e-gold FAQ

"e-gold is to money what e-mail is to letters" J.P. May

Funding FAQ:

How do I put some e-gold in my account? (How to buy e-gold)

Two ways:

receive e-gold from another e-gold account holder,

you exchange your national currency for e-gold (or e-silver or e-platinum or e-palladium) using an 'independent exchange market maker' (IEMM).

The exchange market maker will deposit the e-gold into your e-gold account, on your instruction. You can pay the exchange market maker by a variety of methods.

The list of exchangers gives information about what some exchange market makers charge and the payment methods they accept. This transaction attracts a charge of 1.5% or more of your money being transferred into e-gold. This can be compared to the charge made by banks, travel agencies and money exchanges to change from one government currency to another.

Now just how easy is it to buy e-gold?

You will need only two things:

You will need a free e-gold account
You will need to exchange your money into e-gold using a e-gold exchanger like TampaExchange

The e-gold exchanger will take your US$, AU$, EUR, GBP, NZ$ or whatever your local currency is, by one of the following options and fund your e-gold account:

Credit cards (very quick and easy accepting VISA or Mastercard)
PayPal
Western Union (go to a Western Union website or to the nearest office and send your funds)
Money Gramm
International/local bank wire transfer (you go to your bank and send a bank wire)
Direct cash deposit in major banks of the world (make a cash deposit into one of our bank accounts)
Money order/Postal order
Checks
EZCMoney
PrePaidATM
BPay (easy way for Australians to pay)
C2it
Moneybookers
Webmoney
Nochex
Springpay
Qchex
Princess card
Evocash
Netpay
Fastpay
E-bullion
Intgold
Stormpay
Exchange e-metal/e-currency to e-gold

Please read this highly informative independently written articles by an E-Currency users.

Can you provide me with a list of market makers?

See:

What exchanger (market maker) do you recommend?

www.goldex.net

www.tampaexchange.com (no need to sing up, just fill in the form and send money order. 4% fee)

Can I use PayPal to fund my e-gold account?

Yes, check the following:

What is the least expensive way to fund my e-gold account?

http://www.gold-pages.net/E-gold_egold_Daily_Exchange_Rates.htm

How long will it take to get my e-currency?

The best gold exchangers like www.goldex.net can fund your account in 24 hours (even faster if you are a returned customer up to 10 hours).

The majority of transfers are completed in 3 business days, sometimes you should expect to wait up to 5 business days to receive your funds.

What is the quickest way to fund my e-gold account?

With some market makers you can walk into a bank, make a cash deposit to the market maker's account, send them an email with the details, and within hours they credit your e-gold account. See Gold Exchange Services , where "Payment Methods" include "Direct Deposit(s)" or "Cash Deposit(s)."

Western Union also can provide fast (but luxury) funding.

What if 5 days have passed but I still have not received my money?

There can be several reasons:

It is five business days, that have to pass until you should really start worrying that something is wrong. This means that you should subtract not only Saturdays and Sundays, but also bank holidays in the countries of both your and our banks.
Your bank is not very quick at processing international wires. Depending on a country and even a bank, it might take up to 6 business days for a wire from gold exchanger bank to reach your account. Don't ask gold exchanger why, but some banks like to take time at funding their clients.
You have made a mistake in the order and the money has been transferred to a wrong bank / digital currency account. This is probably the worst-case-scenario, as digital currency transfers are irreversible and although bank transfers are reversible, these reversals are costly (our bank charges us $100 per each such type inquiry) and are not guaranteed. Check the details you sent to gold exchanger and contact them, they might help, but this is not guaranteed. Also, inquire with your bank, they might be able to help.

Why did not I receive the promised amount?

Assuming, that by promised amount you understand the amount stated in the email sent to you, the usual suspects are as follows:

Bank wire fees
Gold fluctuations
If you are selling a digital currency like E-Gold, which is backed by gold, you must understand that its value in US Dollars or Euros will change over time. This means that you are prone to a gold fluctuation risk. It is not a fee, but it has an effect on the amount of money you receive. Read about it in more detail below.

If I have money in e-gold and the gold price fluctuates, how does that affect my account balance?

Your e-gold account is denominated in grams of gold (or other precious metals). If US$ gold price in terms of US$s goes up, then your account balance in terms of grams of gold remains constant, however, its value in terms of US$s goes up.

Why does the value in my account keep changing?

The amount of e-metal in your account is accounted by weight. This amount will only change when a transaction is performed to or from your account, or a storage fee is assesed. You can view these transactions and the amount of e-metal credited/debited to your account using the History function of the e-gold Account Manager. The Balance function also shows an equivalent fiat currency value of your e-metal - this value will fluctuate with changes in exchange rates.

What are currency fluctuations?

The gold exchanger Gold-cash explains it as follows:

Our base currency, the currency in which we make all calculations is US Dollars. If your base currency is different, this might mean that you are open to a currency exchange risks. This risk is inherent in all digital currencies, pegged to national currencies. One prime example is Evocash, which is pegged to US Dollar. For example, you send 100 Evos to us and want to get it transferred to your Euro account. Let's say, that the current EUR/USD exchange rate is 1. Thus, you expect to get 100 Euros less our commission and banking fees. However, when we process your order several hours later, the EUR/USD exchange rate can change. As we convert USD to EUR, we get a slightly different figure. This will mean that the amount you receive can be different from that you calculated. Usually currency exchange rates do not change wildly, but they do change.

What is a gold fluctuation risk?

The gold exchanger Gold-cash explains it as follows:

Most digital currencies are pegged not to a national currency such as US Dollar, but to a precious metal, such as gold. The price of gold in dollar terms fluctuates every minute. Your holdings at currencies like E-gold are held in grams or ounces, not in dollars. So, as there is a time lag between the time you send us E-Gold and time we send you US Dollars or Euros, the price of gold might change slightly, and you might receive an amount that differs from your calculations. Although we strive to process transfers as fast as possible, it might take us from one to four hours to process it. To illustrate, let's say you send us 10 grams of E-Gold at 10:00 GMT. At this time 1 gram of E-Gold costs $10. This means, that you sent us $100 of E-Gold. We will receive the E-Gold to our account and will process your order at 13:00. Let's say the price of gold changed from $10 per gram to $11 per gram. This means that at the time of processing we treat your order as you have sent $110. We take our 2% commission, deduct the wire fees and send you the rest. The money that will end up on your bank account will not be the same as what you thought. Of course, gold price can move both ways, so instead of getting more than you expect, you can get less. Gold price fluctuates every minute, and during a couple of hours its price can change 1-2%. It should not frustrate you, this is an inherent feature of all digital currencies backed by gold, but you should be aware of it. You do not have this kind of risk when using currencies like Evocash, which is actually pegged to US Dollar.

To check the gold price fluctuation, please click here .

How easy or difficult is it to convert from one alternative currency to another?

Numerous market makers provide this service. In particular, see:

After I deposited the money into gold broker account I find out they want to have a working landline telephone number before they will process order so they can do a quick check for the first time i use the account. Why?

The broker want to be sure that exactly you are trying to buy e-gold and not someone using your stolen credit card.

How do I turn my e-gold into cash? (How to sell e-gold)

Two ways:

Trading your e-gold

If you receive e-gold, or if you just want to cash in all or some of your holdings, go back to your 'independent exchange market maker' (or another one) and sell your e-gold.

See the list of 'independent exchange market makers' for further information. Some will even pay you to sell your e-gold.

Accountholders with more than 400oz gold (equivalent to a small bar of gold bullion and worth about US$120,000) in e-gold may redeem their e-gold as a bar of gold bullion, not just reconvert their e-gold holding to paper currency. (However, this will depend on what types of bullion e-gold Ltd is holding at the time of such a request. They can only redeem gold bullion of the types they are currently holding).