For the past week I have been dealing with propay not responding to my questions and even though they have live chat the people who answers basically says I have to wait for other departments to get back to me. I have sent emails and made phone calls with no response.

My problem is they froze my account to verify some transactions I have. I don’t have a problem with that because just like us in the web hosting community we want to make sure we’re not processing fraud. I have sent the resolutions department (where the say to ask questions to) several messages with no response. From what I can understand about their TOS (not written for the non attorney) I will be able to process credit cards but I will not be able to withdraw the money processed until they un freeze the account. I can live with them holding the money but I don’t want to pay for a customers domain and register it if they don’t have enough money on their card or something else is wrong with it.

Has anyone else had problems with propay out there?

I have had several chat sessions with their customer service and they basic act like they are helpless people and all they can do is forward the message to the other department. Even the CEO, CTO, and everyone else has not answered their messages.

While I don't know what the exact problem is on this issue with ProPay and your particular account, the issue wouldn't be related to the cardholder not having enough money on their card.

When a credit card transaction is processed and authorized - the amount of credit for the sale is automatically withdrawn on a temporary basis from the cardholder's line of credit. Once the transaction is "settled", this amount of money is then actually deducted permanently and cleared through the MasterCard/Visa networks.

So the issue that ProPay could have might be that they suspect: (a) fraud on the part of the purchaser, (b) the transaction amount or specifics have made them somehow nervous, or (c) suspected fraud on the part of the merchant. Those would be the typical reasons why an account would be frozen.

Also, when an acquirer or third party processor indicates that an account is frozen or on hold but tells you that you can still accept sales - generally that means that 100% of your ongoing sales will also be held on the risk issue is resolved. However, the handling of this does vary so the best thing is to get something in writing from them (if possible) as to their specific intent.

I understand everything you stated. My problem with propay right now is no one is responding. Thier customer service people say I have to speak to mr email address but no one response when I do.

As I told them in my email I don't care if they have to hold the money I process right now I need to know if my customer's card is not maxed.

Here is an updated. Propay closed my account for too many international credit card transactions. They are not good for hosting companies.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

International transactions are a much higher risk. Your funds have been
moved into a reserve account and will remain there for 6 months to
cover any
chargebacks that may occur. After that time, we will release any
remaining
funds (after chargebacks and/or chargeback fees) to you and allow you
to
withdraw them. I have pasted an excerpt from our user agreement below.
You
can access our user agreement at http://www.propay.com/agreement.html


Excerpt from ProPay user Agreement:



"g. High Risk Transactions. Your presentation to ProPay of high risk

transactions may result in one or more of the following: (a)
suspension of

your processing privileges; (b) creation of a reserve account in
accordance

with this Agreement; (c) ProPay exercising its security interest as
defined

in this Agreement; (d) closing of your account in accordance with this

Agreement. Higher risk transactions include, but are not limited to,
adult

material, or access to it, jewelry sales, and gaming or gambling

transactions."


Further, we have terminated your ability to process credit cards
through our
system because of the high risk, International transactions.




Best Regards,


Resolutions Department

ProPay

this is ridiculous.

You tell me, It took them over a week to tell me this. I had to hurry up and find a new company cause I had a bad feeling about them after the 2nd day.

If you are a non-us citizen, i recommend getting paysystems.

If you are US citizen, you can check out cdgcommerce or e-dataonline

I need something that is compatible with modernbill

Modernbill supports a lot of payment gateways other than paypro: http://www.modernbill.com/features/?type=modules

I will admin that their customer service was very poor. It should not take you more than a couple of hours to know why a company is holding your funds.

Well, they are saying, I can't get my money for 6 months. The funny thing I think is I only had the account for less then 3 months. I don't like the fact that they took my $35 registration and is currently holding all my money. They have thier TOS setup so that you can't do any business outside the US with out penalty. They should not be an online credit card processor.

If they have that in their TOS - they should also fix their gateway not to accept CCs outside the US. Sounds almost like a scam - unless you read those TOS. (I know I usually don't :) ) But that is a good thing to keep in mind.

Believe it or not, there are even some merchant account providers that don't allow foreign card transactions. In fact, there is a pretty large processor that has such a policy.

Most true merchant accounts will allow you to process foreign sales and the only time there is an issue is if you are going to process nearly 100% of all sales as foreign cards.

The reason is that the fraud rates and risk is literally about 10X greater on an int'l sale than on a U.S. sale and there have been huge losses to acquirers on those types of transactions.

So this is another good question to ask of any prospective merchant processor (or even 3rd party processor) when you are looking for such an account.

I have used propay for several years and do not have problems with them. I process international transactions and have found them easier to use than paypal; specifically for international transactions . They do have limits on the transaction amounts but they have never put a hold on my transactions.

They said it was some of the countrys and the fact that I had more out of US transactions then in US. If I know that would have been a problem then I would have made sure I did more us transactions thru them some how.

HI tymonhall,

Did you ever get your money back? Please let me know. Thanks.

They said it was some of the countrys and the fact that I had more out of US transactions then in US. If I know that would have been a problem then I would have made sure I did more us transactions thru them some how.

Most processing banks have restrictions on which countries you are allowed to conduct commerce with. You should determine whether the questioned transaction originated from a restricted or prohibited country.
Three days ago I had to turn down a travel agency based in NY because they've had a number of transactions with Syria, and that is one of the countries the bank prohibits conducting business with.
Good luck with getting your money back!!!

Hi:

I have a question. Did you ever get the money back after they hold it for 6 months? Please respond. Thanks

The put the money back into my account with them, they never notified me so I didn't know until about 9 months later. After 6 months you don't think to check your account.