. So lets say someone uses a stolen credit card to order off Amazon. You receive the product and everything seems OK. They get the BTC and disappear. Then later the black helicopters show up and raid your house (you know what I mean, ). There would be no way to catch the actual scammer.

So yeah, you're getting a discount but you're also taking a huge risk and not just risk of losing BTC, but legal risk of being charged with fraud.

And now:

A few weeks ago, the home of a user named vnnkl was searched by authorities as a result of a purchase he made on Purse 6 months ago. Through an internal investigation, we discovered that the counterparty’s activity originated from a hacked computer of another German resident. To vnnkl, we are truly apologetic and have offered to compensate lawyer fees and any other expenses related to the incident.

Yeah, I mean I understand this is a noble and good cause but there are way too many crooks out there. Even $10k is not worth the risk of my house getting torn apart in the US. I mean it could literally ruin my life for months if not years as I'm tied up in legal bullshit. Is that risk worth the couple % savings? Not in my book.

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[ebliever]

I don't think the risk is huge compared to the volume on Purse now. They wouldn't be able to afford protection policies like this if they have to pay out often. For those interested here's the text of their new policy:

Our commitment to Trust & Security

Purse’s $10,000 Spender Guarantee
For ultimate peace of mind, we protect your purchases. Every single purchase.
 
    A few weeks ago, the home of a user named vnnkl was searched by authorities as a result of a purchase he made on Purse 6 months ago. Through an internal investigation, we discovered that the counterparty’s activity originated from a hacked computer of another German resident. To vnnkl, we are truly apologetic and have offered to compensate lawyer fees and any other expenses related to the incident.
 
    In the past year, we successfully transacted over 10,000 items, and 4 transactions went awry. 3 transactions involved gift card reversals which we promptly refunded. In this case, a refund alone did not suffice.
 
    We want to make this right, and on January 7, we will implement a $10,000 Purse Guarantee protecting users from any costs related to purchasing items through our website. We will extend this program to vnnkl or any other use who happens to report an incident for past purchases.
 
In addition, we are doubling down on support.
 
  4x Customer Support Team
We doubled our Customer Support team in December, and we will be doubling again by March.
 
  Contact the CEO
If you can’t get a hold of anyone or want to contact the CEO, email andrew@purse.io.
 
We also added several safety-related features to strengthen trust and confidence in our community.
 
  Purse Guarantee
Starting January 7th, when a spender purchases items from Purse, their purchases will be covered for any damages or costs resulting form the purchase up to $10,000 with our Purse Guarantee. This program will apply retroactively to any spenders who may report any damages related to Purse.
 
  Limits & Verification
In our Black Friday release, we introduced a gamification engine that limits new and unverified buyers. Buyers can improve limits with successful transactions, social verification, and phone verification.
 
  Fraud Prevention
We incorporated an algorithm that detects suspicious buyers and requests verification before they’re able to make purchases.
 
   Customized Trust Settings
In the near future, we’ll incorporate features to allow spenders to limit buyers based on their levels.

[stoneage]

I have purchased an item via purse.io which I have now received, but when I go to confirm shipment I get a message saying 'there was a problem confirming shipment please contact support asap'. I have done this, they advised clearing the cache and trying again which I have done and the same message comes up each time i try. I have gone back to support to let them know this didn't work but as yet I haven't had another reply from them.

Any ideas? anyone had a similar problem?

This is my first transaction so would like to get this cleared up asap

[Zyrio]

I think purse needs to think about their fee system for higher discounts. I have an amazon order for 115€. 50% discount would mean me paying 57.5€. But with the fee for purse i pay 74€ in fact. Doesnt look like a 50% discount anymore then. Purse is taking nearly 30% of my discount (28.79%) while i only have a real discount of 35% on my purchase at the end.

When i change the discount to the 29% i really get at a claimed 50% discount then i get 25.68% discount in reality while purse only eats 11% of the theoretical 29% discount.

I think a fee around 10% is something that makes sense. Charging me a fee of nearly 30% sounds like a real hefty fee to me.

[bitcart]

Check out bitcart.io as an alternative with 20-25% discounts on Amazon and other stores.

[js1985]

Added wishlist, got "wishlist is empty" error, when its far from it, your system is buggy.

[SebastianJu]

Added wishlist, got "wishlist is empty" error, when its far from it, your system is buggy.

Right. And on other wishlists it says: "Error

There was an error, and we can not continue.
Please contact support with the error details.
Detail

Invalid order parameters."

The support didnt answer. I wonder whats the problem.

The error message is fixed though the empty wishlist remains.

[mrkent]

Regarding fees:

Fee is 1% for discounts of 10% or less, then it scales exponentially using this equation: FEE = exp((x - 10)/15), x being the requested discount.

Regarding wishlist errors:

We're adding better messaging for wishlist errors, but the jist of it is that certain items (usually obscure ones) cannot be ordered through our system at the current time.

Regarding shipment confirmation problem:

This bug should now be fixed.

[SebastianJu]

The wishlist error is fixed, right, but i dont like that i cant order certain products. And its not obscure ones. A dress for my girlfriend or a branded watch. Sometimes those products arent sold on amazon directly or on amazon marketplace but they are listed on amazon and you need to order it in a different store. Im not happy that this isnt possible anymore.

And i found now that amazon discount codes arent recognized anymore too. No warning about that when implementing the wishlist. Only the other items are shown.

I liked how its possible to use purse on amazon because amazon has a huge amount of products you can order. Now this is limited. And unfortunately for the products that are branded and so on.

Regarding the fee, i wrote that i dont understand the fee structure but i know how its calculated. I only dont understand why purse is taking an exponentially fee. I mean if you would take 10% of the savings i would get when ordering through purse, ok. But taking 30% of the savings away(like zyrio calculated) looks way too much. I think the exponential function is not the best choice. Simply because it takes too much on high discounts. It looks like purse doesnt want these discounts to be used. I dont see otherwise why purse should be in need to take so much more than on, lets say 30% discount.

[SebastianJu]

Is there anyone answering support messages or email? both me and a seller are trying to get in contact but alas no answer

basically half of the order was cancelled by amazon due to being out of stock so now the order needs adjusting by purse support

I get answers.

[mrkent]

Is there anyone answering support messages or email? both me and a seller are trying to get in contact but alas no answer

basically half of the order was cancelled by amazon due to being out of stock so now the order needs adjusting by purse support

PM me your username and I'll look into it for you.

[Zyrio]

I asked for support on a wrong refund on february the 14th but nothing happened till now. My username on purse is Ruqol. Purse order SP-047a509c.

I had three orders, all were ordered but for some reason a lot of the items went back into my wishlist. At some point i initiated a dispute.

Then an admin cleared the orders and gave me a refund for the items i didnt get.

But the refunds doesnt make sense. I got less refund than i should.

For example the first order. Final total was 0.36209185 BTC. Products were worth 111.04€ and products delivered were worth 5.18€. Purse took 0.28117087 BTC + 0.08092098 BTC Fee and refunded 0.11175151 BTC. Clearly makes no sense in any way since the total of all bitcoins (refunded, fee plus paid) is 0.47384336 BTC. And the percent of not delivered items value is 95,34% but i got back only 30,86% of my funds.

I dont know if they sent the coins to the buyer then.

Second order. 0.36628938 BTC. Items value 126.27€ and not delivered value 19.99€. 0.28443033 BTC + 0.08185905 BTC Fee were taken and 0.05798784 BTC were refunded. Total 0.42427722 BTC. Again more than possible. Not delivered value 15.8% and refunded value 15.8%. The refund actually makes sense here though the total (refunded, fee plus paid) doesnt make sense.

Third order. 0.28428267 BTC. Delivered value was 67,22€ and total value was 117,12€. They took 0.22075064 BTC + 0.06353203 BTC Fee and i got back 0.12112112 BTC. Total value 0,40540379 BTC. Not delivered value 42,68% and refunded value 42,61%. Which matches pretty exact too.

Im not sure why the totals of BTC are more than possible. At least with 2 orders the refund matches the value if only taking the original BTC and the delivered value. But not with the first one.

Please fix.

[NUFCrichard]

    A few weeks ago, the home of a user named vnnkl was searched by authorities as a result of a purchase he made on Purse 6 months ago. Through an internal investigation, we discovered that the counterparty’s activity originated from a hacked computer of another German resident. To vnnkl, we are truly apologetic and have offered to compensate lawyer fees and any other expenses related to the incident.

I had dealings on purse that I fear will lead to this sort of this thing happening to me, but so far purse don't seem hugely keen to prevent things getting to the authorities, rather they just say that as I am not at fault, I shouldn't worry... Except I'm very worried about the situation, especially as I am also in Germany. I get the impression I will have to bite the bullet and double pay. I'd rather be slightly out of pocket than in court but covered by purse...

[Zyrio]

In the last time i have the feeling purse staff is overworked. In the beginning the support was quite fast but now problems stay unsolved for me.

For example the refund thing i mentioned above. Then i have another problem with packages i sent back to amazon. Unsolved since months. Spender really should be careful with amazon refunds because practically no amazon employee knows what to do with wishlist returns. Out of 4 products i sent back only one was treated correctly. The correct way to handle things is that you go into send back center on amazon and chose to send back a product from wishlist. Make sure you still know the order id since it doesn't show up in your amazon account. Then you can send back. Or you need to call them. Problem is... even if you do so you have a high chance of failing. If you mail them or chat with amazon then they don't have a clue what to do. Only the people on phone mostly know.

In my case only one product was refunded correctly. I have the money in my amazon account now. Three other products are not. Because amazon failed and sent the money back to the buyer. Even when i cleared things with them before. Great. I asked purse Ashkan in November! They wanted to solve it with the buyer. Nothing happened till now. I now tried to solve things with amazon and wanted to ask them to charge the buyer again and give me the refund. And they told me that it's too late now. Great. Price of the products are 78,40€ + 35,85€ + 15,99€ on amazon. My purse discount was 10-15% on the products. So now i have to believe i lost 130€ since purse didn't fix it till now.

I never thought that amazon is so much trouble when sending back wishlist items. I mean it's not exactly a new thing. And purse did not solve it until it was too late now. I didn't know that might happen.

Next thing is that admins are going around in orders and deciding and making things without real traces what happened. For example an admin claimed he will close an order of three products. The biggest product was still in wishlist for some reason so the admin claimed 2 items were bought and shipped and i will get a refund for the third one. I wrote "no, i did not get anything yet" but today it was closed. Till now i only got one of the items. Don't know if i will get the second. And even if i might have gotten a refund... there is no entry in the transaction list. The numbers change simply back and forth and i dont have a clue what happened. Maybe they refunded, maybe not. No email, no transaction entry. Simly arbitrary.

I like purse but it brings trouble and i don't like that it looks like i lost the 130€. Im not even able to call the buyer to ask him sending me the € another way. Though i see that its trouble for him. Purse should somehow find a way to make amazon refunds safe. As far as i know... never email or chat with amazon, they don't know anything and make surely stupid things. Don't use the contact center because you only can chose your own bought products and you only will get back answers that you can send back your own product. Call them or use the return center for wishlist items. But even then you can get the bad surprise that amazon is telling the seller that the item wants to be returned and the seller asks the buyer. He doesn't know of anything and the return is cancelled until you ask back why nothing happens. If for some reason you have a return label then make sure its a return label for presents. But even when... one of the items was sent back that way and still the money went to the buyer.

Then i have a support request asking where the error was with three orders that were only partly delivered and should be refunded accordingly. See post above. I asked where the error was in order to know how to rate the buyer. They wanted to check but nothing happened till then.

So purse for the moment is a nice place for a buyer though it still has enough child illnesses for spenders at the moment. At least orders are taken fast in the last days. But if you ever have such a return and you don't get the refund in your amazon account then don't wait for purse until it's too late.

[NUFCrichard]

In the last time i have the feeling purse staff is overworked. In the beginning the support was quite fast but now problems stay unsolved for me.

For example the refund thing i mentioned above. Then i have another problem with packages i sent back to amazon. Unsolved since months. Spender really should be careful with amazon refunds because practically no amazon employee knows what to do with wishlist returns. Out of 4 products i sent back only one was treated correctly. The correct way to handle things is that you go into send back center on amazon and chose to send back a product from wishlist. Make sure you still know the order id since it doesn't show up in your amazon account. Then you can send back. Or you need to call them. Problem is... even if you do so you have a high chance of failing. If you mail them or chat with amazon then they don't have a clue what to do. Only the people on phone mostly know.

In my case only one product was refunded correctly. I have the money in my amazon account now. Three other products are not. Because amazon failed and sent the money back to the buyer. Even when i cleared things with them before. Great. I asked purse Ashkan in November! They wanted to solve it with the buyer. Nothing happened till now. I now tried to solve things with amazon and wanted to ask them to charge the buyer again and give me the refund. And they told me that it's too late now. Great. Price of the products are 78,40€ + 35,85€ + 15,99€ on amazon. My purse discount was 10-15% on the products. So now i have to believe i lost 130€ since purse didn't fix it till now.

I never thought that amazon is so much trouble when sending back wishlist items. I mean it's not exactly a new thing. And purse did not solve it until it was too late now. I didn't know that might happen.

Next thing is that admins are going around in orders and deciding and making things without real traces what happened. For example an admin claimed he will close an order of three products. The biggest product was still in wishlist for some reason so the admin claimed 2 items were bought and shipped and i will get a refund for the third one. I wrote "no, i did not get anything yet" but today it was closed. Till now i only got one of the items. Don't know if i will get the second. And even if i might have gotten a refund... there is no entry in the transaction list. The numbers change simply back and forth and i dont have a clue what happened. Maybe they refunded, maybe not. No email, no transaction entry. Simly arbitrary.

I like purse but it brings trouble and i don't like that it looks like i lost the 130€. Im not even able to call the buyer to ask him sending me the € another way. Though i see that its trouble for him. Purse should somehow find a way to make amazon refunds safe. As far as i know... never email or chat with amazon, they don't know anything and make surely stupid things. Don't use the contact center because you only can chose your own bought products and you only will get back answers that you can send back your own product. Call them or use the return center for wishlist items. But even then you can get the bad surprise that amazon is telling the seller that the item wants to be returned and the seller asks the buyer. He doesn't know of anything and the return is cancelled until you ask back why nothing happens. If for some reason you have a return label then make sure its a return label for presents. But even when... one of the items was sent back that way and still the money went to the buyer.

Then i have a support request asking where the error was with three orders that were only partly delivered and should be refunded accordingly. See post above. I asked where the error was in order to know how to rate the buyer. They wanted to check but nothing happened till then.

So purse for the moment is a nice place for a buyer though it still has enough child illnesses for spenders at the moment. At least orders are taken fast in the last days. But if you ever have such a return and you don't get the refund in your amazon account then don't wait for purse until it's too late.

I agree that they must be over-worked, and they say that they are doubling their help staff again in March, but they really aren't that helpful, as you say.
In my case the buyer asked for a refund through Amazon, which was immediately granted.  The amazon marketplace company contacted me later to confirm that the order was not received, as the buyer had claimed, which was not the case.  It's a scam case pure and simple, but Purse.io say that the scammer has to pay....  How is that going to happen? 

I would love some better communication with them, but they don't really seem interested. To be honest I thought posting here might move things forward. Yesterday I got an email from them, but that was an advert saying I can ask for a 50% discount instead of just 25%.  I won't be using them ever again, with a 50% discount or not, I would just be living in fear of another scam situation not being dealt with by them.

[Zyrio]

Yes, they seem to put their time in new features but don't see that a bad user experience is a way worse anti advertising than some new features could be as advertisement. I was pleased to see that they react differently than other bitcoin companies when it comes to trouble. They instantly made a press release when the seize of the one user happened and offered a solution for the future. Way better than rumors going around. But they really need to fix their ground functions first. I think they are a little bit like "I avoid problems because they feel bad and new features feel good and shiny" now.

Hope they solve things. They got multimillion investments when im informed correctly. They SHOULD get their things together.

[NUFCrichard]

Well it seems I have got all of the "help" I am going to get from Purse.io.
I have been threatened with legal action, but Purse say I shouldn't worry, it isn't my fault.  They won't refund the ripped off company and can't contact the scammer (shocking!) so they will just let things run their course now.  I guess I just have to wait until the police turn up at my door now or I get a court summons. 

I don't recommend people use purse.io.  10-25% discount is not worth the stress.

[SebastianJu]

Well it seems I have got all of the "help" I am going to get from Purse.io.
I have been threatened with legal action, but Purse say I shouldn't worry, it isn't my fault.  They won't refund the ripped off company and can't contact the scammer (shocking!) so they will just let things run their course now.  I guess I just have to wait until the police turn up at my door now or I get a court summons. 

I don't recommend people use purse.io.  10-25% discount is not worth the stress.

The company has a contract with the scammer. So normally the person they would have to sue would be the scammer. But when the goods were sent to another person, so that they could get the goods back, it would be really interesting what a lawyer would say. Is it still their property or is it yours since you paid for it. Its even unsure if you have a contract with purse or with the scammer.

It might be that the company claims that you are the scammer and you only used wishlists to hide that. At least purse is a company that has some rich investors behind. I think they can afford the lawyers.

When i think about it. Purse wont be able to do it the way it is doing very long anymore. Personal identification for buyers need to come since where an opportunity there will scammers try more. There are forums where such "tricks" are shared. Or it only needs one person with access to hacked amazonaccounts, to make things really bad.

[mrkent]

I asked for support on a wrong refund on february the 14th but nothing happened till now. My username on purse is Ruqol. Purse order SP-047a509c.

I messaged you via our support system. It wasn't very clear what the problem with your order is, so we might have made a mistake in handling it.

[NUFCrichard]

Well it seems I have got all of the "help" I am going to get from Purse.io.
I have been threatened with legal action, but Purse say I shouldn't worry, it isn't my fault.  They won't refund the ripped off company and can't contact the scammer (shocking!) so they will just let things run their course now.  I guess I just have to wait until the police turn up at my door now or I get a court summons. 

I don't recommend people use purse.io.  10-25% discount is not worth the stress.

The company has a contract with the scammer. So normally the person they would have to sue would be the scammer. But when the goods were sent to another person, so that they could get the goods back, it would be really interesting what a lawyer would say. Is it still their property or is it yours since you paid for it. Its even unsure if you have a contract with purse or with the scammer.

It might be that the company claims that you are the scammer and you only used wishlists to hide that. At least purse is a company that has some rich investors behind. I think they can afford the lawyers.

When i think about it. Purse wont be able to do it the way it is doing very long anymore. Personal identification for buyers need to come since where an opportunity there will scammers try more. There are forums where such "tricks" are shared. Or it only needs one person with access to hacked amazonaccounts, to make things really bad.

This is exactly my worry, I don't think it will be easy to explain and even more difficult to prove the whole situation to any law authorities.
I have paid, but not the company that has been ripped off, I gave money to some scammer who has ripped off the company, does that mean I can keep the products bought through Purse? 

It's nice that Purse are answering questions on this thread, shame that they pick and choose which cases they want to deal with though.

I assume this happens quite a lot, what annoys me is that I can't change my review of my transaction, I put is as positive earlier, now I see it is a scam I obviously would like to put it as negative, but I can't.  Maybe the "customer support" reading this could change that feature.