These are the 5 things you should take into account before starting a trade with another user on a P2P platform. P2P platforms are responsible for uniting sellers and buyers of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in one place.
LocalCoinSwap makes the purchase and sale of bitcoin and cryptocurrencies safe thanks to our custody service and to our customer service which gives support to our customer tickets in less than 5 hours on average. This is far better than the 5-7 day response time expected on other platforms.
Let's see how to use a P2P platform.
1. Reputation of the seller/buyer
P2P platforms not only bring buyers and sellers together in one place, but they also help you understand the quality of the people you are trading with. If you want to ensure a smooth and safe trading experience, you should pay attention to the following factors: Number of trades, ratings, reviews of past trades, and more.
For example, on LocalCoinSwap you can see the following icons that give you information about different important factors:
The shield means the merchant has the verified phone and email, the trophy means the merchant is a professional merchant on LocalCoinSwap and the lightning bolt means the merchant has an average response time of under 1 hour.
Understanding this information helps a lot to get an idea of the quality of the vendor that created the offer. Take advantage of each of this data so you can have a good experience on P2P platforms.
2. Trade limits
Let's imagine that I want to buy $ 100 of bitcoin. It may happen that I see a very good price and I get very excited, only to later realize that the maximum purchase amount of that offer is very low. For example, $20 which would be the maximum amount that the merchant is willing to sell at that price and with the specified trade conditions.
On the other hand, there may be an offer with an excellent price, but with a high minimum amount. Following the example of my purchase of $ 100 dollars. There may be an offer with an excellent price, but with a minimum of $ 1000. If I don’t want to spend this much then I will have to find another vendor.
Let's see what it looks like on the LocalCoinSwap platform. We have put an orange frame to the lows and highs to trade on a specific offer. In this case, we can see that this offer allows you to purchase any amount between $1 to $10,000 AUD. It is a very wide range.
3. Payment methods you accept
Payment methods are very important. Both sellers and buyers can choose which payment method to use in each of their offers. It’s important to respond to an offer that specifies a payment method that suits you.
One of the most used payment methods is a traditional bank transfer. This method is common because many people have bank accounts and, in most cases, online banking is free or cheap. However, in LocalCoinSwap there are more than 250 payment methods with which you can utilize to trade with other people.
In this example, this specific offer uses "Bank Transfers" to trade.
4. Location of the buyer/seller
The location of the buyer and seller is important in many (but not all) cases. This is because many payment methods are region-specific. If we decide to complete an international trade, we must take into account the convenience and security of that payment method.
How much will we be charged for commissions and how long will the money take to get to the seller's account? (Convenience) and once the money reaches the seller and the transaction is finished, can the buyer attempt a payment reversal? (Security)
Most of the time you can see the merchant's country in the advertisement as in this case the merchant is from Australia.
In other cases, there is other important information in the offer title like in this example.
However, when you enter the offer you can see the advertiser's reference country.
5- Read the seller/buyer conditions BEFORE making the trade
Each advertisement has its own characteristics. In the part of conditions is where the creator of the purchase or sale offer explains what are the special requirements to make transactions with him or her. To access the conditions part, we must click on the offer that we are interested in and it will take us to the page with more details.
For example, if the merchant is using “Bank transfer” as a payment method, he or she will surely specify in the conditions section the accepted banks. Also, details such as Bank transfer fees must be included in the transaction. If it is a cash transaction in person, they will likely add specifics about the places and premises where they are willing to meet, meeting time, amount of cash, among other details.
Example:
An important note: Make sure the trade has been accepted and the seller has locked the crypto into escrow before you make any payment to the seller. Once the escrow is funded, LocalCoinSwap protects you through a custody system that allows you to transact with unknown people with security.
Conclusion
Each offer is unique as they have their own characteristics. It is necessary to take into account the reputation of the buyer and seller, the minimum and maximum transaction amounts of the offer, the payment methods accepted by the vendor, the merchant's reference country and the specific conditions of the seller or buyer. It is important to ensure that both the buyer and seller have accepted the transaction in order to make the payment.
After the seller accepts the trade request and funds the escrow, it is safe to make the payment, and you are covered by the LocalCoinSwap escrow service.
We hope these 5 considerations are helpful for your LocalCoinSwap experience. If you have questions or would like to learn more about bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, join our Telegram community and follow us on twitter.