How to accept payment for selling a car? (CHAPS?)

I am selling my car and was going to accept a cheque/bankers draft, wait for it to clear and then hand over ownership of the car - But I now understand that even a cleared cheque can be rejected at a later date for being a forgery!

...I have been told that CHAPS is the only way to 100% securely receive money. Is this true?

If so then how do I set up a CHAPS payment? or is it something that the buyer does and I just hand him my acc num?

Is the proceedure the same for all banks? I dont want to agree a sale on my car only to have the buyer pull out as he/she wanted to pay by cheque and is confused about how to set up a CHAPS payment.

I had never heard of CHAPS before I started looking into this, do many people insist on CHAPS for this kind of funds transfer, or will people think its a bit odd and assume I am scamming them? Thanks

David Bevan

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Reply to
junk1
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In a private sale I would only accept a guaranteed bankers cheque or cash ! Why not try an online account transfer method or through telephone banking...

Domestos

Reply to
Dom

CHAPS is a same day transfer of funds from one bank to another. The buyer goes into a bank, pays from his account into yours by CHAPS (usually involving a fee), and the money is cleared. I've never had problems buying a car using a bankers draft - whether private or from a dealership. Might be worth checking with your bank about using one.

Martin <

Reply to
Martin Davies

Online or telephone takes the same length of time as a normal bank transfer. About 4 days. Unless they bank at the same bank as you (not just the same group).

Martin <

Reply to
Martin Davies

Bankers draft is usually more common and well understood. If the buyer banks at the same bank as you, go to your branch and get him to withdraw the sum in cash, then you can immediatly pay that into your account. Saves bank fees, time to wait for clearance and you are assured you have the money unlike a cheque. However you need to be sure that your branch will hold that much cash on the premises if it's a high value sale and the cashier will ask funny questions if you go over some magic figure (10k I think?)

Reply to
Chris Street

If drawing out more than a grand or two, worth ordering it a few days in advance. I spent a few months working at lloyds TSB and someone taking 40% of our notes on hand was a nightmare.

Martin <

Reply to
Martin Davies

a bankers draft or building society cheque would be fine , insist that they collect the car in banking hours so that you can verify the payment is legit if they will not comply then they don't get the car

Reply to
steve robinson

x-no-archive: yes

why not go to his bank, and watch them draw out a counter cheque to you.

'chaps' are , afaik, only usually done on very large amounts.

Reply to
crofter

No limits but there is a charge (about 10 ISTR) so not worth doing on small amounts.

Reply to
Stephen Maudsley

Yes but they are going to pay it straight back in again, just to the other guys account so that's not a real problem. There does have to be enough physical cash on the premesis though for it to work AIUI

Reply to
Chris Street

........................................................................................................ Why does it have to be physical cash. If both parties are with the same bank a simple transfer form would suffice. All the person has to do is check the balance of his account a few minutes after the transaction has been processed. Once a transfer has been made it is not possible to reverse it unless the other side agree. Eric

Reply to
Eric Jones

Generally true. However IIRC there have been cases of stolen bank/building society cheques being used, which are subsequently 'bounced' by the bank/bs when they find their way through the clearing.

As an additional check, you should contact the bank/bs in question and get them to confirm that the particular cheque you're in the process of accepting is not a stolen one.

Rgds

__ Richard Buttrey Grappenhall, Cheshire, UK __________________________

Reply to
Richard Buttrey

............................................................................ ............................

Works only if they bank at the same bank. If (as is more common) they bank with a different bank, then you need chaps, bankers draft or wait.

Martin <

Reply to
Martin Davies

In message , Martin Davies writes

And the same branch of that bank!

Reply to
john boyle

Thanks for replies so far etc, but the major point that alot of people seem to be missing here is that a cheque/bankers draft can be fake and it will still clear and money will appear in my account etc - I might even spend it, and then the bank will finally realise that its a fake and take the money back (and no doubt charge me for going over drawn!)

...I suppose the only way to ensure its not fake would be to go to the bank with the buyer and get the cashier to hand me the bankers draft and then to pay this into my account, then hand over the keys? (is a bankers draughts gauranteed to clear?)

I cant beleive there is not already an established way of tackling this problem! Jo public has no chance of spotting a fake cheque! Thanks

David Bevan

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Reply to
junk1

? I can withdraw cash at any branch of my bank, and pay it in similarly. How is there any problem?

Reply to
Ian Stirling

I was about to chip in that point ... bankers drafts & building society cheques can be forged and/or stolen.

I suspect that CHAPS is secure and irreversible however I would recommend checking with your bank to make sure.

Geoff

Reply to
Geoff

Yes, if not fake, and the bank isn't going to go rupt, it's guaranteed.

But obtaining one involves a fee, which is a waste of money if you are both going to the bank anyway. Then the simplest way is to get the buyer to draw out cash and the seller to pay it in to his own account. There isn't really even any need for there to be enough cash physically on the premises, as someone else suggested (though for such small amounts as a car sale, it's unlikely there wouldn't be). What you could do is recycle the money. It involves two tellers (or one multitasking one). The buyer draws cash out, and passes the notes one at a time to the seller, who passes it to his teller. There's no reason why the seller's teller couldn't pass the note back to the buyer's teller and have it going round and round.

A further refinement would involve the multitasking teller taking the buyer and seller out of the loop. The cash stays on the teller side of the window. In that case, the cash doesn't even need to exist. The teller simply has to take her own word for it that she handed it to herself.

Reply to
Ronald Raygun

In message , Ian Stirling writes

I think you have misread the thread. The previous but one poster was referring to a an inter account 'transfer' which can only be 'intra-branch' the next poster said that it will only work 'intra-bank'. I was merely pointing out that a 'transfer' can only work in the same branch of the same bank.

HTH

Reply to
john boyle

In message , Ronald Raygun writes

I didn't understand this post at first, but then realised that you must have been either watching too many American films or programmes by those two fake magicians 'Penn & whatsisname' and then I figured out that by 'teller' you meant 'cashier'.

In other respects your post makes perfect sense of course, and in the old days it would have worked perfectly. A few years ago a very similar situation arose at a certain bank and the cashier input the first part of the transaction (i.e. the pretend cash withdrawal) into the computer which instantly rejected it because it knew there wasn't enough cash in the branch. As far as the cashier was concerned, it couldn't be done because the computer said so it couldn't be done so that was the end of it.

It was resolved by inputting the credit to the vendors account first (so conning the system into thinking it had more cash than it really had) and then inputting the debit to the purchaser's account afterwards by using the cash that wasn't really there but which the computer thought was.

Reply to
john boyle

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