PayPal Is Not Your Buddy Feedback

Not more than a couple of days after posting my piece on PayPal, I heard back from them two fold. Not because of the issue itself I don’t think, but more than likely because of the previous article.

How do I know? Simple. Because when they emailed and called me, they used all the contact info from my blog which is linked to all of my articles - not the info that is on record with my PayPal account.

To be honest, if I had wanted to contact them again, I would have had plenty of options should the need felt like it would have actually resolved anything. But enough of that, let’s get your thoughts. Hey PayPal, here is some of that feedback you were interested in discussing…

Keith writes:

A few years ago I had two fraudulent transactions pretty much drain all of the money out of my bank account, so I filed two fraud claims. The first was resolved to my satisfaction, but the second they only recovered 80 cents out of the 1000 that was taken from my account. I argued with pretty much every member of thier support team, was unable to speak to a manager, and finally ended up going to my bank to get my money back. And they still are chasing me for the $1000 even though thier argument is with my bank now, not with me.

Dom writes:

Matt
I totally agree. In fact, I would go further and say that PAYPAL are nothing but a bunch of crooks.
I hd my account ripped off for £815 in 2 transactions. Same day for both, same PAYPAL user, from a german IP address (I live in the UK) and still, despite all this, PAYPAL insist the transactions were not fraudulent. Idiots! I honestly think the entire workforce at PAYPAL could not manage a combined IQ that makes 2 digits. My advice? Do not use PAYPAL for anything. Find an alternative, even if it costs a little more. Believe me, PAYPAL are the new world criminals.

Neil writes: (and has a good point about me)

Matt;

You said: \”…Sure, there are plenty of other services - however, no one is using them.\”

How about listing them — better, yet; how about a review and ranking.

Richard writes:

My biggest PayPal gripe is not a tale of woe but of structure. PayPal makes interfaces available to merchants and to third-party checkou systems such that you login to a form generated by a transaction and will then be presented with a PayPal PAY-THIS-BILL form. I would never login to a financial account except by manually typing the expected URL into a new browser window, as is generally accepted good security practice.

I would never put my PayPal password onto a form sent to me by an eBay seller or by a third party unknown to me! This, however, is not only what PayPal is facilitating, but now requiring, making it impossible for the average user to know just where the password is going and whether it is being copied and retained. For example, Circuit City returns are sold on eBay as Trading Circuit, which requires use of the kyozou checkout system, a third party firm unknown to me. I spend a week corresponding with Trading Circuit about my refusal to enter my PayPal password onto a form from kyozou, as they demanded since they supplied no payee email address.

Finally they gave me an address to use to send money by PayPal in the ordinary way, after I logged in directly to PayPal. First I completed the required kyozou form up till the PayPal login, and then tried to pay the directly using the address they supplied. I was fine in PayPal till the last step, confirming the transaction. At that point PayPal itself refused the transaction with their own error message that this vendor requires use of their own payment system!!! This is a recipe for disaster and is nearly tantamount to advising users to blithely just enter your PayPal password on whatever email one might receive - which is where most of their interfaced links are provided. I’m willing to put up with some risk and annoyance using PayPal, but not with a system that actually requires me to enter my PayPal password, in effect a bank account pasword, on links helpfully provided in email from unknown eBay sellers or supposed third-party firms.

Even if one suspected no intentional nonsense this makes tracking very difficult and opens any number of additional points for hacking and error. PayPal has not addressed my inquiries on this matter.

Julian writes:

You asked to hear from anyone who had experienced problems with PayPal, so I am wiring to let you know what a PATHETIC organisation they are, not only in the US, but here in Australia as well. I bought a product through ebay from “how torepairclocks.com“, who promptly debited my Visa card, but never supplied the goods, or replied to my emails. After 2 weeks of getting nowhere I contacted PayPal for help. Each email I sent them seemed to be handled by a different person and there was no continuity. I would continually receive flowery computer generated replies which didn’t help my situation.

They suggested I ring Nabraska. (Great idea - reverse charges?) After 11 emails I discovered PayPal had an office in Sydney (1000km from where I live) so I rang them (STD) and explained the situation. They promised to get back to me with an answer within 24 hours - nothing heard. A few days later I received an email from PayPal in the US to say my case could not proceed as “it has now gone over 45 days since I made the purchase”. The delay was caused solely by PayPal’s incompetence! I too experienced being put on hold for many minutes and being cut off when I originally rang their Sydney office. The good news is that the world goes on without PayPal - Eventually I contacted the Bank which my Visa Card is with and their disputes section had my refund back within 1 week.

Jeff has another view and writes:

I have been using PayPal for several years now. They rock. I am completely satisfied with their services. I have two instances where I needed their intervention when no product arrived and they were totally helpful. GO PAYPAL!!!

Patrick writes:

I have been buying and selling on ebay since 1997, and have used Paypal since around 1998. I have no major issues with Paypal. The service is a typical web based enterprise, so don’t expect any warm response via telephone.

Wayne nails it on the head and writes:

Matt, If you check out the anti-phishing sites (like castlecops) you will see that Paypal is one of the most popular target for phishing crooks. The reasoning seems to be that Paypal does nothing about the phishing crooks, and totally turns a blind eye to individual Paypal users being ripped off. So why not , when there is no risk to the crook and Paypal is totally uncaring.

Steven writes:

I once made the mistake of using my checking account with PayPal back in 2004, in order to buy a refurbished monitor online. The company in question would not accept payment through credit card, so never having done anything like this before I went blindly into the deep deep deep shark infested waters.
First everything went along just great, no glitches in setting up the account, no worries.
Then I recieved the refurbished monitor in a box, on my door step , and the side of the box was visibly damaged, when i took the monitor out of the box the bevel on the right was cracked and broken, and when I plugged in the monitor to see if it would work at all the bevel vibrated with an irritating hum. So I call up Paypal to explain the problem, they tell me to work it out with the vendor, the vendor tells me to work it out with the shipper, and round and round we go.
I ask PayPal to put a hold on the payment, the customer rep agrees, and so I call the vendor once again to let them know about the hold I put on the payment from PayPal, and then vendor rep says they will work with the shipping company etc etc and so everybody is making nice.

Then I am informed that one of my automatic withdrawls for my mortgage causes a withdrawl from my savings account, and I start investigating that. Needless to say that PayPal and not just withdrawn the money from my checking account not once but twice, so in a furious rush i call a PayPal rep again , and again everything is supposed to be worked out. Then I check 2 days later and PayPal has Made another Withdrawl of the same amount for the Monitor again from my account.

I am furious now, and tke the day off from work, go into the bank and talk to the Bank Maanger, who looks over the records, and expresses due remorse, but can do nothing since I have authorized PayPal , to remove the money, even though I thought I authorized only a single withdrawl.

I shut down all my accounts, and transfer funds, Go through all the hurt and pain of transferring my automatic Withdrawls over the next 2 months, and never hear from PayPal, again, the vendor or the shipping company.

2 Months later I recieve a non descript letter from the company I bought the refurbished monitor with a check for twice the amount I paid for the refurbished monitor, explaining that the company had been paid 3 times for the same monitor.
This letter came from the honest people at the company not from PayPal, not from e-Bay, not from my Bank

To this day I have never used PayPal ever again. If a company will not accepet a credit card, I don’t do business with them.
Never ever again will I ever give any company that is not regulated access to my checking account, never ever will I use a banking system with autoPay, never ever will I ever use any online process that has any legal or semi-legal access my checking or savings account ever.

James points out and has a good point, too:

Your first paragraph states you were “explaining in a calm, rational way”. Well, maybe you were. Maybe the one you were talking to was having a bad day. Maybe you were having a bad day.

Either way, you have used your soapbox to abuse them — not smart, not wise to ignore consequences.

Let me offer the three following thoughts (which I have picked up over the years, and only the 2nd of which I am able to attribute):

1. Before we open our mouths to speak, we should make our words pass through three gates: Is it true, is it kind, and is it necessary?

2. You should view the world as a conspiracy run by a very closely-knit group of nearly omnipotent people, and you should think of those people as yourself and your friends.

3. Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

Maybe in the past you have not been worthy in the use of your soapbox, but you can change the future in that regard. You might also ask someone how you sound before you send your diatribes out the door.

Reed writes:

Well, Matt, this time you and I agree on something. I responded to your eBay article a couple weeks back with my dissatisfaction with your views in reference to eBay sellers. Today I have to share my own disgust with that necessary evil that is known as “PayPal”.

I do agree that if there were another solution I would be happy to use it. PayPal makes it hard to do business with a lot of people because of their policies. eBay has made it all but impossible to accept any on-line payments from any other company and has driven several out of business. Western Union is one of them - in fact, if you offer to accept Western Union moneygrams, eBay will not let you post your auction. I can understand they want to protect their users from those indiscriminate leeches that fool them into sending a large sum of money via wire for an item that is non-existent or not as described, but for us discriminating sellers who stand behind our products and have a strong track record, it is way too much like babysitting and running our business for us. But, I digress, and I could rant on about this for hours.

PayPal has something called the “Seller Protection Policy” that states you must ship an item to a confimred address and use delivery tracking to be covered by their policy. So, knowing this, a seller is not covered by the policy when shipping an item to an overseas destination. PayPal says it covers the seller for UK and Canada, but I have never seen a “confirmed address” on any foreign payment, so I have stopped accepting them. In fact, if ANY user does not have a confirmed address in PayPal, they are blocked from sending me payment in that manner. Just to clarify, a “confirmed address” is the address that has been confirmed by your credit card company - generally the billing address of the credit card associated with the buyer’s PayPal account.

Before I was smart enough to protect myself by setting my PayPal account up this way, a few of my transactions were “charged back” by the buyers. Since I could not prove (either by delivery tracking or the item was sent to a non-confirmed address) where I sent the item, PayPal refunded the charge to the credit card company and levied a $20 processing fee on my PayPal account. Since the buyer still had the item, I never saw that again, either. Of course, PayPal said they would appeal the charge back, but for the time being I was out the payment, $20 and whatever item I sent. Twice this was a significant amount, a couple other times it amounted to about $40. PayPal’s stance on this was that most sellers take this chance and chalk up any losses to “the cost for doing business”. Well, I don’t do that much business as it is more a hobby than my job, so these instances put a dent in my profit margin, so to speak.

My foreign customers have a hard time understanding why I refuse to take PayPal payments for their purchases, and since there is a language barrier at times, they fail to realize the the blinking “I DO NOT ACCEPT PAYPAL FOR NON-US TRANSACTIONS” means they cannot pay that way. So there is a delay in getting their item, where for many other transactions they were used to the ease and convenience PayPal offers. Those transactions, if they were from US sellers, were not covered and the sellers may have unknowingly taken a chance.

It is true that PayPal is the most convenient way of accepting credit card payments for people that are not set up to take them locally. The ease of use and instantaneous transaction makes it a “killer app” as far as many are concerned, but PayPal needs to improve so it can be used safely worldwide. Also, they must pay closer attention to their customers by making their policies easier to find and understand.

On PayPal’s behalf, though, it is extremely hard to please all the people all the time. I still firmly believe that the onus is on the end-user. They should completely understand what they are doing when doing business over the Internet. This includes buying things, selling things and corresponding with customers and providers. The person who complains that PayPal screwed them when they clicked on a spoof or phishing message and gave their password away is not only misinformed, but doomed to failure. Had they realized the pitfalls and risks prior to transacting business on-line, this could have been avoided, as I could have avoided my own charge back issues by reading and understanding the Seller Protection Policy.

Anyway, thanks for listening.

Jerry writes:

I too have had an issue with Paypal. I tried to pay for an ebay item but they intervened saying they identified the transaction as a potential fraud. Mind you this was not some casual purchase but a legitimate business purchase of equipment for my personally owned business. Long story made short, I apologized profusely to my seller and we made other arrangements for the payment. I got my merchandise and have never had a regret. It should ultimately be my choice to proceed with a purchase regardless of whether or not “big brother” believes it is fraudulent. Now I appreciate their warning, but again, it should be up to me not them. Just my two cents. Keep up the awesome work and thanks for all of the advice. It encourages me to try new stuff and keeps me sharp. I will submit a linux question to you soon once I figure out how to do it.

Chuck writes:

My horror story turned out fine.

I have been using PayPal for quite a few years and have never had a problem until last week. Someone hacked our password and made about $800 worth of unauthorized purchases.

Of course I got the email receipts and started calling the vendors to let them know that the purchases were not authorized. When I logged in to PayPal, I found that PayPal had already stopped the transactions because they looked suspicious and they were able to clear everything up within a couple of hours.

I should have gone straight to PayPal in the beginning because they contact the vendors and take care of everything.