Escrow.com

A smoother verification process could give a better experience for me

Escrow.com still does the hard work of escrow for domain names very well and the domain name holding option works. What doesn't work are their outdated and expensive disbursement options. When considering whether to use the DN Holding service as a seller, make sure you factor in the additional cost of transfers and finding a banking provider that Escrow.com approves of. Whether it's their systems/choice or the systems/choice of their banking partner to not accept TransferWise, Revolut or other legitimate banking organisations that offer low cost FX isn't clear. What is clear is that with the overall costs of receiving international wire transfers (USD to GBP in this case) once Escrow.com and the bank charges have been applied it cost $51 to receive the funds every month. So make sure your sales price factors in these costs.

Experience was ok, it was what I had to do to complete purchase

The service Escrow.com provides when purchasing a vehicle online is valuable and the rates they charge are fair. If you are not 100% positive about the purchase you're making, use them or someone else that provides the same sorts of protection.

That said, Escrow.com does not represent how their service will affect your purchase process accurately. If you and the seller are not both fully enrolled in and have used the service before, plan on an extra 4 business days to initiate the purchase. They don't tell you this ahead of time, but there's no way around it. That's at the beginning of the purchase. At the end of the purchase they hold on to your money for at least 3 extra days before the buyer gets it. All of this is probably somewhere in the fine print but there won't be a mention of it when they're trying to get your business and once you agree it's too late to back out.

Again, it's a valuable service. Just plan on a lot of delays. A transaction that should take a day or two will take well over a week not counting transportation. I won't use them again because they fail to disclose all implications of using their service.

We had some issues regarding the verifying of our account and the online interface was a bit confusing, but once we called the customer service number, the agent identified the issues and walked us through exactly how to resolve them.

I still haven't been paid by the buyer. I've called Escrow twice and the problem still isn't resolved.

For the purchase of a $250 website, the process was arduous and clumsy. It took several days for both parties to do what should have been acomplished in a few clicks. There are websites that allow you to buy and sell a house in less time.

Now that I own the website, it won't load... says it can't find the server? The seller won't respond to my questions and finding help on Shopify (other than paying an expert) seems just as slow.

I'm thankful I only spent a couple hundred dollars, I think Shopify has a long way to go to be turnkey.

I found Escrow.com's instalments payments mechanisms very cumbersome, so much so that we eventually just paid the balance out.
The fact that Escrow can't arrange a direct debit, that the transfer is at risk every month that an instalment is due, that each instalment has to be separately invoiced/paid, often leading to minor fx discrepancies are all factors that would discourage a potential buyer from proceeding down this path.
Philip Wood, Director & General Counsel, Fine Art Bourse Limited.

Gave you a 3 because you were unable to follow up with the seller.

The whole process is unclear, you never know what is the next step and sometimes receive conflicting information/requests. Everything is done by email with no global view of completed steps and steps to come. That was very stressful at times. Thankfully I knew escrow by hearsay and had a good image of the company, because the whole thing looked very unprofessional especially for a service handling sums of money. In France, to speak of what I know best, we are used to streamlined processes with professional looking interfaces when dealing with that kind of transactions. If needed I work in a UX company (PwC Experience Center) and this is our job. Would be happy to help on designing a better experience.

Overall the service is very helpful but there were several parts that I felt were confusing:

* at the point where I (the buyer) was to enter my registrar info, I could not do it on your site, instead I was supposed to email the information to concierge. There should be a very clear button on the transaction where I can enter this info

* The transaction was marker "complete" before it actually was totally completed. This concerned me as I had not yet received the domain name that I had purchased

* the chat help could not tell me where I was supposed to enter my registrar info - even after I sent them the page URL they asked me for screenshots. They seemed unfamiliar with the process.

* when I called customer service about the status of my transaction I was told that the people who could help me were in a meeting. This did not give me a great deal of confidence in the escrow team

Fine transaction. However I was told the transaction was done, but my domain never showed up at godaddy. Had to contact them and find out why.

Also I could not use my normal domain provider, and had to use godaddy. Now the domain is locked for 60days which they did not tell me. That is a serious issue now.

Took nearly two weeks to complete transaction after the terms were agreed to. The customer support services provided no help, only promises to pass information along. No escalation, little communication.

UPDATE 2: I am updating my review to improve the star rating and clarify some things. First of all, apparently, the Buyer in my transaction made two mistakes. I'm still a bit annoyed that Escrow.com's customer service took so long to figure out one of the mistakes, especially when it was so easy to see. But my previously poor review needed to be upgraded because it was not all their fault. Should I receive my funds in a timely manner, I will upgrade the review again.

UPDATE 1: Edited to reduce my rating to one star and to add that after online chats and phone calls by both myself (the Seller) and the Buyer (who is in Real Estate), this company's customer service is really lacking. The Buyer did originally make a mistake by not sending the fee (their instructions are a bit confusing). But then she sent the fee via PayPal several days ago and Escrow.com hasn't claimed the funds and you can't speak to finance by phone. Now tell me these delays are not created to increase their interest income from the funds. They had the opportunity to make two new happy customers and instead they just ticked us both off.

FIRST REVIEW: I have used this company once and so far I am not too happy.
Let's think about this... How does a company like Escrow.com make their money?
1. Fees
2. Holding on to the money as long as possible while they earn interest on it.

They seem to find all sorts of excuses to hold your money so they can earn the most interest on it. They are slow to respond to their customers while they earn interest on your money. I don't know where they are based, but the grammatical errors all over their site and in their communications makes me think they are not based in the USA, which is a little scary. I won't be using them again.

Seems like they don't have someone with an actual background in escrow running the show. Problems included:
Bad wording on website led to multiple days of delay around shipping vehicle. When they said "do you need shipping" what they mean is "is this item being shipped?"
They do not automatically release funds at end of transaction. You have to call. No explanation why.
They failed to release the funds after the first call.
They take 3 business days to execute an ach. 1-2 days is typical.
They will close out the transaction BEFORE the funds are sent. This creates the very unnerving status of the funds having apparently disappeared

In the end they covered a wire transfer for my funds. Instill can't help but wonder about their claim that they hold the funds non interest bearing. I bet not.

Sadly, few alternatives.