Sellers Beware! Why transactions outside fiverr are risky

[luvanimation]

Hello fiverrites, I would like to make all sellers beware and warn them to stay away from accepting payments outside fiverr,to avoid the 20% commission to fiverr.
I admit I have been guilty of accepting payments direct through PayPal twice, but both times i was duped by the buyers as they pay up half the amount first, and then once u deliver they will say they don’t like the work and refuse to pay the balance,hence u are at a loss above that they threaten to report to fiverr about it, I would not want to name the buyers, as I too count myself a culprit in encouraging it, in one case I worked for 4 months and post that the buyer kept on asking for revisions on the designs i had submitted a per his instructions as a result I got fed up and finally told the buyer that i don’t want to continue. The buyer not only asked for full refund but repeatedly kept on threatening to report to fiverr. I agreed to refund in 2 weeks, post 2 weeks I asked for a few more days to clear the amount, but then the buyer kept on threatening that he would report to fiverr, so after working for 4 months I have to refund and have an unhappy customer, so all sellers please don’t take payments from any one outside fiverr, it’s a wonderful platform so let us pay fiverr it’s just dues, for being such a protective shield for us all sellers.
Hope this helps sellers in being careful

[catwriter]

Here’s another reason why transactions outside of Fiverr are risky: it’s strictly forbidden by Fiverr’s Terms of Service, and it can get you permanently banned from Fiverr.

[maheshadil]

Contacting buyers outside of Fiverr and accepting payments outside is strictly forbidden. Your account will permanently banned. Never do that.

[mcperfect]

Rules are set for a reason and one of the reasons is for your protection as a seller. Accepting an offer outside fiverr is against the rule here and it can really put you in huge trouble.
I think this should be a great lesson to all sellers and buyers. Sealing deals outside fiverr is forbidden and it could land you I “headaches”

[pintoo0]

You admit that ! You break main TOS of Fiverr. You are still here its your luck but still you are in danger !

[namahshivay]

Good to see you bringing up here for the rest of the community. For anyone who is greedy on saving few more out of those 20%, don’t forget you were nowhere when you started on fiverr. You got a platform here to showcase your talent through your work. Spend your time and effort in bringing more creativity in your gigs which will eventually increase your earning potential sooner or later. Respect fiverr’s TOS. You’re reading this because one fine day they started all.

Fiverr policies protect both buyers and sellers so that none of them get cheated as long as both parties have done everything in correct order.

So please don’t exploit this platform and enhance your earning in the right way of doing things.

All the best on your journey with fiverr.

[brejay]

Yes, very true! Anyone buyer who wants to “help” you keep that 20% is probably out to scam you. It doesn’t do anything for an honest buyer to work outside Fiverr. They pay the same amount of money.

[royjuiten]

Well, you learned your valuable lesson, good for you. But I don’t think that anyone will listen to you…Meh

[frankexpert30]

Never take buyers outside Fiverr!!! It is against their Rulles.I know we pay 20%,but we always have sales here,so for myself I respect strictlly those rulles!!!

[deepanshujbedi]

Fiverr is so safe that i bring customers who i dont trust, on fiverr platform 😃
Try getting some orders using google adwords and something… you will know how much investment it need, here you can start with 0 investment…

[tictac7]

You just violated fiverr’s policy. you can’t do that and you could get banned. I know that sometimes 20% is too much but they offer you a platform to do business just don’t be ungrateful.

[jhallawalla]

Dealing outside fiverr is risky and stupid as well here on fiverr you must have a good AVG selling price and reviews are crucial for further sales…

If you keep taking your customers outside of fiverr just for the sake of 20%
you will never be able to compete with current sellers,Soon they will reach to TRS and you’ll be sticking with 1-2 sales daily,Since 1 year of selling i’ve learnt 1 thing on fiverr

The more reviews = The more trust from new buyers hence the more sales

[mariokluser]

I don’t communicate with buyers outside of Fiverr.

This doesn’t take away that I have much more customers outside of this platform though. They don’t even know that I’m also active here on Fiverr.

Indeed you may not have contact with buyers outside of Fiverr as it is against the ToS. However, you can do business outside of Fiverr with whoever you want as long as the first contact didn’t start here. If you are not capable of doing business online without getting tricked you can see Fiverr as your save haven.
You shouldn’t forget that there are billions of transactions between individuals and businesses online every day that don’t have anything to do with Fiverr. So saying working without Fiverr is dangerous is kind of naive. Fiverr is not a patron saint.

This rule of not doing business with buyers outside of Fiverr has nothing to do with protecting the seller or buyer. It’s about their cut. That’s all. Of course neither of them will be protected when doing so. But that this rule is to protect them is as real as Santa Claus.

[markp]

@mariokluser There is another angle to this here as well. The buyers and sellers who want to do business outside are in many cases looking for a way to take you to the cleaners. They want to take you outside fiverr and take you down a dark alley and mug you. There are plenty of posts from people complaining that they have been ripped off blah blah blah. "I lost my pants and I’m now broke because of xyz and my wife haz left me for a gig extra ". Whatever.

You know whats funny about these posts… These people have no problem coming straight to the forum complaining and pleading ignorance, when its all over the forum about it being against the TOS and they are obviously reading the forum & they know its not allowed and just think everyone is as dumb as they are. I have NO sympathy for them.

Look at this clown who posted above. Its pretty obvious they knew taking the order outside here wasn’t allowed, but did it anyway as greed got the better of them. They only came on here crying because they ended up with zero and the fact they have outed themselves on here as breaking the TOS shows just how stupid some people are.

[miroslavglavic]

Fiverr’s cut covers credit card fees, bandwidth, advertising and all those things YOU would have to pay out of what you make.

In here you don’t have to worry about getting a merchant account to process CCs, your website’s bandwidth, you don’t have to go to adsense or any big advertising budget, and things like that.

[mariokluser]

I agree with you on that. Who acts stupid like that deserves to suffer.

There are also buyers here on Fiverr that I don’t want to work with and I always suggest to them in a polite way to look for someone else.

When a buyers asks me to contact him outside, I always send a reply in which I explain that he is violating the ToS by giving me his e-mail address or whatever. This way I have proof in writing if something happens.

The OP tries to let it look that every business outside of Fiverr is dangerous. It’s only dangerous for people who are not capable of thinking. I said this earlier and it may sound harsh, but by some posters I wonder if their brains are only designed to support the functions of their vital organs.

[mariokluser]

As I said, I have much more customers outside of Fiverr who don’t even know that I have an account here. Still I don’t have the expenses you mention and I have hours of work every single day.
I just tried to go from a work week of 7 days to one of 5 days. Didn’t work out entirely. Today is one of the rare occasions that I have a free Sunday and still had to look into an offer for a client.

[seofanatics]

You’ll get the juicy offers to pay directly into your PayPal account mostly from those who want to get away with your sweat and implicate you! You accepted the deals because you’re GREEDY and you think you are smart. The only time i suggested payment outside of Fiverr was when a client ordered my premium gig without contacting me. This is what actually happened…

The buyer could have asked me before placing the order if i can use my AdWords account to run her campaign, but unfortunately, she contacted me after placing the order. I gave her access to one of my adwords accounts and asked her to fund it so that i can run her campaign. After a couple of messages, i got the alert that i have violated ToS. I quickly contacted CS and they said i should ask her to pay for the campaign via a custom quote. This won’t work, so i had to cancel the gig and refunded her $180.

Apart from that, i can never agree to accept payment outside.

[psychicbunny]

Yes! Always play fair.

[deborah_article]

i don’t mind fiverr taking even 30%!!! i love fiverr because they have wipe most of our tears!! from grass to grace. going out of fiverr for business is wickedness. i won’t rob the fingers that put food on my table for no just cost

[mahabub_ru]

Fiverr is a secure platform for all of us who wants to get paid. if you think that it would be better for you to avoid fiverr’s percentage, then it is totally wrong idea…out of fiverr you always have a risk to be cheated…and it goes against fiverr.

[fastcopywriter]

So why are you on Fiverr? Need more money than what you make outside of Fiverr? I admit I have one offline business, a vending machine. We’ll see in two weeks how much money it has made me.

[fastcopywriter]

“There is a British saying I always loved, “penny wise, pound foolish.” I took it to mean, “making decisions with small amounts of money (pennies) that end up making bad sense for affecting larger amounts of money (pounds, as in Great British Pounds).””

Stick to Fiverr, you’ll make pounds and won’t have to worry about pennies.

[pearcecreatives]

Thanks for sharing this here, as for many who loves cutting corners you end up biting more than you can chew. But you are lucky no disciplinary action has been taken.