
Process your first $1,000,000 of Bitcoin payments for free with Coinbase - FredEE
http://blog.coinbase.com/post/59417545262/
======
downandout
Coinbase may have venture investment, but their customer service and week-long
verification process will make this a nonstarter. If you want to read some of
the more entertaining stories about their customer "service" read this thread:

[https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=147341.80](https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=147341.80)

One of my favorites:

 _Well they refunded the BTC. In order to get a response, all I had to do was
post on several BTC related forums and chat, contact the founders on Twitter,
LinkedIn, and Facebook, and file a complaint with the government.

What a company. Now hopefully I am able to successfully transfer the coins out
(doubtful). _

~~~
carrja99
"week long verification process"!? I really have to call B.S. on that one. I
setup a coinbase account a few weeks ago and was verified within 3 days.

I can't comment on their customer service as I have yet to need it.

~~~
ComputerGuru
I hardly think one anecdotal experience of 3 day turnaround is enough to call
a second anecdotal claim of 7 days "BS"

For a process that sometimes takes 3 days, I can _easily_ envision someone
else having a 7-10 day turnaround. You make it sound like it's an order of
magnitude off, but it really isn't.

~~~
carrja99
Ah true. I guess I'm just really used to the 1-3 day turnaround that it seems
norma. ;)

------
cperciva
Why can't coinbase follow Stripe's example of having a "publishable key" for
payment forms? If it weren't for the headache of needing to make an API call
to create a payment page (or button, or iframe), I would have added Coinbase
support to Tarsnap months ago.

~~~
Osiris
Something else that's a bit different is that you have to create an
invoice/order number to send along to Coinbase, then mark that invoice as paid
later. With Braintree/Stripe, the server makes a call to the service with the
amount to charge and it gets back a success or fail which I can then
immediately display to the user showing that the purchase went through.

With Coinbase I haven't found a way to have that tightly integrated
experience.

~~~
epscylonb
Probably because a bitcoin transaction doesn't confirm instantly? (a block is
found once every 10 minutes on average).

~~~
Osiris
Exactly. Which means developing a completely separate process for accepting
bitcoins over credit cards. I worked on adding Coinbase to my small website a
while back but the workflow of how it works is so different, I would have had
to write a whole new sales process just for bitcoin.

~~~
cperciva
It seems to me that the process for Coinbase could be exactly the same as the
process for Paypal -- post a form with the amount to be paid and the account
money should be paid to, and get a payment notification later.

------
pkfrank
I think this is a great move. For one, it further cements their position as
the best-funded, most-respected Bitcoin processor. Even putting $1mm figure
into the ether raises their profile.

Their investors (USV et al) definitely understand marketplaces back-and-forth
and are in it for the long game. It makes sense to do anything possible to
spur merchant adoption, and this is an eye-popping way to do it. Without
merchants broadly and happily accepting Bitcoin, the marketplace just can't
mature properly.

What % of Coinbase's value of is captured in merchants that will process less
than $1mm lifetime? I'm sure it pails in comparison to the potential profits
on the (hopefully huge and forthcoming) merchants that will drive Bitcoin at
the same order-of-magnitude as Paypal, traditional credit cards, etc.

~~~
ballard
Really cool giveaways (say a Tesla) seem to work for mass appeal on the other
end of the double-end of this. And the press lap it up = free marketing. :)

------
jcampbell1
This is negative marketing. Anyone that does $1M+ a year in online sales
doesn't want their payment vendor losing money. What I want are honest FAQs
and simple integration options. "Free" is irrelevant. If I can get incremental
customers and I hope that means $20,000 more bucks. I don't give a shit about
$400 vs. $200 vs. $0. Hell, I pay Apple $6000, and I am only kinda mad.

~~~
ronaldx
Agreed: I found this offer a bit strange. It alerted my Ponzi-senses.

I'm open-minded, but how can they afford to offer this for free? Will this
offer be attractive paying customers, and why do they want to attract non-
paying customers?

~~~
Anderkent
It attracts startup businesses, most of which will fail, but some of which
might turn into profitable and paying customers later on. A big winner there
can easily pay for all the lost ones - esp. since most startups will probably
fail very early, not using anywhere close to the 1 million.

Yes, it's a loss leader. However, if they have the cash to support it for a
time they might tie some very profitable businesses to their infrastructure.

------
eruditely
Coinbase is not instant like advertised, it's identity verification system to
level 2(the one that is instant) is incorrect and I try it every day but it
will not accept that the information I provide to prove my identity is
correct, even though it is. So I'm stuck at level 1 for no reason,

Coinbase's main thing going with it is that they're the only competitor that
seems to have not let the entire operation burn down(bitinstant).

~~~
christiangenco
The exact same thing is happening to me! Every time I try to enter my
information it says:

> Your ID could not be verified at this time. Insufficient Data for Questions

I've emailed, tweeted, and posted to their support center about it with no
response over the last week. They need to get that support staff[1] up and
running quick.

1\. [http://blog.coinbase.com/post/58733449732/we-are-looking-
to-...](http://blog.coinbase.com/post/58733449732/we-are-looking-to-grow-our-
customer-support-team)

~~~
superuser2
I think they're trying to question you about database entries regarding your
life in Experian-type databases. Past addresses, cars you owned, etc. If you
never generated that sort of paper trail, the automated verification fails and
they just won't do business with you. I too hope they can set up an alternate
method soon.

~~~
beaner
They actually do do business with you in the form of a 10 btc limit at ach
transfer speeds. For most people this is annoying but sufficient. They're just
not willing to, you know, give a total stranger on the internet access to
$5,000 worth of instantly-transferable goods without knowing their identity.

------
ekanes
Great promotion. We just signed up. 1% of $1M is $10k, and compared to the
alternatives (CC, Paypal) it's pretty huge savings. I do agree their
support/responsiveness needs to be better or they'll cement a poor reputation.

PS: In terms of adoption, Bitpay has several companies doing $1M+ monthly, so
this promotion isn't without meaningful value to someone.

------
doublemorph
I wonder if adverse selection will apply where people will abuse this for high
frequency transfers of some sort.

------
juzfoo
Unfortunately until coinbase support non-US banks, we could only watch and
sigh! :)

------
DanBlake
Too bad it's completely impossible to use the service. It takes forever to get
verified and even when you do transfers hardly go through. Total waste of time
when I tried it a month or so ago.

------
chatman
I almost double checked if its not 1 April? How will they make money?

~~~
citricsquid
The number of people using Bitcoin now is negligible, it may as well be 0.
Coinbase is perfectly positioned to be a serious player _if_ Bitcoin does
achieve the lofty goals supporters are aiming for: Coinbase will make money
hand over fist from personal users if that happens. 0% for merchants is
Coinbase investing in the long term success of Bitcoin. The money they would
make now from charging merchants is inconsequential compared to the money they
will make long term if Bitcoin succeeds.

~~~
t0
This is more of a marketing stunt. They might as well _pay you_ to be a
merchant.

------
yumcoin
Interesting development, but $1M seems a bit much.

~~~
ISL
If you want to make bitcoin _really_ attractive to merchants, this might do
it.

------
dcc1
No payments to banks in europe :(

------
revelation
Merchant adoption might be key, but _user and buyer_ adoption might be even
more important. Merchants will happily adopt if theres demand.

In that direction, it seems like charging customers has become untenable since
PayPal (and credit cards, really).

------
a3voices
I hope one day Coinbase adds Litecoin support.

~~~
rlpb
Are there any figures on how many people actually care about Litecoin, as
opposed to Bitcoin?

~~~
alerkay
One metric to track usage is the number of transactions per day:

\- Bitcoin: ~50k transactions/day
([http://blockchain.info/charts/n-transactions](http://blockchain.info/charts/n-transactions))

\- Litecoin: ~5k transactions/day ([http://ltc.block-
explorer.com/charts](http://ltc.block-explorer.com/charts))

------
jaggederest
I wonder how long until the first merchant to take the money and run? Alice
buys something from Bob, Bob sends a tracking number for a rock in a box and
chuckles his way to the bank.

Or vice versa, of course, Alice buys something, Bob ships it, Alice never
pays.

~~~
jessaustin
How would the second scenario occur with BTC? The _start_ of the process is
Alice paying.

~~~
jaggederest
I'm not clear whether customers will be comfortable paying in advance. There's
zero way to recover your money, unlike credit cards or bank transactions.

~~~
jessaustin
BTC in and of itself has no answer for the situation of not trusting the
merchant. However, merchants typically do business with many customers, don't
need anonymity, and have an interest in maintaining good reputations. None of
these conditions obtain for the customer in the general case, and this
asymmetry explains why all merchants that take BTC are paid before delivery.

Those who need to use a credit card, will.

