Just when you thought Paypal couldn't get any worse

[YoshiFan1]

I saw this on FW and thought I would post it here, and after reading it, I am really angry that Paypal can do this to someone. I know unfair chargebacks occur from buyers but this seems even worse:

"Today, I got an email stating that Paypal had completed their investigation and that they were going to return the $155.00 back to the buyer.

The story started 4 weeks ago when I got an email from Paypal stating that they were reviewing a transaction and they were holding $155.00 of my funds. They told me that they would hold the money for 5 days. So, I submitted the signature confirmation information and waited. The problem is that the post office failed to get a signature. Here is the S.C. information:

We attempted to deliver your item at 11:24 am on August 07, 2004 in NEW CANEY, TX 77357 and a notice was left. It can be redelivered or picked up at the Post Office. If the item is unclaimed, it will be returned to the sender. No further information is available for this item.

I thought it was weird so I called the buyer (I had their phone number). They told me that they hade not filed a complaint. What had happened is that they had sold some cameras on eBay that they did not have in stock. Well, a bunch of buyers complained about this seller and Paypal started reversing funds to her buyers. She went into the negative and then Paypal started looking for ways to get the money out of sellers she bought things from. Here is the MAIN problem, she bought an item from me in AUGUST but then had problems with her account in SEPTEMBER. Paypal is claiming I received fraudulent funds but truthfully I didn't. The funds she sent me were in AUGUST, about a month before she had any problems. Paypal doesn't care about this information though. She also told me that she did receive the package and had not filed a complaint.

I did a little investigating and I found out some great information:

1) I called her post office to make sure that the PO Box I shipped to was valid. The PO Box was her confirmed address. The PO Box was not registered to anyone. So, Paypal sent me an incorrect confirmed address. The post office also told me that they did not have the package.

2) The package is worth less then $250 hence a signature was not required.

When I spoke with my Paypal rep. he told me that I was stuck in a "triangle". It wasn'tt my fault but I was responsible for the transaction.

How was I suppose to know I was receiving fraudulent funds (I asked him).

Sorry, there's no way to know. So, when you receive a Paypal payment you not only have to be worried about the person who has sent you the money BUT you also have to worry about the people who sent that person money!

Still, today, they claimed that they reversed the money into the buyer's account. The truth is they reversed the money into the buyer's account so that they could then reverse it out of her account and into their pockets."



So basically, I can sell something to a buyer. The buyer can then sell other items on EBay and if they rip off their own buyers, I could be held responsible and lose money because of it?! Ridiculous. I'm starting to think I made the right decision to sell less on EBay and more on Half.com despite the high comission.

[pimp tyranny]

sucks

didn't finish the post though

[jlarlee]

I really really have been thinking of only doing money orders. I have a possible problem with Paypal on the horizon and the more I reserach them the more these kinds of stories pop up. I really hate how the fees go only to the seller when a more sensible and fair way would be to split the fees between the buyer and seller. The way their system works they make it so easy for the buyer to screw the seller

[GF_Eric]

Half.com - It's the shiznit.

[Arakias]

Half.com is owned by ebay, but yes paying less in fees is good. Paypal is also owned by eBay. Too bad those are the big auction/resell/internet payment sites.

[judyjudyjudy]

Half.com is owned by ebay, but yes paying less in fees is good. Paypal is also owned by eBay. Too bad those are the big auction/resell/internet payment sites.

You don't really pay less fees when Half.com takes a lot more of the cut (15%, right?). Whether or not that's better than not dealing with Paypal depends on how the eBay folks deal with chargebacks and other types of fraud on Half.com. (The only time I dealt with something like that was asking for a refund for an item I never got, and they were good about that.)

[wubb]

eBay/PayPal can't stay on top forever. (Can they?)

Remember 5 or 6 years ago when AltaVista.com was the premiere search engine?

[jlarlee]

eBay/PayPal can't stay on top forever. (Can they?)

Remember 5 or 6 years ago when AltaVista.com was the premiere search engine?

If paypal pisses off enough sellers maybe we will all leave them than Paypal would be pretty useless. With the way they work things they are really setting themselves for a lawsuit

[RAMSTORIA]

paypal is going down, thats all there is too it... even though ive never had a problem with them, WAY to many people have and i know of at least one class action suit in court against them right now

[Unassuming Local Guy]

I have to wonder how many of these stories are true. I've never had a problem with PayPal and I've been using the service for four plus years now.

[thesilentshadow30]

Paypal was so much better before it was bought by Ebay

[nasum]

eBay/PayPal can't stay on top forever. (Can they?)

Remember 5 or 6 years ago when AltaVista.com was the premiere search engine?

If paypal pisses off enough sellers maybe we will all leave them than Paypal would be pretty useless. With the way they work things they are really setting themselves for a lawsuit

There is a classaction suit against Paypal as we speak. The rumor is that everyone who signed up more than three years ago is going to get some kind of kickback as long as you can prove that paypal caused you to lose a transaction in some way.

[thatstoobad]

i had a problem recently with paypal where they sent me the wrong confirmed address. it turns out that the buyer had (supposedly) changed his address, but in the email paypal sent me (as well as in the transaction details in my account) had his old mailing address. unfortunately, the buyer didn't realize this until a few days after i mailed his item. he filed a claim with paypal, and even though i used delivery confirmation, i was sure that i was going to get a charge back, even though it was obviously not my fault. luckily, i ended up having the game returned to me, which resulted in the buyer cancelling his claim, i mailed it to his new address, and everything ended up working out ok, but for a while i thought i was going to be out $50.

i know my story is different from the one posted, but it still shows the absurdity of paypal, and how it passes fault to those who do not deserve it.

[Dead of Knight]

This is why I refuse to use Paypal on my auctions. I use it to buy things from people, but I will not use it on my auctions.

[Strell]

Currently having a similar situation with eBay.

One day I got a notice that my account was banned. Completely out of the blue. I e-mailed eBay's dispute regultion offices and found out that another account has had several negatives/neutrals posted against him. He also didn't pay fees to eBay, so they banned him. The kicker is that he was my little sister's ex boyfriend, and somehow, some of his information in his profile (like a phone number or something) is "linked" with mine. Now when they were dating, he used to come over a lot, and always sold things on eBay. So chances are he used some sort of info that was the same as mine.

They won't even tell me WHAT is linked. They can't say "it's the address." They say it's too personal, private information. This is after me AND him have BOTH e-mailed them asking over and over on how to fix the issue. It's shaq-fuing ridiculous on about a million levels.

Anyway, I got banned because he got banned. I have 69 flawless trades, 100% positive feedback, etc. I have e-mailed them repeatedly and been told that I must resolve the 12 complaints on HIS account before MINE can get reinstated. I've contacted him and he was told that he needed to pay off fees. He's since done that but STILL he remains banned. One rep from eBay says one thing, another says something else, etc. It's spiraled out of control to the point where I can no longer functionally use eBay.

eBay and Paypal are great ideas ONLY when they work. But they are staffed by idiots and regulated by shitty rules, and they can do anything in their power to ban you without remorse. eBay makes millions, if not billions, per year. They can stand to lose a user or two. Same with Paypal.

I'm waiting for the day when both of them get sued to hell and back, barring the current class action lawsuit.

BTW, if anyone has any information or knows of a way I could solve my eBay woes, PLEASE let me know. A PM would be nice if anyone can help.

[Rodego]

That is a pretty crappy situation. I think the law is though that any transaction that is known to have been made with fraudulent funds is no longer valid. I could be wrong about it, but I think that is it. It doesn't seem fair to me, but technically PayPal would be correct in some ways, but the way they went about things seems shady.

[Serialkilla]

Paypal and ebay have gotten way out of control. I still use ebay, but fuck Paypal, I have only accepted check or MO's for payment for some time now due to their fees and shoddy treatment of members.

[buddy the puppy]

Yeah only take money order and checks. screw paypal, only the seller pays fees and if you get some nut buyer all he has to do is file a claim against you saying he never got his stuff and YOU get screwed EVEN IF you really sent him his item.

ebay and paypal are an evil corporate giant that will crumble in scandal!! :twisted:

[garoehr2]

I have to wonder how many of these stories are true. I've never had a problem with PayPal and I've been using the service for four plus years now.

I'd never had a problem with Paypal either until about 3 weeks ago. The same thing that happened to the original poster, happened to me. The pulled funds that they said were fraudulent and kept them.

I had sold to a person, sent and it was received. The person left positive feedback for me on the item with the item number listed in the transaction history for the payment.

Since I did not use a tracking number (my mistake) and did not buy the seller's protection...they took the money from my account. I immediately complained, got a bunch of crap back from them and then I closed my accounts to make sure that they can't take more money from them.

I'm still afraid that they might try to get money from my bank account or credit card, but I hope that it doesn't get that far.

My recommendation....get all the money you can from your account and get out now. I only lost $35, but the original poster lost $155. The guy at the card shop here in town lost $300+ from Paypal for the same thing. The writing is on the wall. All cheap ass gamers should go now. Tell everyone you know too. They won't get better unless we hit them where it hurts, in the pocket book.

My 2.3 cents.

[humidore]

Yeah I got that email from Paypal about the class action lawsuit. I researched it, and seemed legit (I was real scepticle about it at first). I checked and it seemed I was apart of the group they were saying was affected by some mishandling. I sent the paper, so we'll see...

It seems shoddy though, cause they're all, "theres $xxxxxx that could be won, and will be divided among the members of the people who agree to send the paper", but what if it's lost? I don't want to be on these guys' bad side...

[wubb]

Those class action suits generally make millions for the lawyers and the thousands+ of defendants end up with something like a coupon for a free rental at Best Buy.

[cyberlian]

I think if there were good alternatives to ebay and paypal that many sellers would go with the alternative route. Ubid.com sucks, there aren't many yahoo or amazon auctions, overstock looks like the best, but I've never used it. As for paypal, I hate the way they basicly force sellers into a premier account where they take money from you everytime you are sent money, but money orders take forever and cost money themselves, i've got screwed with bidpay.com before... etc... I wish some ligit contenders to the ebay/paypal monopoly would surface, I think a lot of people would try them out...

[Indiana]

Have you contacted the Better Business Bureau. You should because PayPal and Ebay are out of control.

[Mookyjooky]

Half.com - It's the shiznit.

And owned by eBay.

[dtcarson]

Sigh....
Not a shill or anything, but ebay/paypal are the biggest because they're good at what they do. Not perfect, of course.
There's Yahoo auctions, Overstock, Amazon marketplace, hell, your local newspaper or *.forsale newsgroup on Usenet.
You can get screwed using any of those sources.
I don't begrudge Paypal or Ebay or Half.com or Amazon at all for charging fees. If you don't like the fees, which are QUITE reasonable [place an ad in your local paper to see. Now add a picture. Now make it reach half the internet. Ebay's a bargain], then don't use them.
Paypal's fees are also quite fair--a small flat fee, plus a small percentage, for the ability to take credit cards. You do know that Best Buy and Walmart have to pay Visa and Mastercard a fee to accept those cards? It's not free. For me to be able to take a credit card, as needed, for 50 cents or 1.00, is quite an opportunity small businesses didn't have just ten years ago.
I of course support competition, and should a worthy contender come up, I'll try them, but I am getting sick of all the hate against Ebay and Paypal. Now, hate against some of the ebay/paypal *scammers*, I can deal with that.

Now, if you don't like some of their policies, fine, but to hate them for 'ridiculous fees' which are quite competitive and offer you a lot for their fees, is just whining. There's a difference between being a cheapass and being a cheap SOB.

Class action lawsuits ultimately benefit only the lawyers, and end up harming the consumer. First, most plaintiffs gets either a pittance, or a stupid coupon or something [which means the company either gave away something that'll never be used, or have you purchasing something from them again *anyway*]; and of course those court costs and judgements have to be paid for by someone--who pays them, does the CEO take a 5million dollar pay cut? No. Raises aren't as big next time, they hire 9 instead of 10 people, or prices go up/service goes down.

Half.com's commission is 15% on most items less than 50 bucks. I've had stuff listed for years, and sometimes it sells [you only pay when it sells.] 15% is worth it to me.

Splitting the fees with the buyer is silly. You're making your item more attractive to the buyer, by allowing him to use multiple methods of payment. To charge him directly for that is an insult. Any auction that says 'Please add 2% to cover my Paypal fees', I don't bid on. If I go to a store and use a credit card, and they charge me to use a credit card, I'm not going there again. [even apart from the fact that that violates the credit card agreement the vendor signed.] Whatever fees it costs him to run his business, should be taken into account in his pricing structure. They don't-and shouldn't-charge me a .15 electricity fee for running the register on my transaction, or a .10 cent vacuuming fee for bringing in some dirt on my feet.

[Santurio]

Well said DTcarson!!

I am fairly new to the ebay/paypal scene but am very sceptical about selling anything, so I don't.
I do use Paypal to buy stuff but that is about it.