i find it a little strange that the person doesn't want to deal face to face.. surely your dad would want to go and check it out in person, adam?
escrow services are like a middle man for larger sales, they take payment for an item from the buyer (for a fee) and hold it until the buyer receives the item and ok's it at which point the money is released to the seller
if they are using the recommended ebay escrow service it should be sweet, but i still don't know why you wouldn't want to get the car checked out?
on a slightly different tangent, this is a bloody funny read related to escrow and scammers http://www.zug.com/pranks/powerbook/