Today I received payment for a painting via Paypal. The customer is not verified by Paypal. The address is a business address in Florida, although the customer is from Saudi Arabia.
Paypal suggests caution when dealing with payments from unverified accounts.
Does anyone have experience with similar situations?
I suspect that if it is a scam, the money will disappear from my Paypal account…
Am wondering how to proceed…
Thanks…
It is more than likely a scam. You can contact the business in Florida to verify. They may or may not reply. I had the same thing happen to me and they would not reply to verify; as if the business was not an actually business here in the states.
Could try transferring that payment immediately from Paypal to your bank account, and ensure it clears, before dispatching the picture. Probably will take several days but worth the wait, otherwise you could have neither money nor picture.
I’d say there is a 99.9% chance this is a scam. They even sometimes send a payment and overpay then requesting a return for the overpayment and thus receive your bank info through the refund somehow. Especially look for broken English. Usually also a clue. I received a scam just yesterday myself only they wanted my art and then asked for pricing etc. Broken English and overseas. No specific piece mentioned. If they were truly interested, the pricing is already on my website. My instance was more obvious. Good Luck!
It doesn’t need to be a scam at all, because from selling cds I know there are worldwide more un-verified than verified paypal accounts. If you are the seller, you can wait for clearance of the money and then send the item. You could also ask them to add this new shipping address to their paypal account.
I have resolved this question – and did not sell to the man in question.
He told me that he cannot add his shipping address to his Paypal account.
I sleuthed a bit re the address in Florida that he used, and saw that he employs a shipping service which allows international customers buy something, have it sent to Florida, and the shipping company then sends it (taking care of any customs, etc., paperwork) to wherever in the world that customer prefers.
This service in itself seems a little odd, but hey - whatever.
I maintain confidence in Paypal re its clear policies on covering all sellers’ risk when sellers use verified accounts with confirmed addresses. These policies state (among other things) that “At this time, only addresses in Canada, the United Kingdom and United States can be Confirmed.”
Hi Judith…I am familiar the “shipping company” address process. I am sure in some cases there is a scam involved. However, if you live outside the US you need a reliable service to deliver your goods. They take responsibility to get the package to you and offer you a better rate. I have lived in a third world country and it was the only way for us to get items in without the hassle of customs, very late delivery or being stolen in the process. I Would look up the US address it is going to and then verify that it is a legitimate shipper and go from there. With that being said, I would wait for my payment to clear just to be sure!
If there is any hint though that it was a scammer, can’t a ‘bad’ buyer get their payment reversed? Like a charge back?
I’m sorry to the people who are out of the country, if I have doubt I can’t ship. I guess lots of people would send anyway on the chance that it is legit…but I wouldn’t.
I had something similar from Switzerland. The address shows up in google maps, but other details were “phishy” so I told the buyer I would send a post card to his address with a secret password on it and he was to email the password when he received it. Sort of a 2-step verification via post. No response yet. Stay tuned!