Think someone is trying to scam me on Flippa?

[datatrond]

Just recently I sold a website on Flippa for + $20.000 USD.
The buyer used the "buy now" button and bought it in the middle of the auction (last bid was +11k).

The user says his bank does not support wire transfer, and he is asking for a way to pay with his credit card.
This made me a bit skeptical, and I did some digging.

Although I might be (horrible wrong), it looks like the person in the below link and the name and email address in the Escrow account is the same person.
He has the same name, and I'm pretty sure this is an attempt to scam me.

I'm afraid that he might use others (stolen) credit cards to pay, and that I will have to "return" the money and the website being lost forever if I go through with this deal.
What would you guys advice me to do?

Here is the link: http://pkmncollectors.livejournal.com/8730607.html

As mentioned, it is the EXACTLY same name mentioned in the URL above that is listed in my Escrow account.
Also, he uses almost the exact same username, including e-mail address as mentioned there (only added a number at the end of the username)..

I've got two bidders who are willing to pay 20k, but if I sell them the website for this price, I'll lose 4,5k and guess I have to pay some money to re-list the domain and pay the fees to Escrow and Flippa?

Inspection period is 7 days, and I can cancel, but since it is almost the end of the year and would like bidders to buy it in their 2011 budgets, I am considering to cancel before the inspection period is passed.. Will this make any difficulties to me?

It is the very first time I'm using Flippa, and I've got little or no experience in this industry.

Another question; Escrow only allows buyers to pay a maximum of 5k with a an Escrow premium account if he/she is using a credit card. It seems like wire transfer is the only working and also most safe way to sell domain names and keep the scammers away- or are there others?

Appreciate your feedback!

Kind regards from the newbie afraid to get scammed!

[Thomas]

If you have other people willing to pay 20k, why do you lose 4.5k selling it to them? I would not risk it with the first person - looks way too dodgy to me so go with your gut and say no to him.

I would never accept credit card for a website sale. Go through Escrow.com and you should be fine.

[grynge]

If you can take credit cards why not talk to your bank and find out how long it takes before the amount is actually cleared (with no chance of chargeback), with escrow the buyer would be waiting xx amount of days depending on his payment procedure. If you accept the cc then he should still be willing to wait xx amount of days until your bank account has cleared it. I have found once you turn a payment procedure back into your favour the buyer normally "finds a way" of doing it the way you first had agreed to.

[Clinton]

If he's in Albania then it may be true that international payments aren't as easy for him as he'd like. However, that said, the owner of a CC can issue a chargeback several weeks after the transaction.

Bidders for sites like this don't usually have an annual budget. It sounds like you're being setup. Scammers are good at honing in on vulnerabilities and yours seems to be that you can't see the $20K bids as being the highest genuine bids and therefore the market value of your site. I haven't investigated this person and won't make a comment about his honesty, but I certainly wouldn't take a CC no matter which country he is from. If he's using a stolen card - and I emphasise if - then it doesn't matter to him how much he bids and such bidders do often go for BIN.

grynge, IES (escrow.com) has a max of 10 days for inspection.

Disclosure: I spoke to the OP about buying his site (though I'm not one of those $20K bidders).

[crabfoot]

Albanian banks have been part of IBAN for some time now. There should be no problem in making a cash transfer.

But isn't it possible that the buyer doesn't have money, and he wants to use the credit card because he does have credit?

If he's genuine, one might offer to accept a credit card, let him download the site, and put it on his own servers. Point the nameservers for him, and delay transferring the domain for three months, or whatever time the bank says will make it obvious that there is no problem with the payment.

The worst you could lose that way is three months income. If it is a scam, you point the servers back at your own copy of the site. Remember, for many scams there is often some poor person trying to prove that he is not the scammer, just another victim.