Recently Reddit and other sites have been blowing up with harsh criticisms of the Voyager exchange and equally vigorous claims the exchange is amazing by apparent 'fanboys'. Is Voyager the next great exchange, a scam, or something in between? I don't have all of the answers, but I can share my own experience.
After a recent support issue with Coinbase I decided it was time to expand my on/off ramps with fiat currency to avoid being locked out during a significant market move. I chose Voyager for this purpose and signed up for a new account in mid March. My Voyage on Voyager started off rather well. Signup and KYC were seamless and quick. I was able to attach my bank account and quickly made my first (and only) deposit of a few hundred dollars. Then the first warning signs appeared, I was unable to trade my deposit for 5 days while it was clearing. On other sites I am able to trade immediately even if I can't withdraw the funds for a period of time. I chalked this up to it being a first deposit into a zero balance account and didn't get too concerned. The next week I was able to invest my entire deposit on Ethereum during a dip. I was actually able to purchase at a lower price than the day I deposited so lucky me!
Before I invested serious money into the exchange I wanted to test it thoroughly. My next test was to withdraw my Ethereum and deposit it on KuCoin where I wanted to purchase a coin not offered on Voyager. This is where I hit the rocky shoals. My first two attempts to withdraw were denied. There was no reason given for the denial, but I was told to email [email protected] for more information. I emailed the address and received an automatic reply that you no longer reported issues via email but must submit a support ticket. Minor ding, but I dutifully submitted a support ticket. I then received an email about the ticket with a completely unhelpful canned response. If I had more issues concerning the ticket I should email [email protected]. Indeed an infinite loop of unhelpfulness had started. I still don't know why the withdrawals were denied.
On March 29 I tried again this time using a Coinbase address. My withdrawal quickly changed status to 'pending'. The promised time for review was less than 24 hours. It staying in 'pending' status until April 8 when I received the following email.
In other words Voyager decided to clear their backlog by deleting it! I quickly resubmitted the withdrawal request which at the time of writing has been pending for over 24 hours.
Other than a few bland mass emails from the CEO and the email above, I have had no reply to my support ticket on the pending request. At this point I don't know if I will ever get my crypto back.
The only thing more discouraging than Voyager support is their active fanboy base. Customers who have posted similar stories to mine are rather viciously attacked by Voyager fanboys accusing them of everything from incompetence to flat out lying. It seems that the Voyager community feels that having your crypto locked up for weeks on end without any communication from the exchange is normal and should be expected. I could write an entire post on the condescending and ridiculous claims of these other users and I suspect holders of the Voyager token. To be clear these are not Voyager employees just anonymous internet posters.
So is Voyager a scam? I won't go that far yet since to date the only evidence is that the company is just incredibly poorly run. Is Voyager secure? Fanboys claim the delays are due to Voyagers amazing dedication to security. To me my deposits are only secure if I can access them in a reasonable and timely manner. Right now I don't know if I will ever get my crypto back.
What can Voyager do to win back trust?
1. They can stop taking new deposits until the current deposit and withdrawal queues are cleared. All resources should be focused on current requests. It may not be the truth but from the outside it seems like they are focused on processing deposits and will get to my withdrawal only after they hire and train more employees. I hope they prove me wrong
2. Give daily updates to those with transactions in the queue on how many transactions are ahead of them and an estimated time of completion, even if that time is ugly, at least it would provide some certainty
3. Pay the customer interest on all withdrawals taking more than 24 hours (based on the original request you deleted please) as a show of good faith.
Maybe someday Voyager will improve but as for now I advise staying with land based exchanges.
