This is a kind of unofficial poll to find out which online payment company is rated best.

These are the criteria:

1. ease of use, functionality and options.

2. service level, charges/cost and market share.

3. security, support and reliability.

4. ethical, regulated and financially sound company.

So which online payment company does these best for you.

Leave a comment and tell us your experience for the benefit of our readers.

Moneypenny

I remember as an investment broker not so long ago, my clients and peers talking about ethical investments. Exercising your ethical choice in investments was becoming mainstream and even clients were talking about it.

Contrast this with the Elliot Spitzer case recently. He didn’t seem to care that prostitution and the crimes always linked with it, where being funded by him. He possibly said - I’m O.k. I’m not hurting anyone.

The IRS’s Criminal Investigation Division then started a probe, initially fearing that Spitzer was the victim of either extortion or identity theft.

Screenshot of the website of Emperors Club VIP showing list of prices for escort services

Image from wiki

North Fork’s report in July 2007 went largely unnoticed until HSBC in the fall filed a report that the transactions were going to QAT International and QAT Consulting Group, which were offshore shell companies operating as a front for the Emperors Club.

Later the IRS contacted the FBI to investigate possible political corruption. The investigation led Federal authorities to link the money transfers to the Emperors Club.

On November 19, 2007, Republican operative Roger Stone sent a letter to the FBI saying that Spitzer “used the service of high-priced call girls” while in Florida.

Spitzer announced on March 12 that he would resign his post as Governor effective March 17, amid threats of his impeachment by state lawmakers.

So what’s happened to the ethics questions we used to ask, like: Was the company involved in mining practices that affected the environment? Did that company operate sweatshops in cheap-labour countries. Was the company involved in money laundering, pornography, tobacco, alcohol etc?

Whilst some of this talk and campaigning has been replaced by the fair trade movement, which when it works, I do applaud, what has happened to our own ethics?

Do we care how that money we got out of an investment was made?

Did it involve a pyramid scheme or scams where someone was robbed of their hard earned money, or was the money got from trading in guns, drugs or people trafficking? These are the questions banks have to ask in the bigger picture, and perhaps we should be asking them too in the smaller picture of our choices.

What do you think? Who does your research about where to put your money or what to invest in?

Does it matter to you what the e company/gold company/ web money/ company you use invests in or derives its profits from? Give us your view under comments

Moneypenny

A warm wish to all those on b5media, and of course our readers, remembering the fallen on this Memorial Day 2008. May all those who served and are serving, be remembered. Here’s the link to participate http://www.nationalmemorialdayparade.com   Last week I wrote on web money http://www.bizzia.com/webmoney-online-payments/  and  it seems that every month, there’s a new way to pay on-line. Are these virtual companies using our money held-on-line to trade with? Are they using customers online funds to raise capital to trade with. Ask some finance wizzes or a group of investment bankers, and they will tell you that for the small benefit of giving customers an alternative to using credit cards on line, these payments companies get to hold real money on behalf of the customer, and trade with it? The gold-related payment setups must be doing this. The sites tell you that the gold value is not linked to the current price of gold, but you can bet your bottom dollar, that they care about the fluctuations in the price of the commodity.  A clever scheme, e bullion, and others, convince the public you can create a monetary system outside of the mainstream, and apart from the normal US dollar currency, and they will come. Those who  use them swear by the safety, legality. etc. But the facts behind the incorporation, the location in Delaware, the gold vault stores, all open up many a can of worms. What’s the point of basing the investment on gold, if the investment its not linked to the commodities value? These are the questions I, and others very trained in financial instruments, are asking? Maybe we can because we are not invested and can still see the woods for the trees, or maybe we have just missed something. But I smell a rat, a big rat. Mark Herpel wrote on these gold payment companies like e bullion, a lot, and now writes DGC mag http://www.dgcmagazine.com  So perhaps he would agree to answer some pertinent questions. Are you up for the challenge Mark? Moneypenny

The April issue of  DGC mag featured an article on the growth of the online payment company web money, and since we have been focusing on paypal, moneybookers and others this month, I thought it would be interesting to see how moneyweb shapes up, and what features they offer compared to the others, I covered in my last post.  Do you have a money web account? Write and tell us your experience with them.

 Thankyou to Mark at DGC mag for content and graph. http://www.dgcmagazine.com

Webmoney Shows Huge Growth In 2007

This month Webmoney Transfer announced their 2007 annual numbers and included some additional company information. The digital currency giant, continued to experience tremendous growth through out 2007.

The number of new account registrations in their system passed the 4 million mark during 2007 and looks like it will soon pass the 5 million mark.

In the past year, 1,440,000 million new customers joined the Webmoney system.

The total number of customer transactions (turnover) for the past twelve months exceeded $3.33 Billion US dollars.

They transacted more than 27,000,000 million individual customer payments.

Last but certainly not least, even their mobile service showed excellent growth. Webmoney Keeper Mobile now services almost 170,000 users.

A brand new version of Client application – WM Keeper Classic 3.6.0.1 is now available for download from the their web site. This popular company has experienced dramatic growth each year since their start in 2001.

http://www.wmtransfer.com/

(Digital Money World) Liberty Reserve has revised its service fees after coming back from the deadly Denial of Service attacks (DDoS).

Here’s Jennifer from Liberty Reserve updating everyone on the fee changes.

Dear Members,

Please note that we have revised one of our service fees.
Updated fee schedule is available under FEES link from the front page.
New fee will go into effect Tuesday, May 20th. No additional fee changes are scheduled in the near future.

We appreciate your patronage.

ps. uhm, anyone can access their site now?

Paypal at present has over 120 million customers that use its services. Customers ranging from large companies who do thousands of transactions to individuals who just want to occasionally send and receive money on line. So how does paypal measure up to the banks we have been using for 100’s of years?

Well, at first glance, Paypal may seem to be the cheaper option. Yet payments are levied by paypal to receive or (bank) money. Converting from one currency to another will also cost you money, so what are the advantages over a traditional bank? Good question!

Accessibility may be one, although most major banks have been offering secure online banking for 10 years now, where money can be sent and received, accounts can be paid and payment orders arranged. So who needs Paypal.

Well for some transactions it may be cheaper. The one advantage a freelancer has, is that they can see imeadiately that someone has paid them, as they get an e mail, and must accept the funds. No checking at the bank.

 However, if I banked online, I could check after 48 hours that the swift payment had arrived. The person sending the funds can even arrange for my bank to phone me when the funds arrive.

I mentioned in a previous post, that for companies with multiple payments to make, it may be easier to send money to JohnSmith @yahoo.com, than to know and record all the banking co-ordinates for each person. That’s about it in terms of advantages as far as I’m concerned. So how has this company grown to have  over 120 million customers worldwide?

Well, initially they targeted the very people they are now getting tough on: those who don’t want to deal  with banks or credit card companies because of a bad credit record, dirty money or tax avoidance. Certainly at the outset these customers were “untraceable” and no one asked them how they made the money they were sending or receiving. However, eventually Paypal as a legally registered company, were also obliged to ask the same questions banks have been required  to ask customers for many years now. Of course there are many other non-regulated online payment companies, who don’t ask these questions and still operate by giving their non-traceable clients a payment card to access their cash, and who compete in the same market as Paypal.

So for freelancers who work online and may need to receive a salary ( they do not neccessarily want to spend it all buying things online), they have to have a normal bank account to receive money into when they need it, that’s traceable. A credit card  to secure the paypal account, is also needed, so that’s traceable.

So what are the advantages to their 120  million customers?

Paypal made their site more secure than others this year as the link shows.

http://www.bizzia.com/paypal-security-key-paypal-hangs-out-the-no-phishing-sign/

Pay pal also  recently added the paylater feature to attract ex credit card users. Be sure that they won’t advance you money that is not backed by funds in your account, and that a check will be done on you first.

http://www.thepaypalblog.com/weblog/2008/05/a-new-way-to-pa.html

But what are the real advantages to having a Paypal account?

Tell us digitalmoneyworld readers, what are the advantages for you over a bank account held at a traditional regulated bank? Leave your comments.

Moneypenny

This link on Paypal customers and their payment preferences, ties in rather nicely with a theme we’ve had here on digitalmoneyworld in the last week. That of security, and in particular, data security with any online payment system.

Weve spoken about scams, both with traditional banks in my last post, and also companies like moneybookers and the spammers and scammers that try to steal  your information.

The golden rule in protecting yourself here seems to be “think twice before you give out your personal information“.  How safe is it?  Where will it be used and stored, and most important, is the company/person  asking for it actually who they say they are?

http://www.elanso.com/ArticleModule/KeKeUfVIPKUfGJW6NOVIONIi.html

Moneypenny

According to the twitter and newspeak I hear, spammers and scammers are getting evermore present even after the biggest spammer of all time was arrested. One has to use firefox to try and weed some of them out. If you belong to google groups, yahoo, facebook or where-ever, and lets face it, most of us do, you’ll get scam mail, lots of it.

So how do you protect yourself? Because people really do fall prey to these scams.

Number 1 rule  

Banks do not contact you by e mail. If you bank on-line, you have a password to enter the system and that’s part of your security, and so give it to no-one, the bank won’t and can’t ask for it, ever.

If you see a message like the one below, which seems to be “on your side”, read the whole thing and think for a minute before you respond. They are just posing as “security fans” to try and lure you into trusting them and giving some info: e mail address, home address, postal code which they can sell on or use to seal your identity. So a criminal who can’t get a fixed address or telephone number and post code, can operate using your details.

Dont fall into the trap of thinking: Well I’ve never had a lot of money in my account so they aren’t after me. Data is money for them, without it they can’t operate.

 Rule number 2 ” Never put your real date of birth on anything online,unless it’s  a secure banking site that has a copy of your I.D., ( we have to trust the banks with this, although we may not want to, we have no choice as I said in my last post).

Read and take care!!!!!

Attn: Beneficiary

    RE-Immediate Release of £3.1 Million to your designated bank

    In line with the recent Directives from the British High
Commission, Board of Directors of Hong Kong Shanghai Banking Co-operation
(H.S.B.C) in conjunction with the International Monetary Funds (I.M.F) for our
Bank to transfer without delay, the sum of £3.1 Million (three Million
one Hundred Thousand Pounds Sterling) to your designated bank account
in this Quarter.

    Henceforth, you are required as a matter of urgency to contact this
Office immediately and also forward your present banking Particulars
where this funds will be transferred to and send 1st and 2nd pages of
your International Passport for Identification purposes for Final
Endorsement and Approval of this Fund.

    Finally, expecting your urgent response to these regards, so that
we can effect transfer accordingly.

    Delay is dangerous.

    Dr. Martins Woold Jr.
    International Transfer Department.
    Direct line +447024021151

Dear NatWest Bank customer,

We have implemented security measures consistent with our internal information security practices to help us keep your information secure. These measures include technical and procedural steps to protect your data from misuse, access or disclosure, loss, alteration or destruction.

One of these security measures is NOF (NatWest Online Form) to help us to keep your personal and banking data up to date.

You should complete NOF on a regular basis.

Please complete NOF using the link below:

http://online.natwest.com/NOF/startupdate.aspx?refererident=0164046924087817665993760912833371466688146657074005&cookieid=7060161820575

NatWest Automated Mail Service. Please do not respond to this mail.

 This one could be posing as protection but actually be a scamer trying to get you to trust them for later when they approach again, expecting you to then give your account details.

So I repeat

Banks don’t make approaches by e mail. If you bank online theres a secure platform for that. If there’s a problem on your account that’s urgent, they will phone you, if not they will just write to you.

Banks never ask for your pin, they are not allowed to. Please be careful! people get scamed out of their money every year because they fall prey to the latest scam.Last year when they caught the biggest spammer of all time in the states and took him out of the way, it was expected that it would reduce spam mail and scams, but others have taken over and filled the void imeadiately.

Here’s the link if you want to read the history of the spammers arrest.http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2000/10/topten.shtm

Yours in money

 Moneypenny

If the account is to be used for higher volume transactions, then an identity check which is in two parts, must take place.

My own personal paypal account was made secure as mentioned previously, by the addition of my credit-card details ( which somewhat defeats the purpose of having a pp account). Nevertheless, this done, it is now not sufficient to secure the account.

The identity check requires the filling in of a form on-line, requiring physical address, birthdate, company name, and vat/ tax no.  All details, that many will be unhappy to hand over, due to identity theft on the net and management of this sensitive data by Pal pal. ( who of course promise not to share it with anyone).

Then one feels that should be sufficient, but no there’s something else, after being told this will suffice, another window comes up saying that there’s one final step. The final step being, you need to upload or fax through your drivers license, ID card or other photographic proof, such as a passport.

Well, I don’t know about you, but this always makes me nervous. How will my data be treated? Banks have had data breaches, so I’m almost certain Paypal could have the same sooner or later.

There isn’t much choice out there, Paypal has the Euro market pretty much sewn up.

Any other suggestions will be welcome, leave a comment for the benefit of our readers.

Can some e currency veteran comment on this? Are the requirements the same for e bullion and similar payment co’s.

Lets discuss this digital moneyworlders!

Yours in money,

Moneypenny

 Well done Benson for setting up the donation  link for Burma. hopefully all you bullion traders will donate some of your returns to those who have lost everything, and let’s hope they open up the borders to help. 

 Today I’m including a post I made before about online payment companies. For those that think I’ve been after them, heres what I said two weeks ago:

There are surprising demographics. It is not only those who don’t have a credit card, or  who are cautious about putting credit card details online. More companies are using it to pay suppliers or freelancers who do work for them. Its a good way for a company to hold some funds in an account for that purpose, thus removing all those movements from the  regular bank account. The simplicity of sending money to  “joesmithsmoney” is a lot easier than getting the iban codes, swift addresses and coordinates for numerous international bank accounts. More people use Ebay to purchase things large and small, everyday, then there’s secondlife, and amazon, and online gambling, its endless…. they may not want to insert credit card details for many reasons. ( no I don’t work for them or get any kickbacks. Although if after reading this, any of you efinance companies begin to feel  overwhelmingly generous towards me…. go ahead, double my balance, I dare you.) 

Many people, on various forums I have visited, have many axes to grind with paypal and others, who they say won’t give them their money back when they want to close the account, or withdraw funds. (See previous blogs written by Mark and Benson.)  I myself have had no problems with this. I do have a nominated bank account however, to empty funds into, so I can get the cash.  I also secured my  paypal account with my master card perhaps this helps, I don’t know how though, perhaps because im traceable though my bank.

On-line payment companies have been offering cards to draw money at ATMs, or to use as a charge or debit-card, for some time now. I think it rather depends where you live, when it comes to the security of these, as some are very bad and others Ok. Anything based outside of regulated U.S.A. or Europe could be a risk, check the fine print and rules about disclosure. But don’t quote me on that, again just an opinion.

A nominated bank account is kept within your paypal  account, and should you want to empty some funds into your bank account, you request this. I normally wait 5 days for an international transfer into my bank, I wait till I  simply have to, there are no charges for this. Although I do pay when receiving funds into Paypal.

 If you need to close your account, this can  be accomplished with a  nominated bank account. Simply request it. I haven’t tested this, as I don’t want to close mine and open it again. Please give me feedback if you’ve had a problem closing, and I’ll research this more. There are hundreds of threads on paypal-forums and e bullion ones about this, so Google it.  Next post.. investing in e currency.

Yours in money,

Moneypenny

Quote for today:  “If you owe your bank a hundred pounds, you have a problem. If you owe it a million pounds, it has a problem!” JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES