Mark Cassino <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I recently completed an auction ni which I sold a bit of
Pentax gear to a
> buyer in Italy. For a variety of reasons, each of which
sounds legit, he
> cannot PayPal the funds and cannot use BidPay. He's asked for
my bank
> account number so he can do a wire transfer, but that sounds
suspiscious to
> me and I'm not inclined ot give it out (as if my wife would
tell me what it
> is anyhow...)
Hi Mark,
As others have already pointed out, the bank wire transfer
should be safe and probably the cheapest way to send money (it
depends on the amount sent). Just want to add a bit of personal
experience in sending money abroad...
First of all, PayPal is something incredibly complicated and
expensive compared to what happens in US (at least it was last
time I checked). Dunno about BidPay but I guess it is
comparable.
>
> So what's the deal? I can go to any post office here and buy
an
> international money order for a reasonable fee. Can't that be
done in Europe
> as well?
Yes, it can be done. There are two ways of sending an
international postal money order, ordinary and online. The
online money order is no less than a MoneyGram money order, fast
but extremely expensive (for an ordinary money order you pay
under euro 5/US$6 for a transfer up to euro 516/US$650, with the
MoneyGram for a similar amount you pay euro 31/US$40...)
The ordinary money order is done via ordinary (what else?) mail,
so it may take a lot of time *just* to get out of Italy...
The bank wire transfer has, usually, a fixed fee - I recall
something around euro 16 for more than euro 900 (in the Euro
zone the cost is very low now, the same for a national wire
transfer).
Take into account that, unless you live in a very small town or
you are veeery lucky, in Italy a post office means at least 45
minutes of queue (sometimes more) and you could even have the
bad chance to find an employee that doesn't know how to proceed
with the international money order (first hand experience - I
had to explain her, step by step, what to do...)
Bank employees usually do know what they are doing.
And I cannot imagine a way your account data could be used other
than sending you money...
Hope this helps.
Ciao,
Gianfranco
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