MiniEscrow.com is a project I’ve been working on for quite a while and, as always, I prefer to let facts speak for themselves: we have a commission of only 2.5%, are ALWAYS open for business (weekends included) and accept domains as well as websites (we won’t say no to complex transactions). Need I say more?
Those are our 3 main selling points. I decided to launch MiniEscrow.com because, in my opinion, the market wants an escrow company which specializes in small transactions (we also accept larger transactions but please understand that the verification process will be thorough for obvious reasons) and gets the job done asap.
We really are open 24/7/365, our commission is indeed only 2.5% and yes, we accept complex transactions (domains, domains + websites, you name it).
This is not just a project someone can launch within a week or so. For example, we will be working closely with PayPal since we are specializing in small transactions and, as per the PayPal terms, we needed to go through a special verification process (if you think that anyone can be accepted just like that, you couldn’t be more wrong). As an escrow company owner, I understand that there is a lot of responsibility involved and am acting accordingly.
We have a great relationship with practically all of the well-known registrars and our contact people will be more than happy to help us make sure that everything is always running smoothly. If you guys have any questions, feel free to use the MiniEscrow.com contact form or email us at support@miniescrow.com.
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June 7th, 2010 at 6:14 am
Very pretty site and what I like more is your low commission
June 7th, 2010 at 6:42 am
Is Miniescrow.com licenced and / or bonded?
June 7th, 2010 at 6:43 am
How long will it take to close a deal on your site? I know it will depend on what type of deal it is but do you have an estimate?
June 7th, 2010 at 6:50 am
You want to take over the domaining world don’t you? I hope all of your hard work pays off, the domain is great too!
June 7th, 2010 at 7:02 am
This is a smart idea, I think the site will do well especially if you are also open on weekends. The main drawback with escrow sites is that it can take a while to jump through all the hoops and a lot of people don’t like to wait, myself included. Being open on weekends is a really smart idea.
June 7th, 2010 at 7:22 am
Did the escrow website just start today? Your domain shows to be registered longer ago but it was probably only parked I guess.
June 7th, 2010 at 11:00 am
Great idea!
I saw a typo in the FAQ section:
“…. he or she will need to send us a scanned copy of his or her [password]( – should this be passport)/goverment issued ID and a recent utility bill.”
June 7th, 2010 at 11:26 am
@mrx: we’re an EU-based company licensed to carry out activities related to Internet portals, including but not limited to escrow services, buying/selling and monetization.
@Joe: if we’re talking about a simple push, it shouldn’t take more than a day if both parties get back to us in a timely manner.
@hawkeye: the domain has been registered quite a while ago and you’re right, MiniEscrow.com has “officially” been launched today.
@Marcus: fixed
June 7th, 2010 at 4:12 pm
“we’re an EU-based company licensed to carry out activities related to Internet portals, including but not limited to escrow services…”
Andrei,
It would be well worth your while to be certain you do not need to be licensed in the USA. Normally an Escrow company has to be licensed in each State where business will be conducted.
That is why GoDaddy does not operate an escrow service themselves.
If an escrow transaction involves a US based Buyer and a US based Seller, are you certain your European licensing will be enough?
Please just consider this a friendly question.
There was a Domain Escrow service that opened and then had to stop operating for a while because of the US licensing requirements.
Banks are exempt from the licensing requirements, I believe. If PayPal is now considered a bank then perhaps you can sail under their flag.
For whatever it’s worth, I came across this:
http://www.ehow.com/how_4844241_start-escrow-company.html
June 7th, 2010 at 5:45 pm
@tricolorro: thanks for posting your legitimate question, I had the exact same concerns and let’s just say that I asked an army of lawyers (literally) for advice before even thinking about going live.
As mentioned at the beginning of this post, MiniEscrow.com focuses on small transactions (<$1,000) and as a result, the key player here will be PayPal (your observation is correct and our partnership with PayPal makes it possible for us to run our escrow business as an EU-based company).
Since we're focusing on <$1,000 transactions, using methods such as bank wires (if wire transfers were to represent an important part of our business model, things would indeed be complicated and we're not willing to go down that path) simply wouldn't make sense because of the restrictive fees involved.
MiniEscrow.com will always focus on small transactions and there are two types of partnerships which will help us run things without hiccups: our partnership with PayPal and our partnerships with practically all of the popular registrars.
June 7th, 2010 at 6:15 pm
Andrei,
That’s great.
I just didn’t want to see you get blindsided.
Looks like you “Crossed your T’s and Dotted your I’s.
If that is an unfamiliar expression, see this:
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_cross_the_t%27s_and_dot_the_i%27s
Good luck with your service.
June 7th, 2010 at 8:18 pm
Am I the only one wondering were this “company” is located? I’m willing to guess it’s not even in a EU country. Anyone wonder what the “address” is? How about a “phone number” ? Better yet… What’s your full name?
At 2.5 percent plus pay pal fees and setup costs like hosting and promotion you’d have to sell ummm well. I’d quit while you are ahead this is crazy on so many levels.
June 8th, 2010 at 2:11 am
@Jeff: I don’t use private whois, as I believe in full transparency. Feel free to perform a whois search and you will find my full name, address, country/region/city of residence as well as phone number
June 8th, 2010 at 3:44 am
It would be nice / better if you link to that site. It’s boring and involves much more work to visit it (marking domain / copy / paste to get there).
Dotmainer
June 8th, 2010 at 5:47 am
Could be leap year Chuck. lol Then it would be 366 days. So I am thinking it’s a good time for an employee break.
June 8th, 2010 at 6:47 am
@DoTmainer: done
June 8th, 2010 at 9:07 pm
@DoTmainer: “Much work”? Geez, if you consider cutting, pasting and hitting Enter WORK, then you’re not going far – let me tell you.
June 9th, 2010 at 4:46 am
@Mike: Tell that people that make Data Entry jobs. You can seach on freelancer sites “data entry”. You wouldnt belive, they offer/get money for that.
But that was not my point, my point is why make it hard when it can be easy.
… and now back to the topic
June 9th, 2010 at 7:43 am
@DoTmainer…. I didnt change the topic, you did. I went with it.
June 9th, 2010 at 8:02 am
Very nice idea, it will be interesting to see if it works, but this is definitely a niche, even if you need to raise slightly your fees at some point.
I would second the suggestion to post name and details (address – maybe not phone number, since you do not want to receive calls 24 hours a day!) on the MiniEscrow website contact page. My first reaction when visiting the site was to look for them, usually I tend to avoid doing business with websites without a physical address. Even if, in that case, I have no doubt you are legit and I would go ahead.
June 9th, 2010 at 8:06 am
I have used escrow.com for dozens of domain and website purchases and sales over the past 5+ years, so I am interested in your service. But, I have a few questions/comments:
1. I am very happy with escrow.com, but my one problem with them is that the escrow only handles domains and not websites, so there is a potential problem of the seller giving me the domain, I approve the escrow sale, but then once I get the website transferred to my server and fully working I see I was ripped off but it is too late to cancel the deal. Are you setup to handle something like that? This actually happened to a friend of mine after he paid the seller (the seller faked the earnings and traffic stats), although he did not use any escrow service, even though I told him to ahead of time.
2. In your FAQ, you say that the seller transfers the domain to you and then you transfer to the buyer. Do you open an account at the seller’s registrar so they can push the domain to you? Some registrars for one reason or another don’t allow that, so then it seems like it would take extra time doing the deal, because first the seller has to wait a week to transfer it to you and then it might take another week for you to transfer it to the buyer. I have sold domains to hundreds of buyers, and only around 1/2 the time do they want me to push them the domain, and when I am a buyer only around 1/2 the time can I open a free account at their registrar so I can have them push the domain to me.
3. If the domain is being transferred to a different registrar, why do you have the buyer pay you the fee the new registrar charges? Do you mean the fee that adds a year to the domain? I have never heard of any other kind of transfer fee.
4. I have been using Paypal for almost 10 years, done thousands of payments, but have never used Masspay even though I am aware of how it works and could do it if needed. I highly doubt most domain buyers will be able to figure it out, so that means the total fee is really going to end up being 6.5%, which makes it just as expensive than escrow.com in many cases. Also, getting the buyer to fax/scan their photo id and utility bill is a big task and could potentially lose many buyers.
5. I sometimes sell domains where the buyer pays me over time (they get to start using the domain right away though). The domains are held in escrow until the balance is paid in full. Escrow.com does not handle custom deals like this, although moniker.com escrow does. This might be a good type of service for you to offer.
June 9th, 2010 at 9:30 am
@Jean-Francois Mayer: if you place the cursor of your mouse over our Comodo Corner of Trust, you will be able to see all of the details you have mentioned.
@Eric Borgos:
1) We definitely accept complex transactions and will communicate with both parties via the admin chat area in order to determine what the best approach is. Flexibility is one of our main selling points, we don’t believe in “one size fits all” solutions. For example, once we have the approval of both parties, we can offer a moneyback arrangement.
In other words, it would work like this: the buyer makes the payment and once the money is in our escrow account, we will instruct the seller to push or transfer the domain to our account. After the domain is in our possession, we will point it to the nameservers of the buyer and ask the seller to install the website on the buyer’s server. The buyer will have x days to decide if he or she keeps the site and if he or she decides to return it, we will return the domain to the seller and issue a refund. Of course, we will only be able to do that if we have the approval of both parties, it just wouldn’t be fair towards the seller otherwise.
2) We will always be more than happy to listen to alternatives if we have the approval of both parties.
3) Yes, we are referring to the transfer fee that adds one year to the domain. Let’s assume that the buyer wants to transfer the domain to his or her GoDaddy account and that the sales price is $400. In that case, our commission will be $10 (2.5%). GoDaddy charges a $7.17 fee ($6.99 + the ICANN fee at the moment of writing) for transfers and adds one year to the domain. The buyer will need to cover the $7.17 GoDaddy fee in that case because otherwise, our less than impressive $10 commission would turn into $2.83 ($10 – $7.17)
4) We are willing to explain everything to the other party and even create the .txt file that they need to upload for them. That way, they will only have to press two buttons and they’re good to go. As far as the verification process is concerned, it is something escrow companies need to do for fraud prevention purposes.
5) We would gladly let the buyer pay over time and keep the domain until the balance is paid in full, the MiniEscrow.com team will always accept complex transactions.
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June 25th, 2010 at 8:38 am
we have received the funds from the buyer, the domain name will be pushed or transferred to us so that we can push or transfer it to him or her. Once the domain name.
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August 16th, 2010 at 4:11 am
It’s based on the location of the phone. The phone picks up the local time from the network. If you are in California using your phone and it’s after 7 PM your time you can make the calls for free. The receiver’s time zone doesn’t have anything to do with it. On an interesting note, if you were to travel to Idaho then your nights would start at 7 PM Idaho time while you’re there instead of 7 PM California time.
September 10th, 2010 at 5:07 am
I’ve used an escrow service to purchase a vehicle online.
September 10th, 2010 at 5:09 am
I had a flawlessly safe experience. You have to research or know someone who has used it before you trust one to be of service to you, but there are trustworthy companies available.
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