Buying Bitcoin: The easiest fast way without huge markup for confused newbies.

[dannno]

I sent Bitinstant a couple of emails early yesterday morning with some questions. Never heard anything back. Not even one of those robo emails acknowledging my emails. This sends up some red flags for me. Makes me wonder how solid their organization is.

UPDATE: I sent Coinbase an email question earlier this evening and very quickly received an automatically generated email acknowledging my email and indicating they would respond as soon as possible. So they were far more on the ball with their customer service than Bitinstant.

The owner of Bitinstant was interviewed by Tom Woods on the Peter Schiff show a few days ago, dudes name is Erik Vorhees.

 

[dannno]

Thanks for the easy instructions. I just bought some BTC using Moneygram at my local pharmacy. Guy at the counter asked what everyone was buying suddenly.

Verrry interesting.

 

[anaconda]

EEk. I see BTC is $104. I almost bought at $92 over the weekend, but was feeling a little under the weather so I held off.

 

[jclay2]

Apparently the high was $ 106.00....snooze fest. Wake me up when the real moves happen of 50%/day.

 

[Jackie Moon]

I see Coinbase charges just 1%. Beats 3.99%. But I don't get the "account credentials" verification thing. I don't see why it should be any different than using a debit card online. I get the feeling that they get your login information, including password. So I guess they could steal all your money. There is also something called "Challenge Deposit Verification" whatever that is..[/I]

With the challenge deposit verification you give them your account and routing number and they make two small deposits in to your bank account. Then you log in to Coinbase and enter the two amounts to confirm that it is an account you have access to.

Coinbase is slower than BitInstant but it was pretty simple. I signed up for an account on Tuesday March 19th. On Thursday March 21st they made the two deposits of $.02 and $.08 in to my bank account. I went to Coinbase to enter those and confirm my account.

On Saturday the 23rd I placed an order for 1.5 BTC and it said the Bitcoin would arrive on Thursday, March 28.

On March 26th they charged my bank account, and as promised the Bitcoin showed up in my Coinbase wallet on March 28th.

Overall it looks like it takes about a week from start to finish. I can't guarantee these results for anyone else but I was pretty happy with them.

 

[FSP-Rebel]

I sent Bitinstant a couple of emails early yesterday morning with some questions. Never heard anything back. Not even one of those robo emails acknowledging my emails. This sends up some red flags for me. Makes me wonder how solid their organization is.

UPDATE: I sent Coinbase an email question earlier this evening and very quickly received an automatically generated email acknowledging my email and indicating they would respond as soon as possible. So they were far more on the ball with their customer service than Bitinstant.

When I had an issue with bitinstant they got back to me the next day with personalized detailed info on what I needed. With coinbase, I easily linked my checking account up after retrieving the two debits but after three consecutive days of trying to buy btc, each time I'd try I'd get back a "sorry, we've passed the rolling 24 hour period and the max amount of btc have already been bought" and I did this at different times of the day. So thanks to their bullshit I couldn't get in in the $40s so then I went with blockchain and bought through bitinstant. And every transaction I've had with bitinstant processed fairly instantly.

 

[PaulConventionWV]

EEk. I see BTC is $104. I almost bought at $92 over the weekend, but was feeling a little under the weather so I held off.

That makes me feel good about buying in when you held off. Now it's at $108. I'm trying to decide whether I should put more in. I only have about $200 in but I'm wondering if something closer to a thousand would still be a safe bet. It depends on how far this thing will go. I want to believe Max Keiser when he says $100k, but I still have a hard time imagining it.

 

[PaulConventionWV]

Shouldn't this create arbitrage opportunities up the yin yang?

Yes, and it does.

 

[dannno]

When I had an issue with bitinstant they got back to me the next day with personalized detailed info on what I needed. With coinbase, I easily linked my checking account up after retrieving the two debits but after three consecutive days of trying to buy btc, each time I'd try I'd get back a "sorry, we've passed the rolling 24 hour period and the max amount of btc have already been bought" and I did this at different times of the day. So thanks to their bullshit I couldn't get in in the $40s so then I went with blockchain and bought through bitinstant. And every transaction I've had with bitinstant processed fairly instantly.

Wow, that sucks, coinbase obviously wasn't able to predict that demand increase. The thing is, when you do a transaction with coinbase you buy the coins at the current market value and coinbase I believe makes the purchase so you can have the bitcoin at that price once your transfer clears. If the transfer doesn't clear then I assume coinbase ends up with the coins in an account and they end up giving them to the next in line.

But I guess the way I benefited from coinbase was that I bought in at $78 and by the time my transfer went through the price was actually already over $90, but my purchase held at the $78 price. But if you use bitinstant it sounds like everything just gets verified more quickly and you don't use a bank transfer, definitely very nice benefits.

 

[FSP-Rebel]

Wow, that sucks, coinbase obviously wasn't able to predict that demand increase. The thing is, when you do a transaction with coinbase you buy the coins at the current market value and coinbase I believe makes the purchase so you can have the bitcoin at that price once your transfer clears. If the transfer doesn't clear then I assume coinbase ends up with the coins in an account and they end up giving them to the next in line.

But I guess the way I benefited from coinbase was that I bought in at $78 and by the time my transfer went through the price was actually already over $90, but my purchase held at the $78 price. But if you use bitinstant it sounds like everything just gets verified more quickly and you don't use a bank transfer, definitely very nice benefits.

In that instant, I can see the benefit if that site didn't piss me off and I'd try them again. OTOH and conversely, I was thinking of buying another 4 @ $92, so I placed my receipt on bitinstant, then went to CVS and paid but the price had dropped back into the mid-80s and I ended up getting another .6 BTC that I wasn't expecting.

 

[Jackie Moon]

With coinbase, I easily linked my checking account up after retrieving the two debits but after three consecutive days of trying to buy btc, each time I'd try I'd get back a "sorry, we've passed the rolling 24 hour period and the max amount of btc have already been bought" and I did this at different times of the day.

Wow, that sucks, coinbase obviously wasn't able to predict that demand increase. The thing is, when you do a transaction with coinbase you buy the coins at the current market value and coinbase I believe makes the purchase so you can have the bitcoin at that price once your transfer clears. If the transfer doesn't clear then I assume coinbase ends up with the coins in an account and they end up giving them to the next in line.

But I guess the way I benefited from coinbase was that I bought in at $78 and by the time my transfer went through the price was actually already over $90, but my purchase held at the $78 price. But if you use bitinstant it sounds like everything just gets verified more quickly and you don't use a bank transfer, definitely very nice benefits.

Both of those things also happened to me with Coinbase. It took a day of trying to purchase at random times and seeing the "24 hour limit reached" message until it finally went through. But when it did I was able to lock in the price at $64 and when they arrived they were worth $89.

I agree that Coinbase is having trouble handling the demand right now. They say they're working on being able to lift the 24 hour limit and are trying to hire more support.

Hopefully they succeed because it is a pretty simple way for new people to purchase Bitcoins without having to sign up to multiple sites or learning how to trade on an exchange.

 

[anaconda]

With the challenge deposit verification you give them your account and routing number and they make two small deposits in to your bank account. Then you log in to Coinbase and enter the two amounts to confirm that it is an account you have access to.

Coinbase is slower than BitInstant but it was pretty simple. I signed up for an account on Tuesday March 19th. On Thursday March 21st they made the two deposits of $.02 and $.08 in to my bank account. I went to Coinbase to enter those and confirm my account.

On Saturday the 23rd I placed an order for 1.5 BTC and it said the Bitcoin would arrive on Thursday, March 28.

On March 26th they charged my bank account, and as promised the Bitcoin showed up in my Coinbase wallet on March 28th.

Overall it looks like it takes about a week from start to finish. I can't guarantee these results for anyone else but I was pretty happy with them.

Thank you very much for writing this out. Also, if I may: Did you get locked into the price as of your March 23rd order time? And, did that number appear somewhere in the order process, so that you could confirm that you were getting the market price?

 

[anaconda]

When I had an issue with bitinstant they got back to me the next day with personalized detailed info on what I needed. With coinbase, I easily linked my checking account up after retrieving the two debits but after three consecutive days of trying to buy btc, each time I'd try I'd get back a "sorry, we've passed the rolling 24 hour period and the max amount of btc have already been bought" and I did this at different times of the day. So thanks to their bullshit I couldn't get in in the $40s so then I went with blockchain and bought through bitinstant. And every transaction I've had with bitinstant processed fairly instantly.

Thanks for sharing your experience. Perhaps I fell through the cracks. If memory serves, they listed about three different emails to select from when contacting them. I used:

[email protected]

I wonder if your problem with Coinbase had anything to do with their (seemingly) weird low daily limit level of $100?

http://blog.coinbase.com/post/34357253898/you-can-now-buy-and-sell-bitcoin-by-connecting-any-u-s

Are there any limits in place?

Yes, the maximum you can buy or sell right now is $100 USD per user, per day. This is a low limit just so we can keep an eye on things as we ramp up, and make sure we have all the right systems in place to prevent abuse. We’ll raise this limit over the coming months.

So, if this is correct, we can't even buy one whole Bitcoin from Coinbase in a single transaction.

 

[anaconda]

Yes, and it does.

Well, that's interesting. I know nothing about the silver market. But, is it therefore safe to say it is not a very efficient market? Why not buy it from the lower price offering and sell it to the higher price bid simultaneously? Don't computers do that stuff these days?

 

[anaconda]

In that instant, I can see the benefit if that site didn't piss me off and I'd try them again. OTOH and conversely, I was thinking of buying another 4 @ $92, so I placed my receipt on bitinstant, then went to CVS and paid but the price had dropped back into the mid-80s and I ended up getting another .6 BTC that I wasn't expecting.

I'm confused. If we use Bitinstant, exactly when is our purchase price locked in? And how do we confirm it was correct?

 

[anaconda]

That makes me feel good about buying in when you held off. Now it's at $108.

$117 last trade quote at 4:56 PM PST per Mt.Gox.

 

[FSP-Rebel]

I'm confused. If we use Bitinstant, exactly when is our purchase price locked in? And how do we confirm it was correct?

Don't quote me but they say your receipt has up to 120 hours before it must be paid for or it's a bust. From what I can tell, whatever the price is when you go and pay zipzap (at the store) then you're locked in at the current price when that happens. As an example, I went to buy one btc earlier today but it must have went up a buck or two since I was online and thus I got slightly less than one coin even though I was all priced out to include the fees.

 

[anaconda]

Don't quote me but they say your receipt has up to 120 hours before it must be paid for or it's a bust. From what I can tell, whatever the price is when you go and pay zipzap (at the store) then you're locked in at the current price when that happens. As an example, I went to buy one btc earlier today but it must have went up a buck or two since I was online and thus I got slightly less than one coin even though I was all priced out to include the fees.

Thanks. Hey can you pay at the store with a debit card or do you need to carry in fiat currency?

Also: Kind of scary if you don't know what price you're getting.

 

[FSP-Rebel]

Thanks for sharing your experience. Perhaps I fell through the cracks. If memory serves, they listed about three different emails to select from when contacting them. I used:

[email protected]

I wonder if your problem with Coinbase had anything to do with their (seemingly) weird low daily limit level of $100?

That's the support I used and was contacted back from some chick named Rachel. Also, that issue with Coinbase about the max must have been my problem cause I was trying to max. I'm only gonna use bitinstant from now on til I'm satisfied with Coinbase's progress. In fact, I went with Coinbase first because they also have wallets but when that didn't work out I had already been planning a contingency as I started to see how fast these puppies were increasing. By the time I heard back from bitinstant support, I was ready to roll with a blockchain wallet and canceled my Coinbase link to checking.

 

[FSP-Rebel]

Thanks. Hey can you pay at the store with a debit card or do you need to carry in fiat currency?

It's tough to say but I've only paid in obamabacks.