My first Bitcoin Experience - scam lost $20 USD - BBDC bitcoinberudechange.com

So I needed to get ten dollars of Bitcoins, never used them before, all sounds a bit dodgy if you ask me, I like the idea of being able to make anonymous payments, I would love to donate to Wikileaks for example, I believe you can donate to Wikileaks with Bitcoins, I never got that far! Getting Bitcoins is not like using paypal, there seems to be all these layers, because of my circumstances (a disability I have) I can't just drive or walk down to the bank which is about one kilometre away, So I tried to do it with Paypal after seeing that some businesses can convert Paypal money into Bitcoins, it's all very confusing and my foggy brain found none of this easy. After a bit of searching on Google I came across www.bitcoinberudechange.com seemed legit and there was only one reference to them being a scam on a Google search, but they are new to the Bitcoin game so alarm bells should have gone off.

This is the site it's a forum about Bitcoins https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=122319.0 as you can see there is only the original post and one comment, there was another site that is like a website scam indicator, http://www.scamadviser.com/is-bitcoinberudechange.com-safe.html their tentative report as the site is young was listed as possible scam, but once again nothing definitive. Oh and of course BBDC have the obligatory review or testimonial page, I left two reviews and of course neither was posted, they don't allow negative reviews, so take their reviews with a container load of salt, you aren't getting the truth from all people who have used them lol.

I added the money to BBDC on the third of January, at the time of writing it is now tenth of January and I've submitted a dispute with Paypal, I doubt I will get my $20 USD back, but will now do my best to ensure others don't get ripped off like I was, I'm glad I was ripped off only $20 USD and not hundreds or thousands of dollars, The BBDC website is hosted in the US but appears to be ran from the UK across the pond, that's a bit dodgy as well. Their testimonial page is filled with "people" who say the transaction was done in a couple of hours, well I'm still waiting a week later and no Bitcoins have appeared in my wallet. I asked them why it was taking so long and they said Paypal had a hold on the money, the thing is though that you can ring Paypal and ask them if that is correct, so I did and no it was not correct that they were holding my money, another indicator that they are very loose with the truth.

I left it a few more days and now I was quite angry definitely starting to believe that seeing my money or Bitcoins was looking like it was never going to happen well guess what I was right, no Paypal refund, no Bitcoins and they have blocked my IP so I can only send them an email and apart from an auto reply they are not answering me at all now.

I can only conclude from all available evidence and my own experience that BBDC www.bitcoinberudechange.com are not converting Paypal money to Bitcoins they are just taking your money and that's where it ends, remember I have tried to contact them, they have banned my IP address and are totally ignoring me, I have two emails from them which I will pass on to Paypal as evidence, but as I say I do doubt that I will get my 20.00 USD back either to Paypal or in Bitcoins. This is the email address that they use on Paypal, one of many no doubt, this is all the info I have on them from the Paypal transaction (below)

Name: hayleigh davies (The recipient of this payment is Non-US – Verified)
Email: hayleighdavies2012@hotmail.com
Payment Sent to: payments@bethelook.co.uk

You will see that bethelook.co.uk is just a parked web domain, so none of it is looking legit!

Will I use Bitcoins again? One day I will when I can get to a bank, but I will never use BBDC or anyone that says they can use Paypal money to convert to Bitcoins, I have since found out through googling that Paypal don't allow these types of transactions, my naivety has come back to bite me on the arse, I'm glad it only cost me $20 USD, I did learn a valuable lesson though and it was quite a cheap lesson which is a positive :)

Oh I will definitely update this blog if Paypal can reverse the transaction, but honestly it's looking doubtful, BBDC seem to be expert liars!