Accepting MoneyGram or Western Union?

[jake66]

Anyone accept payments through these? A lot of my foreign visitors in Germany and such have been requesting wire transfers as of late, and I don't offer them (nor do I want to). The post office I visit regularly started offering MoneyGram as a payment service, so it has spiked my interest.

Recently I paid a vendor via MoneyGram and it seemed pretty straight-forward. I provide my name, address & the receivers.

The receiver then goes to a MoneyGram kiosk in their country with proper ID to accept payment.

I assume, the same would go for me, if I were to accept MoneyGram or Western Union as a method of payment on my website. (UPS & the local post office both offer these payment services in my area).

Would I be taking on any risks associated with taking these types of payments? I always hear of both these companies (MoneyGram & Western Inion) associated with fraud.

But I've been accepting Money Orders since '98 and the vast majority of them originated from Western Union kiosks across the USA. I am wondering if their other payment services would be similar.

[Quadrille]

Provided you don't dispatch until you have the cash in your hand (don't trust email confirmation that the money is there), it's a safe system.

It is slow, and you will get people offering higher amounts in exchange for dollars (standard scam), and you will have to visit the kiosk to get your cash.

For customers, it is expensive, especially for low value items, so you do need to offer better alternatives.

But if you are dealing in high value items, it just may be worth the effort!

[HRoth]

I used to take Western Union money transfers, but after a while I felt suspicious whenever people wanted to pay me with it. Why would someone want to pay a 20% fee to buy something for less than a hundred dollars? I felt like somewhere someone was being ripped off to pay that fee. It seemed like it attracted weird people and it was a pain to pick up the money (I think they can pay into your account now), so I quit taking it. People in other countries can use a credit card or Paypal. Or they can send a Western Union money order in USD. Banks in the US will take this without charging for a foreign money instrument because it's a US company. And it doesn't have ridiculous fees, so it doesn't attract crooks.

[Corey Bryant]

With Western Union (and I am pretty sure it is the same with Money Gram), things are more in your favor. The consumer is not able to do a chargeback - once you have the money, it's yours.

Money orders / certified checks used to be a good form of payment, but those can be faked unfortunately and it might take a couple of days to receive that notification. By then, chances are good that you have shipped the goods.