How to provide Escrow service?

[Thekool1s]

Hi i have a question how can i provide escrow services? What are the requirements for that? Please explain

[Anduck]

First of all, escrower should be trusted by both parties conducting the actual trade. These days a good way to do bitcoin-escrowing is to use multisig addresses. 2-of-3 should work quite well. Also check out how the escrowers of these forums do it.

[Thekool1s]

What are multisig addresses is their any guide for beginners for that?

[messibtc]

There many trusted and well-known escrows in the forum, you should build a nice reputation before someone will ever use your escrow services.

[mprep]

Thekool1s
Jr. Member
Activity: 42

I think you should spend more time building trust, otherwise no one is going to use your services.

[forever21]

the first requirments is you need to be a trusted user here people will not use you as an escrow if you are just a newbie you need to have a good reputation and have a lot of experience here in the forum

[newflesh]

You'll need a lot of trust and reputation, takes a while to build that up thanks to all the scammers out there.

If you're interested in multisig address, you could check out Armory https://bitcoinarmory.com/

They've just released Lockbox (decentralised multi-signature interface), there's an article on Coindesk:

http://www.coindesk.com/armorys-lockbox-multisig-storage-escrow/

[DannyHamilton]

Step 1.  Participate in discussions on this forum regularly for 1 to 2 years.  Contribute usefully to discussions and demonstrate over this period of time that you are intelligent, even tempered, and fair.

Step 2. During this 1 to 2 years time, engage in transactions, and build a reputation as a reliable, honest, trustworthy individual.  Assist others with no benefit to yourself, but simply because it is the right thing to do.  Demonstrate a strong sense of morality and ethics.

Step 3. Learn to use PGP for encrypted communications with those that desire it. Learn to use PGP to provide and verify digital signatures.

Step 4. Consider all the things that might go wrong in a transaction, and structure your standard escrow agreement to account for as many of those possible issues as you can.  This way there will be no surprises or frustrations with the way that you handle the settling of disputes.

Step 5. Get a second computer to run Armory offline.  Learn to generate and use paper wallets offline in a safe and secure manner.  Hold all escrows in paper wallets stored in a secure location with backups so you will never risk losing your customer's bitcoins to theft or hardware failure.

Step 6. Do it for the benefit of the community, and not because you believe it will bring a profit.  In the past month, I've spent more than 20 hours handling over a dozen escrows for a total profit of $0.78 for the month.  There are much better ways to make money.  There are several very trusted people in this forum that already provide escrow either for free or for very cheap prices.  Nobody is going to want to pay more money to a less trusted person. Those of us that do it, do it because we don't like to see newbies getting scammed or shut out of potential transactions due to lack of trust.  We feel that providing a safe and secure business environment here at bitcointalk benefits the entire community.

Step 7. Create a new thread announcing your willingness to offer escrow services. Add a link to your announcement thread to your forum signature. Mention your willingness to the two most commonly used escrow lists on the forum. Wait and see if you are as trusted as you think you are.

Step 8. Provide your customers with information on how to contact you outside of the forum so they can complete the transaction if the forum goes down or disappears for some reason.

[Wafel16]

Most important is trust and being active, you must start from small and climb your trust ladder up and this will take some time.

[Thekool1s]

Step 1.  Participate in discussions on this forum regularly for 1 to 2 years.  Contribute usefully to discussions and demonstrate over this period of time that you are intelligent, even tempered, and fair.

Step 2. During this 1 to 2 years time, engage in transactions, and build a reputation as a reliable, honest, trustworthy individual.  Assist others with no benefit to yourself, but simply because it is the right thing to do.  Demonstrate a strong sense of morality and ethics.

Step 3. Learn to use PGP for encrypted communications with those that desire it. Learn to use PGP to provide and verify digital signatures.

Step 4. Consider all the things that might go wrong in a transaction, and structure your standard escrow agreement to account for as many of those possible issues as you can.  This way there will be no surprises or frustrations with the way that you handle the settling of disputes.

Step 5. Get a second computer to run Armory offline.  Learn to generate and use paper wallets offline in a safe and secure manner.  Hold all escrows in paper wallets stored in a secure location with backups so you will never risk losing your customer's bitcoins to theft or hardware failure.

Step 6. Do it for the benefit of the community, and not because you believe it will bring a profit.  In the past month, I've spent more than 20 hours handling over a dozen escrows for a total profit of $0.78 for the month.  There are much better ways to make money.  There are several very trusted people in this forum that already provide escrow either for free or for very cheap prices.  Nobody is going to want to pay more money to a less trusted person. Those of us that do it, do it because we don't like to see newbies getting scammed or shut out of potential transactions due to lack of trust.  We feel that providing a safe and secure business environment here at bitcointalk benefits the entire community.

Step 7. Create a new thread announcing your willingness to offer escrow services. Add a link to your announcement thread to your forum signature. Mention your willingness to the two most commonly used escrow lists on the forum. Wait and see if you are as trusted as you think you are.

Step 8. Provide your customers with information on how to contact you outside of the forum so they can complete the transaction if the forum goes down or disappears for some reason.

Best answer nicely summed up. Thanks.

[Sutters Mill]

Danny Hamilton hits it on the head once again. Becoming an escrow is not something you can rush into or speed up but can only become one after you've put in the work over a very long time. I think the minimum amount of time would be a year, but like he and others have said you need to have done lots of successsful trades during that time.

[BitcoinMillionaire]

Thekool1s
Jr. Member
Activity: 42

I think you should spend more time building trust, otherwise no one is going to use your services.

Yeaaah man, in BTC world things are pretty scammy at times. An escrow needs to be especially trustworthy, like me for example. I think it's a great thing if you want to learn about how escrow works, but the simple fact that you've got to ask those questions tells me that you shouldn't be providing that service yourself as of now...

[Thekool1s]

Yeah i am not planing to start any thing soon. I am trying to sell stuff currently once enough trust is made up and get some respect from community then and only then i will start.

[DjPxH]

Yeah i am not planing to start any thing soon. I am trying to sell stuff currently once enough trust is made up and get some respect from community then and only then i will start.

That's a good sentiment right there. I think it's always an awesome thing if new people are interested in how things work in Bitcoin's ecosystem. And if you are a trustworthy person, we had one more good person here in the Bitcoin world to actually do something decent!

[Jenny69]

Yeah i am not planing to start any thing soon. I am trying to sell stuff currently once enough trust is made up and get some respect from community then and only then i will start.

That's a good sentiment right there. I think it's always an awesome thing if new people are interested in how things work in Bitcoin's ecosystem. And if you are a trustworthy person, we had one more good person here in the Bitcoin world to actually do something decent!

To be able to act as escrow you need to really have a lot of trust in this forum. With "normal" trades when the other person sends first only one person will need to trust you. When you are acting as an escrow service, both parties will need to trust you and you have little opportunity to gain their trust.

[Buziss]

Yeah i am not planing to start any thing soon. I am trying to sell stuff currently once enough trust is made up and get some respect from community then and only then i will start.

That's a good sentiment right there. I think it's always an awesome thing if new people are interested in how things work in Bitcoin's ecosystem. And if you are a trustworthy person, we had one more good person here in the Bitcoin world to actually do something decent!

To be able to act as escrow you need to really have a lot of trust in this forum. With "normal" trades when the other person sends first only one person will need to trust you. When you are acting as an escrow service, both parties will need to trust you and you have little opportunity to gain their trust.

And don't forget you need to compete with all those existing escrows.
Many of them already are well-established and have lots of experience in providing the service, and some of them are even offering the service for free.