Payment for car

hartcjhart

If hubby can have the time off to go to the bank then drive him home why does hubby not get the train to the car and then go to the bank with the seller

bumpoowee

Only safe ways of taking payment as a private seller as far as I know are CHAPS payments (which are instant) or you both go into the branch and the buyer brings the cash and they pay it into the account there and then. Anything else has a degree of risk to it.

Can't you pay by CHAPS? This is an instant bank transfer but costs about £20. It's what businesses use (often used for transferring money to solicitors during house sales too).

Sandieflowers

Thank you hartcjhart, I appreciate what you say, we do really want the car and I understand the sellers caution but we also want some protection and paying by bank transfer does not seem to give us any.

lisyloo

I am pretty sure that you can't do CHAPS on a Sunday.
If I have DDs that are meant to come out on a weekend then they are deferred until Monday.
It's not a banking day.

I don't see why you should take the risk and I wouldn't be prepared to.
Unfortunately that meets lnot getting this particular car.
Is there anythng special about it? if not, just look for another one.
If the seller said bankers draft on his terms of sale then you have the right to your money back.
Did you use paypal?
You might have some paypal/ebay protection to get the deposit back.
But the seller has broken their advertised TOS.

Sorry don't have any other ideas.

What do you do when there is a family funeral on?
Surely you must have some way of at least one of you taking time off during the week?

Sandieflowers

Thanks hartcjhart, we had thought of this but we bank at Natwest in one town and he is about 50miles away so branch would not know us and it could be difficult to withdraw.

Thank you bumpoower, we did ask our branch about chaps but they said it was not instant.

I have to pop out now so will check in later for any more suggestions, thank you all for your help so far.

Ebe_Scrooge

I can see both sides here - you're absolutely right that once you've done a bank transfer he could fail to hand over the car, and there's not a lot you could do about it.

There is one way round this - you could use an Escrow service. Some information here :

http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/community/escrow.html

Essentially, you pay your money to a third party, they will release the money to the seller once you confirm that you're happy with the deal. There will be a fee for this ( I've never used it, so don't know how much ), but the service is specifically to get round this sort of situation. Of course, you need to make sure you're dealing with a reputable company ......

lisyloo

Just had another thought.

Do you know who the seller banks with?

NatWest -> NatWest is instant.
NatWest -> FirstDirect is instant.

Haven't tried it on a Sunday.
But could you do it at the sellers house on the sellers PC if it is instant?
Perhaps you could try transferring a small amount beforehand to test the process.

CvPiper

If he is being that funny about it, as it was from eBay I would Paypal the difference and let him get hit with fees.

Sandieflowers

Thank you all for your help and advice.

Situation now - spoke to seller today offered him the opportunity to accompany hubby to our local bank to collect the money which he could pay into his bank 'Barclay's' just down the road. Once transaction complete hubby take him home in 'our new car'. He is considering this as a possibility.

The other complication we have is that the car has personal number plates which he wants to retain and thinks this can be done this week, I have had dealings with DVLA and it has always taken at least two weeks. If there is a two week delay we will of course want to re-check the car to make sure it is still in the same condition.

Being self-employed in retail is a problem, luckily in 20 years we have only had two funerals and one wedding which we have closed for, I don't think a notice on the door saying 'closed today, gone to collect car, sorry for any inconvenience' would go down very well. !!

Thank you all again and I will post back with the final outcome.

CvPiper

You'll never get the private plates turned around in a week, he might have some paperwork back, but the V5 will take 2-3 weeks minimum, and will go to his address.