My Horrible Experience at 4.CN - Sellers Beware

[OnlineBusiness.com]

So I wanted to try out the Chinese sales platform at 4.cn and submitted a few numerics I owned. It was one 5N and three 6Ns. I added my domains but 2 of them needed to be manually verified so I emailed Monica who was my assigned "broker".

She emailed me the next day and said all my domains had been verified. She continued to ask if I wanted her help in finding me a buyer. I anxiously agreed. I thought that since she was a professional broker she could get me the best price.

I don't want to get into specifics but the way the discussion unraveled it felt as if she was acting more as the buyer's broker vs my broker. Long story short we entered into a deal and I pushed the names the next morning after payment had been secured.

After names were pushed I checked the whois to make sure the buyer had accepted the merchandise. To my surprise the new owner appeared to be 4.cn themselves. I asked Monica about this and she told me it's because the new owner didn't have an enom account so they were holding the names for him. Really? The new buyer couldn't take 3 minutes to create a free enom account.

Anyway, that didn't really bother me too much. I mean yes it's messed up if my broker was buying names on behalf of herself and 4.cn. If true, that'd be a HUGE conflict of interest. But whatever, I was ok with the price. Not thrilled but it was good enough.

So then I asked when will the payment be sent. She said it will be processed soon. I asked when and she said once I enter in my bank details they will get started on it. That was good. However, a few hours later she says "the buyer is concerned about these domains being used illegally" Remember this concern had now been voiced AFTER the transaction was deemed complete.

Now that really really surprised me. Then she tells me we need to wait 2 days for the buyer to hear back from a security company to make sure the domains are not blacklisted. I was shocked. It's so simple to do a check on archive.org to see the history of any website.

All 4 of these numeric domains NEVER had a website on them. I purchased all of them on aftermarket auction sites 6 months ago. I have proof of this. I even created a video for her of me logging into my namejet account to prove this but it was no help.

So now I'm stuck sitting here at the mercy of 4.cn. It really seems fishy to me that they would favor the buyer in this situation. I really get the feeling THEY are the buyer. Which again would be fine if not for this fiasco of them questioning the safety of the domains.

I've asked her to simply push back my names since I don't want to deal with them anymore, however, she says she has to ask the buyer if that's ok. Hmmmm...if the buyer has doubts then simply push back my names and we're done with it.

That's where we stand now - no money, no domains. I'm hoping Monica replies to this post because I'm really getting nervous about this whole situation. I think there's so much dirty business that goes on at this marketplace that they are always paranoid with new sellers. In spite of them having my official ID on file they were still questioning my identity and the safety of these domains.

Moral of the story: If a Chinese investor insists on 4.CN or DN.com - do yourself a BIG favor and save yourselves from the huge headaches and insist on the industry leader, Escrow.com.

 

[Skyvisum]

Bad service.Its your domain and online property and should be sent back immediately.I don't see myself trying them anyway.Escrow is competent enough and if your broker acts in favor of 4.cn then its not favorable or transparent enough.I wont deal IMHO.Hope you got your domains back.

 

[OnlineBusiness.com]

Thanks for your comments. I agree with you 100% they should have sent back my domains as soon as they had any doubts. I agreed to take them back because I know I owned them legally and these are completely clean names.

Now they are playing games with me. They are asking for the receipts of my purchases of these domains. I have complied but they are giving me the run around. Very worried here as I have about 8K tied up at 4.CN and 6K at DN.com.

Anyone get completely screwed out of their money from these guys?

 

[DnEbook]

Wow I was considering using them, this has put me right off, please do keep us updated, thanks for sharing

 

[Skyvisum]

To me 4.cn.com is in a place where rules can be broken and asking you for receipts now of your domains is suspicious and hope it gets resolved.Why didn't so called broker ask you all of these before you listed your names there.I hope they don't use the receipts you sent them to change ownership to theirs.Hope you dont have any premium names listed there as they would set their eyes on them.

 

[OnlineBusiness.com]

Wow, I've been domaining and doing business online for nearly 20 years and this by far is the worst experience selling domains. Seriously. I've wasted hours on this and it continues to get worse.

Monica tried to call but I did not have my cell phone so I told her to call me on skype. I told her I'd show my face on video so she can verify my identity and safely send the funds. She declined. I don't know why. She insisted she had to call the number on my file.

An hour later my wife comes home with my cell phone and I told her to call me then. She declined. Then she asks of XXX-XXXX was my phone number. She obviously did some google searches about my company name and found a very old phone number. About 5 years old. She asked me in a suspicious way if that was my phone number. Well honestly I didn't remember until I googled the number.

She still is not calling my current number, the number she wanted to call me when my wife had my phone. What the?!!?!?! And now she's doing all these searches in google about me and my company. There is absolutely nothing that I am hiding. These guys are super super paranoid!

I'm pulling my hair out here. I'm part Chinese myself so I guess I can get away saying that these Chinese people seem very incompetent when it comes to handling dollars and deals. Please 4.CN get a clue and hire some competent employees.

 

[Skyvisum]

This is beginning to sound like your domains ''might' be claimed by 4.CN. Nothing in the world will make me do anything with them or recommend them for anything.Even if this was an American company,I wont deal with them the moment there are bad experiences like these.Please update for more info and document every correspondence incase things don't fall into place.

 

[OnlineBusiness.com]

They say they will push the names back so that's where we stand right now. Remember this is on a COMPLETED transaction. Equivalent to the "Closing Statement" sent in escrow.com.

They had reversed it in favor of the buyer. Because the buyer was "worried that there is a security flag by 360.com". HMMM.. sounds really shady to me. There were NEVER any websites on these domain names.

And since when does a seller's broker favor the buyer? Maybe when the buyer is her own company. Guys, do not do business with this company...they seem to operate with no rules. And if you choose to take the risk, be very careful and document everything you do.

 

[alcy]

you keep talking about incompetent and paranoid workers and yet your story sounds much more like a scam to me.

I am not saying that's what it is.. I am just saying it sounds like it.

 

[OnlineBusiness.com]

Yes, it does sound like a scam. Here's the short version. Sounds like the 4.cn broker bought the names for their company, shopped it around and maybe figured out it was not as hot as they initially thought.

Now they are giving some bogus reason that the domains might have been used in illegal activities. Yet there have never been any sites on these domains.

So now they refused to send my payment and now they are saying that the push back from enom will need to wait a few more days.

Hmmm...sounds all very shady. I welcome Monica to share her side of it. She has the link to this thread but yet has not posted anything.

Monica, are you there. Please clarify in public why you are returning my domain names on a COMPLETED transaction.

 

[alcy]

well.. I've not that much hair left to pull out anyway so I will be staying away.. thanks for sharing and good luck recovering your domains and then selling them on a real domain marketplace.

 

[iamonline]

i know that when you use their service, they ask you to push the domain to them (4.cn), then they will push it to the buyer after the transaction has been completed. this is sort of their escrow service. as for the rest of your incident, i'm not sure.

 

[OnlineBusiness.com]

There's a few things messed up in this whole ordeal..but biggest one is the fact that they are willing to REVERSE a completed transaction based on the results of new owner trying to sell the names to others and not being able to do so due to some "warnings by a software scanner for the domain names"

I had scanned the domain using tools in the US such as: https://sitecheck.sucuri.net/ and ALL domains came up clean.

So after the new owner had 2 days to shop the name around, he has the right to request a reversal of the transaction. And to which 4.cn is readily complying. What total BS.

How do I know the new owner didn't screw with the domain in time after he gained control? (which is a moot point because as far as I can see there is nothing wrong with these domains)

 

[forge]

Yes, it sounds like a nightmare.

BUT... don't assume too much here. I had a recent experience where an eName (China) domain broker took control of a purchased domain for their client, and it remained in eName's company name for many weeks before finally showing what I will assume (!?) is the client's details. A different situation altogether, but I do think that you can't immediately assume 4.cn has done something underhanded here. I would say it's unfair and unprofessional, however, to treat you as they seem to have done.

 

[artstar]

Its sounds liked the broker is one of their employees and they are now trying to resell your domains at a higher price to some predetermined buyer.

Once they resell your domains they could easily pocket the profit then pay you back the funds they initially agreed on with you eventually.

So this way they broker your domains to their buyer while making you wait for your money.

This is just can observation and hypothetical scenario.

Good luck in getting it resolved!

 

[OnlineBusiness.com]

Its sounds liked the broker is one of their employees and they are now trying to resell your domains at a higher price to some predetermined buyer.

Once they resell your domains they could easily pocket the profit then pay you back the funds they initially agreed on with you eventually.

So this way they broker your domains to their buyer while making you wait for your money.

This is just can observation and hypothetical scenario.

Good luck in getting it resolved!

You completely got it right..I mean that's how I see it and that's what I think they had done. I don't know for sure but it sure smelled fishy from the very very beginning.

They couldn't find a buyer right away so now they are reversing the transaction.

 

[artstar]

Plus possibly they had as buyer lined up who backed out then seeing the value they still wanted to make a profit so they use a delay tactic until they find a new buyer.

I'm sure you will get this resolved in a positive manner but being asian they cannot lose face and admit they screwed up so they make up this bs about nature of domain etc etc until they have a new buyer.

They won't put their company in jeopardy over this so be patient . ive done a lot of business with asian companies within import export & ifv established they are quite trustworthy but can be hard to fathom on some tactics especially when it comes to losing face.

 

[fuzzy]

Thank you for sharing your experience domainswithtrafik. Do keep this thread updated.

I am going to postpone listing my best domains on 4.cn

 

[Joshdns]

If a completed deal cant be honoured, i prefer my domains pushed back to my account immediately; Guess i'd be staying away from them too.

 

[OnlineBusiness.com]

UPDATE:

Thanks all for listening. I never rant about things like this but this was borderline scamming in my book. I want to keep things civil at this point because their sister company DN.com is still holding $5.5K of my money from another deal.

But the update is that I just got all my names back. It appears whoever was the buyer (whether or not it was 4.cn themselves... I'll never know) tried to sell the names after the transaction was marked complete. They didn't succeed and got cold feet on the deal.

So they made up some bogus excuse about the domains being tainted. Monica attempted to show me some security update regarding this but I don't read or speak chinese so I couldn't figure out what it meant.

So that's it. My names got shopped around for a couple days after the deal was offically completed and yet it got reversed..simply because the buyer wanted it reversed.

How's that for a safe and secure escrow platform. Stay away unless you like playing games and risking your names with a platform who doesn't protect sellers.

I will update again if they make things right with me. I'm discussing with Monica now and hopefully there will be some good out of all this wasted time.

Oh and btw, to get my names back I had to shell out the transfer fees. 4.cn did not agree to pay this nor did the buyer. That was the icing on the cake for me in this entire fiasco. Oh well..live and learn.

 

[fuzzy]

UPDATE:

...to get my names back I had to shell out the transfer fees.

!!??

 

[John Abay]

thanks a lot for share your experience brother.

 

[kriss05]

Thanks for sharing!

 

[silentg]

Wtf? 4.n messed up and they should ban the buyer and cover all fees.

As for dn.com, I used them for the first time this year and transaction went smooth. They do make you jump through the hoops to verify you are the legit domain owner.

 

[GoWebnames.com]

UPDATE:

Thanks all for listening. I never rant about things like this but this was borderline scamming in my book. I want to keep things civil at this point because their sister company DN.com is still holding $5.5K of my money from another deal.

But the update is that I just got all my names back. It appears whoever was the buyer (whether or not it was 4.cn themselves... I'll never know) tried to sell the names after the transaction was marked complete. They didn't succeed and got cold feet on the deal.

So they made up some bogus excuse about the domains being tainted. Monica attempted to show me some security update regarding this but I don't read or speak chinese so I couldn't figure out what it meant.

So that's it. My names got shopped around for a couple days after the deal was offically completed and yet it got reversed..simply because the buyer wanted it reversed.

How's that for a safe and secure escrow platform. Stay away unless you like playing games and risking your names with a platform who doesn't protect sellers.

I will update again if they make things right with me. I'm discussing with Monica now and hopefully there will be some good out of all this wasted time.

Oh and btw, to get my names back I had to shell out the transfer fees. 4.cn did not agree to pay this nor did the buyer. That was the icing on the cake for me in this entire fiasco. Oh well..live and learn.

Oh, they are horrible as a TRANSACTION platform. I had shared my 4CN experience in a different thread sometime back and they reversed my transaction after the name was sold in a public auction. Because they didn't tell me whether to push or provide auth code and when I pushed to buyer's account and buyer had control of the domain, they still kept telling me: PROVIDE AUTH CODE. Funny people !!

Lastly I got on Skype with them and got them to reverse the domain push to my account. But it was a big big headache. The domain was 905905.com

BUT, 4CN can be a good place for exposure of your domains to chinese buyers. The hits on my numeric name when it was there was very good. And any auction at 4CN would only take off in last few hours mostly.

Feel glad at least you have your names back safe.