ePassporte Official Statment

[ecchi]

Originally Posted by Charlie

I don't even see how he can start back up without paying back that money whether it's his fault or not, or having it unfrozen if that is the actual case.

Well that is a given. Assuming this gets sorted out, eP will be dead in the water if their clients loose money.

Originally Posted by Charlie

I love they way they always tell you, your money is safe. Great! But it's not in my hands. Why don't you let me have it so I can keep it safe myself LOL.

Because there is no legal way he can do this. It would require monumental financial misdealing at eP's end, and if they even tried they are looking at 20+ years in prison. And worse, any US bank account that they do manage to get money into is going to get frozen by the government while they look into it, which will probably take years! You really want to be unable to withdraw any money from your own bank account for the next few years?

Originally Posted by Charlie

I do admit that I always found them to be pretty incompetent They are complete screw ups in my eyes.

Another given, but this time, there lack of a brain (or heart) is not the cause of the problem.

The problem is US federal banking law, which is a mess to put it mildly. There are corrupt African states run by incompetent military juntas who have better banking systems that the US. An when things go tits up, it takes them ages to sort things out.

It is costing the US a fortune, because no one likes to do business with American companies, not because they don't like the companies, but because it is such a pain to exchange money for services/goods. Part of the reason your economy has still not fully recovered from the crash is down to this.

As an example, the only US companies I currently use are sponsors (because there are very few non US ones), eBay/PayPal (because they have an European division which is separate from the American division, so I do not have to deal with US laws), and ePassporte (which has just confirmed my "never use US companies" rule). For things like hosting, payment processing, affiliate account management, distribution, advertising, etc - for which there are plenty of good US companies I can use - I always use European companies because of the shit problems of dealing with US banking laws.

This is also why ePassporte got so big so quickly. No country likes dealing with US banks, simply because the law on your side of the planet is so unfit for purpose that it makes life difficult for everyone. And when a non US bank does deal with a US bank they charge their clients high. For example to cash a non British cheque from any country other than the US costs me up to about the equivalent of a dollar and a half. To cash a US cheque costs me nearly the equivalent of 20 dollars, over ten times as much! And baring in mind that some sponsors send me a cheque when the amount goes over $50, that means I have to give nearly half my money to the bank (one sponsor even sends out cheques for $35). So going via ePassporte and using ATM to withdraw is the only sensible way to go if you do not live in the US. Since the US now only accounts for less than a third of English Language business on the 'net, any sponsor who does not offer ePassporte is throwing away two thirds of their business, no sane company would do that! So, assuming this matter does get cleared up, eP is here to stay, at least until someone starts a viable alternative.