PayPal put my account in restricted mode. A couple days later, they locked my account. I tried several times to contact them, it took a week or more for them to responded to me. They don't give me more details why my account was locked. That's bad. If there's a complaint from buyer, they should let me know who, how, why...

They took my $2000! Anyone has a similar experience?

:angry:

Sounds like people were sending you money from stolen credit cards. I've heard stories like this before and when Paypal locks accounts like this it has always been because of stolen credit cards. Based on other stories, it also sounds like they look through your transacation record before locking an account; if you've only received on payment and it came from a stolen credit card, they'll probably assume that your account is just a fake account created for the purpose of money laundering (yes, that is a major problem they have).

If I were you I'd keep asking for details and wait; sometimes it takes them a month to work stuff out but they do work things out eventually.

Yes, that's what I was thinking - someone using stolen credit card. I tried to ask them if it's what I think. If that's it, please let me know. So, I can contact that customer buying from me. I repeated my questions again and again to them and they still use the email template in responding to me and ignoring what I've asked. To unlock my account, I have to fax them a copy of driver license, latest bank statement, and a copy of their email to me. So, I faxed them. The problem is that the address in the bank statement is not the same as the one I gave them a year ago. They said it's invalid and want to get the same (old) address. When I explained they didn't listen and kept sending the old instruction again and again. Each email took them from 3 days to 2 weeks to respond.

I suspected that they are cheating people on this. If you run into the problem like me, you will look for the physical address of the company. I did! I couldn't find it. There's no address, map, or anything on their web site. I called them about this matter and the rep who picked up the call said I have to email appeal@paypal.com sir.... I can't help you on this.

I wondered what's the reason they have the phone number for. Maybe the phone is used to answer questions of someone who's not yet a member - someone who's not yet in the trap. Be very careful when using PalPal.

If there's someone here experienced the same problem and did some legal actions, please please drop a message here. I want to do something to get my money back.

Originally posted by baba101
, I have to fax them a copy of driver license, latest bank statement, and a copy of their email to me. So, I faxed them. The problem is that the address in the bank statement is not the same as the one I gave them a year ago.

Try faxing them both your latest bank statement and one from last year with your former address. Generally speaking Paypal is quite reasonable, but they have to be absolutely certain that they're only dealing with fraud from one side of the transaction and not both.

With the FBI breathing down their neck over money laundering, you can't really blame them. ;)

And that's why I caution against using PP for your importanting billing and collections.

With a regular CC a dispute is just a dispute. But with PP you whole account is locked.

If you are a business customer and you have the funds autosweep turned on, then at the worst, you are only looking at having to wait for at most 1 day's reciepts.

Obviously, not ideal, but still, you just shouldn't leave money sitting in the account. You can earn better interest in a Money Market checking in most cases.

Brian

Originally posted by baba101
If you run into the problem like me, you will look for the physical address of the company. I did! I couldn't find it. There's no address, map, or anything on their web site. I called them about this matter and the rep who picked up the call said I have to email appeal@paypal.com sir.... I can't help you on this.


Here.......try this:

Registrant:
Confinity, Inc (PAYPAL2-DOM)
394 University Ave.
Palo Alto, CA 94301
US

Domain Name: PAYPAL.COM

Administrative Contact, Technical Contact, Billing Contact:
NetMeridian Software, Inc
100 Trade Centre Drive, Suite 302
Champaign, IL 61820
217-239-2359 (FAX) 217-352-7139

If they really have $2000 or more, it's worth the cost for you to have your attorney write a very sharply written letter threatening a lawsuit against them. I have never had a situation where we involved our attorney where a company failed to respond within a matter of hours of when the attorney sent the letter (he usually faxes the letter with a followup via FedEx First Priority Overnight).

We had a situation with our merchant bank where they held up some funds (a lot more than $2000), and I spent 4 days getting nothing but the run-around, until I called my lawyer in on it. I had the full amount in our checking account 6 hours later.

Definitely, for the $300 or $400 it'll cost to get your lawyer involved, do it. When there's that much money involved and you did nothing wrong, it's definitely warranted.

Good luck,

Jason

Hi,

Another user of this forum directed me here. I would like to offer my assistance and I invite you to contact me at my email address (in my profile).

Account restrictions are rare items, but they can be cleared with the proper documentation requested. I would also invite users to review the terms of use about account restrictions and why they occur. They are rarely, if ever, restricted over a single transaction (we use the Seller Protection Program to avoid restricting accounts over transaction---details are on the site).

Thank you for your patience. I also apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.

hey cool...
welcome to WHT Damon :)

Thanks! I hit several large forums daily and I come to others when users alert me to a potential issue.

I am more than happy to assist in answering questions (users can send me an email and check the IP if they really want to check on who I am).

Honestly, I will NEVER EVER use Paypal again, here's why...

I signed up for them long long ago when they first started business. I was using them for ebay payments for items I was selling back when they were almost totally free.

When I signed up, there was absolutely nothing in their TOS that stated that a buyer couldn't pay for an item using multiple transactions. They limited a new user then to $500 per account. If I sold an item on ebay for say, $700, usually the bidder just opened two accounts, paid $500 from the one and the balance of $200 from the other. I did this several times with not a problem...until....

October 2000. Someone won an auction for an item that was 735.00. The winner bidder wanted to pay via paypal. I instructed them to open two accounts, pay with one for $500, the other for $235. All was good. I shipped the product, received payment from paypal. Then....

About 3 weeks later I got a nasty gram from paypal stating that they were investigating my account for fradulant (sp?) activity. So, they request details of the above transaction, which I provided. Mind you, they never made an attempt to contact the buyer.

About a week later, someone from paypal called me asking me about the transaction. I told them everything that happened. Then they inform me that I violated their TOS agreement. I say, "Hold on, wait a minute, that wasn't part of my agreement a year and a half ago." He said, "We changed it back in August 2000, and your original TOS said that we could change it without notice." To make a long story short, they debited my paypal account for the entire $735!!!!! End of story...the guy was a total jerk, wouldn't hear anything else, said I violated their modified TOS.

So, I had two problems #1, they never EVER notified me of the change of TOS, and #2, the winning bidder stuck me for $735...they never responded to my request for payment, and I really didn't have a legal leg to stand on.

So, guess what?? I still owe Paypal 735.00. They can sue me for all I care. I'll never EVER do business with them again.

Originally posted by bteeter
If you are a business customer and you have the funds autosweep turned on, then at the worst, you are only looking at having to wait for at most 1 day's reciepts.

Obviously, not ideal, but still, you just shouldn't leave money sitting in the account. You can earn better interest in a Money Market checking in most cases.

Brian

And you pay a fee for SWEEP too. :(

The auto-sweep fee is an optional service for users and they don't need to use it if they don't want. Basically it prevents users from logging in to request withdrawals to their checking account every time they get a payment.

There are no fees if the user does it manually and the option can be changed under your account Profile.

The program you are mentioning was actually put in place to protect sellers from charge backs. Receiving multiple payments from the same or different party is a solid fraud indicator and the items were probably charged back.

I can cover the program in detail for you and advise of the benefits of using it. Charge backs are a fact of life when accepting credit card payments, but you are liable for them. You can eliminate liability for them through our Seller Protection Program (that the representative was mentioning).

I would also recommend staying up-to-date with changes in the service under the WHAT'S NEW section on the web site.

Thanks for your comments.

Were all of you verified sellers? You should be, that way, they can just debit the amount of the chargeback from your account.

paypaldamon:

Could you please Private Message me your email address? I have a problem with my account, and I want to send you an email via my email program, not this web form, so I have a record of it.

Thanks!

Originally posted by Micky
paypaldamon:

Could you please Private Message me your email address? I have a problem with my account, and I want to send you an email via my email program, not this web form, so I have a record of it.

Thanks!

You can just click on the mail link below his post and shoot him an email rather that waiting for him to private message you.

Thanks Marty, but would I have a record of sending it this way? Does the form send me a confirmation verifying that I sent the email?

Thanks

Actually no, but you could send one through the form asking him/her to email you back so that you can discuss the issue. He may get that sooner than he may check this forum. I can see that you are obviously frustrated with something, so I was just trying to help you get a quicker answer.

Thanks Marty...I appreciate the help.

Yup, I am frustrated alright. Hopefully it will be straightened out soon.

I just sent him an email using the form asking him for his email address as well.

Thanks again for the help Marty. :)

Well in the spirit of this thread and the new ROE for WHT, I have attempted to contact 'paypaldamon' using the email/PM function here.... but it appears that he will not respond unless taken to task publicly...

The fact that PayPal has experienced a high growth rate is no excuse for screwing with peoples credibility.

you know, I'm not sure if paypaldamon works on weekends... maybe you should wait until Monday before expecting an answer?

I actually do not work on the weekends, but I do spot-check at times.

I will actually be on vacation until after the Memorial Day weekend beginning tomorrow.

Please feel free to contact me before that time.

Regards,
Damon
PayPal Consumer Relations

Hi

They closed my account without any reason telling that they do not support my country.

After I wrote them I received a very very rude reply from their customer support.

Regards,
mac:angry:

Originally posted by sarmadys
They closed my account without any reason telling that they do not support my country.

After I wrote them I received a very very rude reply from their customer support.


I don't know about you, but when I first tried to sign up (from Canada) I had to select my country from a list and then I was told that I couldn't sign up because I wasn't in the US. Unless they've changed that you couldn't have created an account without misrepresenting yourself if you're not in one of the prescribed countries... in which case I'd say they were quite justified in terminating your account.

PayPal is a joke. They've sent me a notice about a complaint that an item was never recieved. So I sent them a reply with the tracking number that showed the item was delievered to the verified address. Then I get another email saying that I never replied. I wish they would hire some third graders, they would probably do a better job than the imcompetent people who work there currently.

I also tried to send a message through their webform, and got a message back saying to use their complaint-response system... already tried that twice.

I would not trust PayPal for any transaction. They will screw you sooner or later.

A reseller of mine had a person pay them via PayPal then two days later this user was caught by me running a program that tried to get the root pass. I suspended the account and killed the process. Well this person went and had PayPal take the money back. So we now we are thinking about refuseing to accept any payments via PayPal since they support crooks and hackers.

Considering all the posts above, I wouldnt dare to touch paypal with a pole.

i was considering using it to let our customers pay for things, but i think ill have to get a merchant account.

No one deserves an automated messages when they email a query.

I can revisit your issue with the Seller Protection team if you would like to send me the information, but tracking is only one part of the Seller Protection Program.

Were all of these rules followed?

What is the Seller Protection Policy?

Starting August 23, 2000, sellers will not be held liable for chargebacks due to fraud (including payments made with stolen credit cards and false claims of non-shipment) when they follow the rules of our Seller Protection Policy:

The seller has a Verified U.S. Business or Premier Account.
The seller ships to the buyer's Confirmed Address.
The seller can provide reasonable proof-of-shipment which can be tracked online. This document must show that you shipped to the buyer's Confirmed Address.
The seller accepted a single payment from one PayPal account for a purchase.
The seller shipped to a domestic (U.S.) buyer at a U.S. address.

If you are talking to me it was a service.(web hosting)

The post was directed at someone else, but I did note (from another post) that you were claiming that a PayPal member attempted to hack you? This would not be an issue we would have control over.

No they paid for web hosting from a reseller of mine then they hacked the server and when their account was closed they had PayPal refund the money. That is just like PayPal helped them in the crime.