If you folks need to outsource your website development or custom programming, I highly recommend http://www.programmingbids.com I have had a great experiance so far. Not too fond of their payment structure though.

Artena,

Thank you for your comments.

Not too fond of their payment structure though.
We are having problems with our processor 2checkout. We donot want to pay programmers from our funds until we fully receive the funds into our account. It is the money that we haven't received. The fact that the card was charged does not make it an approved/funded transaction.

We had a couple of unpaid buyers and frauds and had to take these measures. Otherwise, there is no way to do this business. In fact, zoltrix here who is a member can confirm this because he was frauded by a buyer and was not paid for his work. We eventually refunded his commissions too. The buyer (fruad) is also registered in this forum and if anyone wants to know, I will pull up his member name. Luckily, it was only a small amount - but lessons were learnt, and changes were made.

To make this worse, it has been a nigthmare dealing with 2checkout. Most of our transactions currently come from Paypal and this has not been an issue till now. 2checkout has not approved $1,000 for orders that were processed on 5-19. The account panel said/says that the funds were released on 6-1-2002. When we checked the bank statment last week, the funds had not come in. So, I emailed them and the guy said he is doing voice authorizations. After one month??? That too after I emailed. If this is money was already paid, we would be left with a $1,000 loss and if it happens that all transactions were bogus.

Folks, $1,000 is a heck of a lot of money for most people here and no doubt for us.

I welcome feedback - is there anyone as a businessperson willing to take that risk and pay the programmers ahead of time? We cannot do that and make a loss. Also, we are still learning a lot form all the ways people are/may con us and hence we had to change the payment rules accordingly. When we started it was much easier but never would I ever have believed that we would be dealing with so many immature programmers and con artists. We had/have to make changes.

For the buyer we give a gurantee that their work is delivered. Unlike ohter sites, we deal with the programmer to make sure the program is delivered - only then the programmers are paid. I know it is bad news to some untrustworthy programmers but buyers are assured that they get their work delivered but that is only if the tranasactions are approved and we have been paid first.

Gurudev,
Anyway is an interesting and warning experience for others coming into this business...

2Checkout is full of problems. Since you are based out of Colorado, why don't you just get a merchant account? When people outsource things, about 85% need the job done fast versus having to wait for ProgrammingBids.com to get the money. With a merchant account, you get your money in your checking account or savings account in 48 hours or less.

I am in the middle of getting two merchant accounts for two businesses, and if you need low rates or some type of deal, please let me know because ProgrammingBids.com can succeed, but it isn't going quite yet in that direction.

Yes, I am looking into other options, possibly one with an insurance because like I said, there is a lot of risk involved. Most of our transactions come from paypal and they are not sitting on money for a month - have not had such problems.

The immature guy at 2checkout is asking me questions like "if you have been using paypal, then why are you coming to us now?" and a lot more insulting comments (I have all emails) and Tom who comes here often has been copied. I told him that we have had them from day one and they were just an option - buyers can choose either paypal or 2checkout while making a payment. He is thinking that we are selling goods and telling me that the payment should be made. All of this while they have not approved the transactions and it has been a month. All of this when, until I emailed them last week, they were/are still sitting on $1,000.

We will make alternative arrangements and I am researching. Currently, anyone wanting to use can pay us with paypal - that is not a problem. We were using 2checkout as an option only.

Artena,

I will be in touch with you soon. Small world after all - if you are in Colorado, I will be happy to stop by and explain what we are doing (I think you understand this already) and see what solutions you have. If not, we will just continue using paypal and we have been using revecom on our other sites and we may use revecom instead of 2checkout on this site too.

Spoke to you today via email. Seems you gave up on 2checkout.com, huh?

They are bad news. They are your nightmare. It is a shoddy shack or any credible company with proper systems in place can tell within 3-5 days if a tranasction is good and pay the merchants accordingly. It does not take a month and their system said the funds were released on 6-1. The worst thing is, when I started asking them about the payments, they have been cancelling the transactions.

I only found out about them from these forums. Should have never used them.

Please wake me up when this is over - thank you.

Originally posted by Gurudev
They are bad news. They are your nightmare. It is a shoddy shack or any credible company with proper systems in place can tell within 3-5 days if a tranasction is good and pay the merchants accordingly. It does not take a month and their system said the funds were released on 6-1. The worst thing is, when I started asking them about the payments, they have been cancelling the transactions.

I only found out about them from these forums. Should have never used them.

Please wake me up when this is over - thank you.

Either you misunderstood what you were being told, or whomever was verifying the order should have explained it better.

He was NOT verifying the customer, he was verifying that the customer RECEIVED the product/service prior to our paying you.

We take relatively no information from you when you signed up for your account. Verifying that you have supplied the product/service you sold prior to paying you is small protection for 2checkout.