Selling my car. How can I ensure secure payment?
Discussion
pvn said:
Hi. I'm looking for advice please. I am looking to sell my car privately, probably on Gumtree. I expect it to sell for around £4000. I don't do online banking and I don't fancy having £4000 in cash in the house or on my person! Can anyone recommend a secure payment method please?
Just take the cash. By refusing cash and not having online banking, you are limiting your pool of buyers to about 2 people as virtually nobody is going to mess around with bank branch visits, especially as the nearest branch is always 20 miles away these days with all the closures. In fact you'll probably have aggro with your bank anyway as they hate this sort of thing and will put every obstacle in the way by asking 3000 questions re the source of the cash and force you to download and install their banking app on your phone instead.pvn said:
I don't do online banking
Why not? How often do you check your account(s)? Do you trust to luck that your money is there and there's been no suspicious withdrawals? You should learn to do online banking, if only on your home pc. It gives much greater peace of mind. Especially in a day and age when its quite possible to get your cards cloned or your details stolen online.
r3g said:
pvn said:
Hi. I'm looking for advice please. I am looking to sell my car privately, probably on Gumtree. I expect it to sell for around £4000. I don't do online banking and I don't fancy having £4000 in cash in the house or on my person! Can anyone recommend a secure payment method please?
Just take the cash. By refusing cash and not having online banking, you are limiting your pool of buyers to about 2 people as virtually nobody is going to mess around with bank branch visits, especially as the nearest branch is always 20 miles away these days with all the closures. In fact you'll probably have aggro with your bank anyway as they hate this sort of thing and will put every obstacle in the way by asking 3000 questions re the source of the cash and force you to download and install their banking app on your phone instead.
r3g said:
Just take the cash. By refusing cash and not having online banking, you are limiting your pool of buyers to about 2 people as virtually nobody is going to mess around with bank branch visits, especially as the nearest branch is always 20 miles away these days with all the closures. In fact you'll probably have aggro with your bank anyway as they hate this sort of thing and will put every obstacle in the way by asking 3000 questions re the source of the cash and force you to download and install their banking app on your phone instead.
There is some truth in this. I had to do a CHAPs payment recently which requires a visit to a bank branch (it was for well over the app payment limit). It was quite a palaver and took at least 30mins of slightly awkward questioning by the branch person about where the money had come from, who I was sending it to and why. Also cost 25quid;)And that was after I had negotiated all the 'why don't you just use the app?' chat. If I could have done that, I would not have schlepped all the way to the bank...
OP, for 4k either just take the cash or go to a bank if there is one near and get the buyer to do a transfer that you can confirm there - if they are willing.
dontlookdown said:
r3g said:
Just take the cash. By refusing cash and not having online banking, you are limiting your pool of buyers to about 2 people as virtually nobody is going to mess around with bank branch visits, especially as the nearest branch is always 20 miles away these days with all the closures. In fact you'll probably have aggro with your bank anyway as they hate this sort of thing and will put every obstacle in the way by asking 3000 questions re the source of the cash and force you to download and install their banking app on your phone instead.
There is some truth in this. I had to do a CHAPs payment recently which requires a visit to a bank branch (it was for well over the app payment limit). It was quite a palaver and took at least 30mins of slightly awkward questioning by the branch person about where the money had come from, who I was sending it to and why. Also cost 25quid;)And that was after I had negotiated all the 'why don't you just use the app?' chat. If I could have done that, I would not have schlepped all the way to the bank...
OP, for 4k either just take the cash or go to a bank if there is one near and get the buyer to do a transfer that you can confirm there - if they are willing.
As you said, it's for 4k which can be done almost instantly with an app.
Paid £7k for a car end of last year via app, and it was instant payment.
bare in mind OP that there are apps and websites which will show a fake bank transfer now so don't let anyone show you their device as proof a transfer has been made to your account. Whatever method you choose make sure you verify the money is in your account, assuming you are not going to take cash
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