Difficulty selling BitCoins

[sverre]

So I started writing an email to an eCommerce site in Australia that I use a bit, encouraging them to accept BTC for payment. I got to the paragraph that starts "Once you've accepted BitCoins, you can convert them into AUD by" and then got stuck.

From what I gather, the process is something like this (!):

Create sell orders on MtGox until you have all your BTC in USD on the Mt Gox site (minimum $800). Do a withdraw funds on Mt Gox of your USD to put them into Liberty Reserve (1% fee). Use a third party exchange like m-gold.com to have the Liberty Reserve balance transferred into your bank account ($35 fee).

Seriously!? No wonder it's hard to get eCommerce sites to adopt BitCoin! 

Is there no BitCoin2PayPal, where you send BitCoins to a BitCoin address, wait for a confirmation and around 10 minutes later the money is PayPal'd to you? Yes I know it's ironic to use PayPal, but until someone starts BitCoin2AUD (plus another for every other country) that's surely the easiest stop gap that gives every country in the world relatively easy access to BitCoin.

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[grondilu]

What about you implement such a service?

[doublec]

Is there no BitCoin2PayPal, where you send BitCoins to a BitCoin address, wait for a confirmation and around 10 minutes later the money is PayPal'd to you?

CoinCard pretty much does this.

[sverre]

What about you implement such a service?

In theory I could, but I would need to program a system that allows people to lodge transfers online, integrates with the BitCoin system, links in somehow to PayPal's API (do they even have one for this sort of thing?), and then also implement the selling of BitCoins system so I didn't end up with a huge stack of BitCoins and no money. I've got a little PHP experience but this is way beyond my ability. Then there's the risk that BitCoins will decrease in value between my buying them and people buying them from me. Surely some of the existing BitCoin players would be better equipped to offer such a service?

CoinCard pretty much does this.

Hardly! You try telling a business that it has to convert it's BitCoins into VISA cards and then can only use them for online purchases. How do you pay wages with a VISA card?? Bitcoin is a currency, not FlyBuy points!

[grondilu]

Bitcoin is a currency.  Not a currency exchange plateform.

Do you know any currency that integrates a forex trading system?  I don't.

[CCCMikey]

genjix and I are working on an AU conversion site at http://coingaroo.net.au - with details and design functionality questions at http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5102.msg74552#msg74552

I hit the same problem as you - no way out of BTC to AUD that I know of at the moment.

[sverre]

Wow that's an excellent level of thought you've put into it.

As a director for a small company (6 of us in total) doing web programming, custom databases, on-site tech support and so on, I've got access to some decent programming experience. I myself have quite a bit of experience dealing with tax issues (I'm not an accountant, but I make a point of knowing the ins and outs of GST law and so on), setting up trusts (not trust accounts, the corporate entity), registering companies and so on. I'll PM you my details and if there's anything I can do to help let me know.

[dsg]

CoinCard pretty much does this.

Hardly! You try telling a business that it has to convert it's BitCoins into VISA cards and then can only use them for online purchases. How do you pay wages with a VISA card?? Bitcoin is a currency, not FlyBuy points!

What VISA card? My reading of the site indicates that you can get a straight paypal payment from it (I see no mention of any VISA cards at all in fact). You can get domino's gift cards or just a straight paypal payment. The fees are listed on the "prices" page:

PayPal payment (under $50)    3%    You pay no PayPal fees
PayPal payment ($50 or more)    1% + $1    You pay no PayPal fees
Domino's Pizza gift card    1%    between $5 and $100

I've not used the service myself, but I've used CoinPal (the sister service) and have had a good experience with it.

[mndrix]

CoinCard pretty much does this.

Hardly! You try telling a business that it has to convert it's BitCoins into VISA cards and then can only use them for online purchases.

Perhaps the CoinCard page is unclear, but it does exactly what you want.  You send Bitcoins, it sends you a PayPal payment.  You pay no fees to receive the PayPal payment.  You can read the full price list for more details.

EDIT: Oops, I just noticed that dsg already addressed this

[mndrix]

I hit the same problem as you - no way out of BTC to AUD that I know of at the moment.

CoinCard has quite a few Australian customers.  If you encounter any problems receiving the PayPal payments, please let me know.  I'll be glad to fix them.

[sverre]

Now dont I feel silly! Where it says 'select your gift card type' I didn't notice paypal payment was in there, I thought it was selling gift cards.

I will now finish my email to this ecommerce vendor!