If you use paypal..

[Dot50Cal]

Do not send or receive money with the subject line PS3. My account was just limited because someone I was trading items with paid me shipping for a PS3.

Paypal is automatically locking accounts that receive money for PS3, even though this was clearly marked as "Shipping for PS3". Now they want me to jump through hoops, including:

1) Answering my phone at a specified time
2) Enter my business information (even though I dont own a business, this is REQUIRED or you wont have any chance of unlocking your account. I just put anything)
3) Tracking links for the past few transations (WTF, This clearly wasnt payment for an item, yet they require tracking!!)
4) Fax them proof of inventory

The last one really kills me, as I have no way of doing this and its a clear message that this is because of the PS3. They are now holding 300$ of mine in my account unjustly. Making matters even more complicated is the fact that I opened the account years ago under my mothers name (with her approval of course).

So now I cannot resolve this, she has even though she has very little knowlege of the problem.

Im about to say fuck it and close the account, or do whatever the hell as this is now the third time paypal has screwed me unfairly.

Just wanted to give a heads up there before it claims more victims.

[dracula]

Do not send or receive money with the subject line PS3. My account was just limited because someone I was trading items with paid me shipping for a PS3.

Paypal is automatically locking accounts that receive money for PS3, even though this was clearly marked as "Shipping for PS3". Now they want me to jump through hoops, including:

1) Answering my phone at a specified time
2) Enter my business information (even though I dont own a business, this is REQUIRED or you wont have any chance of unlocking your account. I just put anything)
3) Tracking links for the past few transations (WTF, This clearly wasnt payment for an item, yet they require tracking!!)
4) Fax them proof of inventory

The last one really kills me, as I have no way of doing this and its a clear message that this is because of the PS3. They are now holding 300$ of mine in my account unjustly. Making matters even more complicated is the fact that I opened the account years ago under my mothers name (with her approval of course).

So now I cannot resolve this, she has even though she has very little knowlege of the problem.

Im about to say fuck it and close the account, or do whatever the hell as this is now the third time paypal has screwed me unfairly.

Just wanted to give a heads up there before it claims more victims.

make another account. It is perfectly fine with paypal rules to have more than 1 account. If you have account #1 linked with your checking account, then link account #2 to your savings account. This will let you make other auctions, getting your money out of account #1 may take a while and have much frustration, GL tho

[Yakumo]

Now why a PS3? Sony up to it's old tricks again I wonder?

Yakumo

[krieg747]

I honestly think the PS3 was forged in hell after Sony signed a contract with the devil...

[Dot50Cal]

make another account. It is perfectly fine with paypal rules to have more than 1 account. If you have account #1 linked with your checking account, then link account #2 to your savings account. This will let you make other auctions, getting your money out of account #1 may take a while and have much frustration, GL tho

When your account is limited you cant send money anywhere. Its frozen.

[oldengineer]

But why don't they not like the letters PS3 if that relates to a console?

...Who are they to say what the letters 'PS3' mean?

[Jasonkhowell]

After what happened with my last ordeal with paypal (locked my account because the BUYER was a new account and they thought that me and the buyer were doing a scam involving a laptop I was selling), I just said screw it. Bidpay works far better for me than paypal did, even if it isn't as fast. Not only is their phone service unreliable, but they don't even respond to email claims and just do form replies.

[Dot50Cal]

They started it because of people pre-selling PS3's long before it went on sale, now anything envolving PS3 is heavily scrutinized. Likley they dont want the bad media exposure but your right.


But why don't they not like the letters PS3 if that relates to a console?

...Who are they to say what the letters 'PS3' mean?

[n-y-n]

I need to remember this thread. Perfect to point people to when i want to sell something and they ask "why dont you want to do paypal???"

[Barc0de]

use "that popular console number 3" , instead :p

[Japan-Games.com]

hehe or "Pre-PS4"

[TheJesus]

What a bunch of bull. Even if you are selling ps3's, why is that any of their business? They dont have any right to lock up $300 of your money like that.

[jwhazel]

My $.02: I don't know that there is a definitive correlation here between what your selling, rather how much you are selling for. Paypal starts to scrutinize transactions when a.) there is a surge of transactions, especially incoming. Traditionally has happened alot to people when they try to set up an account to accept donations. b.) there are large transactions (not sure what the threshold is here). Happens alot to people selling computers and whatnot. Since you can easily send money without ever identifying what its for, explicitly monitoring for certain words in the subject/description would be real innaccurate. Alot of credit card companies do the same thing (based on a and b above).

Paypal is a soulless corporation and I severly detest everything about them. However I think blame should be put where it is due, on the scammers and greedy scum that cause these "policies" to be instituted in the first place, not the people who are trying to protect you. If you don't complete the transaction, paypal doesn't make any money. So they aren't intentionally trying to screw you. I am sorry to hear about your plight though.


They dont have any right to lock up $300 of your money like that.
Haha...I take it you haven't read their TOS yet, have you? They essentially have the right to come over, dig up your great grandmother, have their way with her corpse all the while punching you in the face and defecating on your new furniture. Lesson be learned, read carefully what you sign your name to (or check a box that says 'I agree'). In the age of instant gratification, probably 98% of the people neglect to do this.

[Barc0de]

hehe, another fine-print-reader.. ;)

[jwhazel]

Actually I almost never read the fine print, I've got better things to do. I want my gratification now (I'm being serious). But by doing so, if whoevers service I contracted comes to screw me over, I just accept it and write it off as "they may be violating my great grandmother in front of me, but the cumulative time I've not wasted on studying some pompous lawyers legal rhetoric was time well spent elsewhere. Sorry granny".

But to each his own. Look what can happen if you do read the fine print:
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/02/23/2315211

[mairsil]

Just because it is in the contract/fine print doesn't make it legal or legally enforceable (especially with the number of banking regulations that PP believes it can disregard). Good luck getting anybody official to care though.

[Barc0de]

jurisdictionally speaking, since PAYPAL acts within the Jurisdiction of the EU, it can be considered domiciled blah blah blah, and in short you can take them to court if their regulations are against 'real' laws. If you re a consumer, and not dealing with them in the course of your trade or profession, you can even sue them in the Member State you live in:)

[Parris]

I stopped using PayPal over a year ago when they did something similar with my account. I hate to weary you, but it took almost 9 months to get my money back and hours or frantic calls to PayPal. Their call centre staff in India were just reading scripts and NOT willing to go into any deviation from what they are expected to say (fair enough, but it helps nobody!) So DEMAND that you are put through to the head office. In the UK that means speaking to a representative in Ireland.

The whole exercise resulted in me having letters coming in from a debt collecting agency for several months, who after reading through the correspondence and understanding my issue went back to eBay & PayPal and cleared everything. (I realised that eBay were a related company, so to get my own back I refused to pay my listings fee for several months - that was what finally lit a fire under them to get things sorted as I assume they realised I was serious. The collections agency was very helpful actually and gave me all sorts of advice I am sure most agencies wouldn't have - I got the impression I was NOT the first eBay / PayPal customer they had dealt with in a similar situation).

It was very complicated, time consuming and despite getting my money back in the end I had paid probably 20-30% in lengthy calls for several months.

Unlike high street 'banking' institutions PayPal is not easy to get hold of, seem to operate within their own rules, have generally poor customer service, demand all sorts of unrelated and difficult to obtain information and frankly appear to do all they can to retain your cash once they have it in their mitts.

My advice to most people these days is to avoid using PayPal, but then again when it works it is a very good means of paying for items over long distances (exactly what collectors need).

Good luck with sorting your situation out.

[Dot50Cal]

Update!

After youtom sent them an email explaining that he received the item and there is no fraud they restored the account. WHEW. Still, man I really dislike their practice, but its the only common service collectors have as Parris said :\


Our review is complete and we have restored your account.

We appreciate your patience and thank you for your help in making PayPal
the safest and most trusted online payment solution.

Sincerely,
PayPal

So the point still stands, Dont accept money with the name PS3 on it, or its going to throw the automatic lock trigger.

[dickibow]

Thanks for the info dude - Paypal are bar stewards. I plan on purchasing my PS3 from the States towards Easter. Although they are really cranking down in Customs over here.

[Parris]

...hey don't start me on customs! Also remember that there is a "release" or "Handling charge" applied by the postal service for doing their job, going to customs and delivering the item to your front door, despite the fact you will have already paid the initial postal service (in your P&P) to do that. It really is a case of just getting the item into the UK, into customs, through customs and then you pay to get it to your front door! The good thing with that however is that it must be paid prior to it being dispatched, you are given an exact date (sometimes a rough time) for it to arrive on your doorstep and it must be signed for.

Contact Customs prior to bidding on an item to find out how much extra you may be expected to pay.

As for the PayPal account, I don't see how Sony / eBay can blanket ban the letters "P S and 3" in conjunction with one another. Just like the term PS2 was also not just a Sony product, but a type of PC connection, they cannot assume that all PS3 relate to 'their' PS3. I can see many annoyed, frustrated and pissed off PayPal customers being affected by this in the coming months.

[dickibow]

Yeah but how many PS2 mice and keyboards cost £500!!

[madhatter256]

Yeah but how many PS2 mice and keyboards cost £500!!


If you're buying a wholesale lot!

Can you talk to their customer service reps at all, Dot50?

[TheDeathcoaster]

Or you could just suffer paypal fraud like me! Just been charged $300 on an order thats not sent to my address (or even my goddamn country). Now I need to cancel my bank card, lock my paypal, blah blah.

Motherfuckers >_<

[Dot50Cal]

What reps? All you get is automated call centers IF you can find the number. Im not even dealing with it. Im just glad this horrible mess is over with.

[Barc0de]

I think its time to create the Assembler Credit Union for Exclusive Members Ltd :p ( A.C.U.F.E.M) ;p

[Parris]

Sounds good! Can we have overdraft facilities, a ACUfem credit card and stocks & shares options?

With the forthcoming Assembler sale this could all come in handy, plus Assembler can reap the benefit of over inflated APR %!

[Parris]

Or you could just suffer paypal fraud like me! Just been charged $300 on an order thats not sent to my address (or even my goddamn country). Now I need to cancel my bank card, lock my paypal, blah blah.

Motherfuckers >_<

Holy sh*t! £150 down the drain? Did you not make a complaint to PayPal under their "item has not been delivered" option? I'd check that out mate. What was it you were after from USA? (Only asking if it's console stuff - not a whole pile of vintage porn or something....you don't have to tell us about that lol) :oh:

[TheDeathcoaster]

Its was a totally fraudulant order. Someone got into my account and bought things for themselves. Fortunatly, I have got the paypal claim put through, and have won back the money.

Just it is stuck in limbo in my Paypal account at the moment, due to my account being limited. Hopefully be sorted in a week or so...but still means I need to budget my money to afford food >_<

[Barc0de]

well if it makes u feel any better, i lost 250 GBP about 3 months ago because of real-life fraud :(

[Parris]

Man, both Barc0de (got it right this time mate) and Deathcoaster (as well as anyone else defrauded by PayPal or eBay users) would benefit from perhaps knowing (and you can play this game for yourselves) that eBay has NO UK contact details available anywhere... You simply cannot complain by any other means than email to eBay. Even then, it is on their terms.

Do a search, try it for yourself. For such a massive company they really are impossible to talk to.

[Dot50Cal]

well if it makes u feel any better, i lost 250 GBP about 3 months ago because of real-life fraud :(

Karma for the xbox? :dance:

[mairsil]

Karma for the xbox? :dance:
http://mouse.pouncingkitten.com/other/laught16.gif

[Mark30001]

:clap:

[madhatter256]

Karma for xbox? Please divulge in this 'karma for the xbox'...

[mairsil]

Karma for xbox? Please divulge in this 'karma for the xbox'...
For reference, though off topic: http://assemblergames.com/forums/showpost.php?p=172939&postcount=8

[madhatter256]

Ahh. Now thats funny.

[Parris]

Oh, I forgot about that price swapping incident lol

[Barc0de]

actually no, this occured before the XBOX. imagine if I had both detriments. I m not acustomed to losing money, that's why it bothered me. be it 1 pound be it a thousand.

PS: 250 is still a relatively small amount of money compared to the shit i get for free guys ;p it's not not even half the pay of one day's work if there's a photoshoot;p (which by the way I don't get the time to do because I m in my final year, thus, saving money instead of spending)

but for all the moneys everyone here has lost and never got anything back for free, what sort of karma is that? ;)

[GaijinPunch]

I still don't know how nobody is able to stand up to Paypal. The shit they do is dodgy at best, and they seem to have a monopoly on the whole money transferring thing.

[dj898]

Do a search, try it for yourself. For such a massive company they really are impossible to talk to.


However if you own them a .25 cent they won't stop at nothing till they get the money from you...

I once owed them A$0.25 for the listing fee and explained to them that it would cost me way more for other fees to pay that lousy .25 cent via BPay nor C/C and asked for the extension so when I have accumulated the fee to say A$10 or so before I pay them off... They won't even interested in hearing my reason demanding to settle the fee ASAP! Yer right!

At the end I just delete my seller account from eBay and removed the e-mail I used for eBay from my mail server account. I had better things to do than exchanging e-mail war with eBay over 0.25 cent...

[GaijinPunch]

I have a few questions:

1: If you have one of those pseudo-merchant accounts (like Play Asia or whatever) can you still get charged back? I couldn't see a business like this using a service like Paypal that has so many freakin' holes in it.

2: Can Paypal mess up your credit history if you stiff them w/ a charge back? IE, close your account and don't pay them.