trusting a new seller

[betaone]

Hi there- I've just been scammed by 2 sellers. The joke is on me, because they had no reviews, their videos are inconsistent on their profile page,, and one a seller has already sent me a phony video with my own song pasted on it, claiming they've created a custom dance routine video for me, and the video's watermark has been distorted-out / blurred.  . I'm not holding my breath for the 'refund' process to be successful, but I AM wondering how the site itself could better protect naive, inexperienced buyers such as myself with some sort of 'heads up' to say "this seller has no proven track record with us yet"... SOMETHING to make us notice this.    The sellers were quick to offer "upgrades" which would give them additional revenue; it's quite an operation, and we need the means to stop it.

[moikchap]

That's exceptionally bad luck. I'm sorry to hear about it.

I focus on new sellers as well, since they tend to have much lower prices. Out of about 80~90 sellers, I've only encountered three or four which were using things I suspected they didn't own.

You could probably make a post in the Suggestion forum, but also add in some framing that the warning could be an opportunity for an upsell to funnel buyers into more reputable (and higher value) sellers. Fiverr likes the idea of funneling, so that might give the suggestion more traction with them (it's one of their four business model pillars, you see it under "Go Upmarket" in the shareholder letters).

[epc_holic]

Not all new sellers are scammers, and you don't always need to check for reviews (everyone started from absolute zero). Reading the gig's description, seeing the gallery, and talking to the seller will give you the full picture of his/her solvency. I hope you find what you're looking for, because from what I've seen, Fiverr has almost everything 🙂

[surajkartha]

2 hours ago, betaone said:

I'm not holding my breath for the 'refund' process to be successful

Fiverr has never for once declined my refund request. So long till your request is genuine and in line with Fiverr's Terms of Service, you should have no issues getting your money back. Of course, it's hard to deal with support sometimes since they mostly respond in a scripted manner (which is also understandable considering the volume of requests they may have to respond to), but overall, they've been great. So, no need to feel that the money is wasted. If you've shared the proof, details etc. I am sure they'd refund the money. However, if and when they refund the amount, it'd be credited to your Fiverr balance, if you want it credited to your payment source, you would have to refer to this article: https://www.fiverr.com/support/articles/360049910953-Cancelations-and-refunds-

My suggestion as a buyer is that if you are new to the platform, go with the experienced lot, sellers who have a decent amount of positive reviews and history on Fiverr. I usually look for sellers based on their a) review count (I have a minimum review count in mind) b) negative reviews and how they handled it (this is the time consuming part) c) pricing d) location (based on the type of job, for instance, if it's translation, I'd prefer to go with a native speaker and location search filter comes in handy). Not in the exact order, but you get the idea. Also, the process varies from person to person, depends on your requirements, budget etc. I guess.

Here are the links to two threads you might find useful:

and

Shoutout to @gina_riley2

[psykkopatte]

Well, if you hire "sellers" who work for 5€ or 10€, you get wat you pay for....