Request to pay by money order

[john_k]

A potential customer has asked the following via a gmail account:

I would very much like to purchase some [green], [red], and [yellow] [widgets] but I don't have a credit card or paypal... Do you accept money orders?

They did not indicate where they would want the items shipped.

My internal fraud meter flickered a little when I saw this. My inclination is to say no. We recommend that they open a PayPal account or purchase a VISA/Mastercard gift card from a bank and then use that. My reason being that, from what I have heard, it seems like it is just too easy to fake a money order and there isn't any safety net.

Does anyone else have any opinions? Is it easy for someone to get the VISA gift cards?

[Corey Bryant]

Well you could also have a chargeback as well.

With the money order a lot of times what happens is they send it to your for $1,000 when they only ordered $500. They ask you to send them $500 back. Now this is a scam.

If the people are truly wanting your products and you do want to sell them, contact your bank and see if they have a specialist there that might be able to look at the money order to determine authenticity. Also ask them what happens if you cash it and it turns out to be fraud? And find out how long that time usually is

-Corey

[topr8]

>>contact your bank and see if they have a specialist there that might be able to look at the money order to determine authenticity.

problem with this is that many fraudulant money orders are real/genuine blanks that have been stolen and filled in by the fraudster - hence they are identical to the real ones.

[eeiioo]

Require a postal money order. They are not generic pieces of paper like some easy counterfeited money orders.

[usps.com...]

[usps.com...]

There have been people duped by the forged kind, but they didn't look to closely at them.

[john_k]

I replied to the person with a recommendation to purchase a Visa gift card and use that as it would allow us to ship the items more quickly. I also said that we would accept a money order, but that it would have to clear before we could ship anything. I didn't define what I meant by clear.

I like the postal money order idea. Unfortunately, I had already replied to the person. I am thinking about making that the only type of money order we would accept. And then only when people ask about them.

Thanks to each of you for the comments.