What we check, and what happens when it goes wrong.

“Is this person real?”

Before a first listing, a seller passes a government ID check and links a payout account in the same name. A handle with nobody behind it cannot list here at all.

“Will I get the one in the photographs?”

For a body, a lens, a cinema camera or a recorder, the serial goes on the record before the listing goes live, and it is on the record you get at delivery. That is what it is FOR: the item you unbox is provably the item you paid for, not a tidier one photographed for the listing and a rougher one in the box. If the number does not match, that is a claim and the payment stays held. Grip, bags and most accessories mostly never carried a number to record in the first place, and the listing says so rather than inventing one.

To be plain about what this is not: we do not run serials against a stolen-property database, ours or anyone else’s. We keep a record of the serials listed and sold here, and that record is what a claim gets decided against. It is not a theft check and we will not describe it as one.

“Will I get scammed?”

Your card is charged at purchase and the money is held. The seller sees that it is held, which is what gets the box shipped, and gets paid when you accept the gear. If you say nothing it releases 48 hours after delivery.

“This is too much money to trust anyone with.”

At $6,000 and up, pay by ACH bank transfer or a pay-over-time option instead of a card. Everything else about the order — the held payment, the inspection window, the insured label — is the same as any other sale.

Your payment is still held the same way as any other order until you accept the gear — nothing about that changes. What changes is how you pay: above $6,000, we don't accept a card, to keep chargeback risk off the largest sales on the site.

“Is the person buying my $3,000 body real?”

The BUYER passes the same government ID check the seller did, whatever the order is worth: a document and a live selfie, held by Stripe. It is asked once and it covers every order afterwards.

This one is for the seller. You are shipping something expensive to a stranger on the strength of a payment we are holding, and the failure that costs you the item is a card that was not the buyer’s. A checked account makes that far harder to do, and far easier to answer if it is claimed. It is not a guarantee, because a bank decides a dispute and we do not. It also does nothing about an item arriving broken or not arriving at all. That is what the held payment and the insured label are for.

“What if it gets lost or shows up broken?”

We buy the label, not the seller, so nobody can quietly skip the insurance. Every shipment is tracked, signature required on delivery, and insured for the full sale price. If a kit ships in more than one box, every box gets its own label and its own tracking, and the clock does not start until the last one lands.

“What if the listing was a lie?”

You have 48 hours from delivery, whatever the order is worth. Open a case inside that and nothing releases: send it back and you get your money, shipping included. A named reviewer picks it up, you get their name in the first reply, and the same person stays on it until it closes. Once it closes, the payment releases to the seller, and there is nothing held for us to give back.

We don't accept a card for a sale this size, to keep chargebacks off the largest orders on the site. The buyer pays by bank transfer or a pay-over-time option instead.