BUYVM: Legit or Scam?

Tried to sign up using my business PO BOX and business credit card. Rejected. Tried to use my business physical address. Rejected. My business credit card is linked to my business address…doesn’t matter you must use a residential address. What the ? Ok, gave the support folks my home address, they said everything was good but I’d have to sign up all over again. So I did, used my home address and a personal credit card. Still rejected. I was using my cell phone the second time and the IP location from my cell phone provider didn’t match my home address, even though my credit card billing address did match my home address. Not worth the hassle and feels a lot. like a scam. I’m concerned now at why they were so insistent on having my residential address – possible identity theft? Customer service could not have been any more arrogant or unhelpful if they had tried.

@Francisco :love_letter:

BuyVM is sadly not a scam and really totally legit. They have a pretty good VM network. I had to a few issues once with payment but they always were friendly. Let’s see if fran replies but they surely can explain it properly.

happy first post !

BuyVM is not a scam, they just have strict fraud checks. The most likely reason that you’re being rejected is due to your IP or other identifiable information being reported elsewhere.

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Agreed!

Only way you get scammed is because the service is so good that you buy too many idling VPSs

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As others have said, not a scam - however they do have more stringent requirements for anti fraud than a number of other providers in my experience. I’ve been a happy customer for 8 years now. When I first signed up I got rejected for not having a verified PayPal account, which was something I’d never come across at the time (or since). That’s fine though, I respect that a provider needs to take precautions to ensure the stability of their business, and it’s clearly working well for BuyVM.

If you are a genuine person with slightly more complicated circumstances, you may find it easier to sign up with other providers who are a little bit more relaxed.

I gave them so much information its scary. Like I said after it was all said and done and I really got to thinking about how much information they had, I was concerned it was an identity theft ring. (and may still be, just because they apparently do have some servers doesn’t mean they don’t have a side business)

There is NO reason to need that much information, there is NO reason they need a residential address. If the address you provided matches your credit card billing address then you should be fine. Heck when I paid the first time using AMEX, my transaction was even verified by AMEX SAFE KEY.

Record the IP address like everyone but don’t penalize me if the IP my wireless company (AT&T) assigned me and that I have no control over and can’t change is “300 miles” from where you think it should be. Can you imagine trying to call AT&T and saying “um yeah, buyvm doesn’t like the IP you assigned me can you change it ?” I’m sure you’d get it fixed right away…not

Furthermore, whats with all the security? They aren’t selling and shipping a physical product. If a fraudulent charge happens you cut the user off, and you’ve lost maybe 1 month of service charges? 20 whole dollars? That loss is minimal compared to the loss of legitimate customers, its not like you’ve shipped them a sever that you’ll never see again. In my case (and more I’m sure) they lost possibly years of paying.

I told buyvm that I was going to share my unpleasant experience with everyone I could - I even shared with them what I was going to write - and their reply was simply “ok” so thats what I intend to do.

I’m glad you guys have had a good experience and I hope it lasts for you but I would certainly suggest back up plans, you can’t run a business like they do forever, I suspect with the rates they charge they need all the customers they can get and can’t afford to turn them away, have customer service agents with bad attitudes, and stay in business.

I’m not sure where to start with your response to be honest with you.

They have a lot of fraud checks to prevent them from getting burned by users conducting illegal activity. That’s the simplest way I could possibly explain this to you. They’re not doing anything wrong, and your insinuation of otherwise is frankly ridiculous. I understand that they have more checks in place than other providers, but perhaps take a minute to evaluate why they might have these checks in the first place.

Lol. They’re not short for business, let’s put it that way. I can tell you for a fact that as a provider myself, I’d much rather have more stringent checks and less headaches to deal with than marginally more revenue.

I’m sure you mean well, but I don’t think you have much experience within the hosting industry as a whole. Fraud is very common, as are bad actors.

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So which other forum are you planning on asking this same question?

Wherever you go and wherever you post, BuyVM will still be recognized as a legit provider.

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They don’t care about revenue from a single customer, they care about losing much more because their upstream punished them for the actions (say… spam, botnet c&c, phishing site) of a single customer. They care about reducing labour costs from dealing with all the different companies that are potentially involved when a customer commits abuse.

Damn, now Fran won’t be able to afford his European expansion…

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There are chargeback fees imposed (typically around $25 per charge, plus the loss of the transaction fees that don’t get refunded, which are typically 3 to 5% of each transaction). It can take 180 days or more for the chargebacks to show up, so it could be six months or more of service before the whole thing comes back. Your $20/month service just turned into potentially a $300 hit if it were six months of service.

Additionally, if a provider has repeated chargebacks, the credit card processors will terminate their account and could potentially place them on a blacklist, preventing them from switching to a new credit card processor.

It’s hugely risky to accept customers when there are red flags.

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They’re not. Fran is my boy. I’d know.

It’s a lot easier to talk bad about someone running a highly abused business than it is to run said highly abused business. Everything they do they learned they had to do based on the actions of the people who wanted to use them for criminal activity (spam, DDOS, etc), harm their other customers in some way (resource abuse), or cost them money (which threatens their other customers by threatening the sustainability of their platform). Everything you just said is merely your opinion of how you think they should operate. Frankly, the latter is of lesser value, as opinion doesn’t override the daily business decisions of a provider actually trying to take care of their existing customers. Personally, I’d be pissed if Fran let anyone in the door to avoid bad threads at the expense of my service quality and his ability to continue to provide me service.

BuyVM has been a huge target for people who want to perform abusive activities and then file chargebacks. That’s the price of running a desirable network at desirable costs. Thankfully, they rose to the challenge even if it pissed off one new user a year.

Bottom line is they don’t need you. If you went through all that, it sounds like you need them. It’s no skin off their back if you choose not to go there. No one held a gun to your head and said “You have to do business with this company or else.” If you want in the door that badly, you’ll follow the bouncer’s rules. If you don’t, plenty of other doors to go in.

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