I am selling my iPhone X and somebody has contacted me to buy it. They are offering the higher end of the price range £500 but need shipping to Dublin and are willing to wait 10 days for delivery.
They want me to send a payment request via PayPal but I’m a bit wary as I don’t know this person and if they initiate a dispute which will block my funds I’ll be stuck.
Would they be able to dispute if I sent a Monzo.me link and they paid via that as I don’t want to give someone my bank details.
You can’t request more than £100 via Monzo.me and I wouldn’t have thought that Monzo would offer any kind of payment protection as it’s not really what it’s designed for IMO
Thanks for the reply, probably should have checked limit before posting.
I dont think they do, and paypal dont either when sending money to people as ‘friends’ (i forget the term) but its almost always a scam when they use the unprotected paypal payment method.
If it makes you feel any better, there is very little people can do to defraud you with your bank account and sort code. I think the most they could do is set up a direct debit in your name but you’d receive a notification in time to cancel and you’d be protected by the direct debit guarantee.
I was thinking that too, I might just request either bank transfer or western union which makes me sound like the scammer 
I don’t understand. Are you using that link to agree or disagree?
Sorry. To clarify;
It is possible to carry out financial transactions on someone else’s account given the necessary information, which includes only bank account# & sort code. This is no doubt a diminishing area of ‘fraud’ but there is always a way for the clever.
I’m genuinely interested in what ways these could be used (besides the direct debit issue I already mentioned). I give out mine all the time.
Bank transfer if he’s in Dublin tho, you’d need to get it sent via transferwise
The link reveals all. Poor Jezza.
I do have a transferwise account but might just sell on eBay and just pay the 10% fee for the added safety.
To be honest, I think if they sent it to you over TransferWise, they’re the ones taking the risk. Not sure how they could get it back from you if you didn’t ship the phone. I’m not an expert, but I do think the risk of not using eBay is higher for the buyer, not the seller.
I did read the link. Hence why I asked the question.
This sort of transaction is risky regardless of payment method, there’s an innumerable list of scams that can take place, from chargebacks, stolen cards and return fraud to things I can’t even begin to imagine. People will literally fill a box with rocks and return it, requesting a full refund via PayPal, showing that they shipped out an equivalent weight box to satisfy PayPal.
Personally, I would be very wary of someone who had contacted me privately simply because the potential for a scam without any recourse for yourself is so high. I would only ever sell an item like an iPhone to a credible buyer directly through a service that offers seller protection: if they don’t have significant positive recent feedback, and their details don’t line up, I would not take the risk.
It sets off my alarm bells scenarios like this. I’d definitely look to transferwise or another service over PayPal
These peer to peer international transactions are a risk on both sides of the deal. Your buyer doesn’t know what’s arriving, and you want protection from chargebacks and the like.
While there is no risk free method of dealing with it now, I’d be inclined to list the item on eBay at the agreed price, and send your buyer the link. It’s by no means risk free, but the risks are mitigated somewhat on both sides.
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