Annoyed with Paypal

pclancy

This is unreal, let me explain the story....

I run a small computer company and we were seeing how ebay worked for us selling laptops, printers and PC components etc. Trade was okay, not fantastic but we were gonna work with it and see how it went.

Sold a laptop to a bloke in the UK in July. He hit Buy Now in Ebay and paid the full price for the laptop as well as shipping via his paypal account straight away. I checked the account to make sure all was well, checked his previous ebay feedback which was good, checked his address which was fine and spoke to him via email about the shipping costs which he paid perfectly. Boxed up the laptop, sent it off, heard no more. Withdrew the money for the laptop from our paypal account into our bank account and that was it. That was in July.

Then, last thursday i get a mail from paypal saying the transactions had been reveresed and we owe the full price of the laptop (over €1100) giving no reason whatsoever. I email asking for an explanation, I get none except contact the buyer. Tried that, got no answer so emailed paypal again. This time they said pass on the address and tracking number which i did. They came back saying nothing they could do contact the police. I rang them today and spoke to a very nice lady in dublin who confirmed the money had been reveresed because the buyer suspected his credit card details had been used by someone else and he was able to file a dispute of which i heard nothing. She couldnt give me a good explanation and said i should call my local police station. Now, even if they actually answered the phone there im damn sure they dont know anything about Ebay or paypal and told her this. She said unfortuantly we were not covered by selling protection. I asked why. She said she didnt know and basically fobbed me off till i gave up.

Paypal wont do any more to help and ebay havent answered my mails. WTF am i supposed to do now?

AARRRGH

Yes. They did a "chargeback".

Sucks big time. Sorry to hear!

Not sure what you can do about it. I also don't think the police will understand, or give a ****.

pclancy

dublindude wrote:

Yes. They did a "chargeback".

Sucks big time. Sorry to hear!

Not sure what you can do about it. I also don't think the police will understand, or give a ****.

My thoughts exactly. Country garda can barely get their heads around the concept of a mobile phone never mind a newfangled "lap" "top". I dunno what do do tho except for just not pay them. That means tho that after 30 days they'll block my account and i wont be able to use Ebay/Paypal even tho ive done nothing wrong.

ambro25

That one sucks allright.

If you spoke to a nice lady in Dublin, maybe a few avenues...
Q1 - is Paypal based in IE (or do they have an 'address for service' in IE)?
Q2 - read and re-read through the terms of use, look for loopholes re. liability (Paypal vs yours) as a seller - do they have any obligations of results/service level/etc.?
Q3 And -importantly- is any of those breached by Paypal not resolving the matter?

If Q1+Q2+Q3 = yes, send a registered letter
(i) asking for the matter to be sorted at once, given that you have supplied all required evidence that the transaction was legit (tracking, auction details, payment history, proof of delivery by courier etc.) and you come to the table with 'clean hands'
(ii) to be sorted by date XX/YY/05
(iii) else you will issue proceedings in the Small Claims Court at date XX/YY/05 + 1 day for breach of contract, seeking costs for advice/representation (if any), time incurred for dealing with the matter and any other expense linked to this matter.

Don't forget to detail in the letter what happened when with whom, who did you talk to/email when at what time what phone no./email address, with copies if appropriate.

A lot of bother and a sh*tload of "ifs" (sorry not being able to offer more), I know (I've done it for €12.87 recently ), but better to have everything out in the open between the parties, verifiable and authenticized (particularly with registered snail mail), if it eventually all goes South (which, you just never know, could go South for you further than it already has... )

nava

Hi

Couple of ideas will be,
Document as much as possible including e-mail, get a report from the garda you might be cover by you company insurance.

Compare the shipping address in the ebay e-mail you got after the auction finished and the paypal e-mail with payment, get Paypal to compare the 2 of them with the person that claimed the CC was used fraudulently.

Was the package send via register mail check with anpost or courier company if you can get a copy of the person that signed for the item, was it delivered to the house or collected from postal/courier company.

Have you tried to contact the buyer by phone, if you don't have the number try a search on www.bt.com



Regards

A Dub in Glasgo

This is the big danger when using Paypal. They are absolutekly hopeless in situations like this.

Have a read and post on <Snippety Snip. Please Read the charter>

pclancy

Cheers for the excellent replies all. Im gonna take that advice tomorrow. The guards are the part im most unfaithfull in for some reason. But i have a good paper trail so we'll see how it goes.

Nukem

pclancy wrote:

I rang them today and spoke to a very nice lady in dublin who confirmed the money had been reveresed because the buyer suspected his credit card details had been used by someone else and he was able to file a dispute of which i heard nothing.

I'm sorry i have a bit of a problem with this part.
Usually when it comes to using your credit card and you order over €xxxx (depends on type) if the billing address and the mailing address are not the same the bank will hold the tranfer until you ring them and comfirm the address - (has happend moi).

If the credit card was indeed stolen and he reported it then that is a sort of fraud and the buyers bank will be notified! As it stands the fraud squad from the bank and the police move very quickly on such matters! Insurance on his card should also come into play as you are unaware and that the laptop has been sent and you have cashed the money.

I recommend talking to your bank manager and a solicitor to see where you stand - they may in fact notify the bank fraud squad who will talk to the gardai for you.

Nukem

bounty

the visa insurance will only cover the debit balance of a card


Do i understand the situation right?

You sold a laptop to someone, and posted it off to an address in england

then 3 months later, visa done a charge back because apparently the visa card had been used frauduently

have you looked into the address you sent the laptop to?

if i remember correctly theres a site to match addresses to names...

call the uk police station close to the address? for the amout of a laptop, id pay a visit myself

A lot of bother and a sh*tload of "ifs" (sorry not being able to offer more), I know (I've done it for €12.87 recently ),

always good to hear someone fcuk with the corporate weasels (i assume its a company?)

pH

Just wondering, have you still got the 1100? You said you transfered it into an Irish Bank account 3 months ago - surely it's now up to PayPal to try and get the money back?

How are they looking for the money? They can't reverse a cleared irish bank transfer without a lot of hassle, so I was wondering how they're trying to get the cash back from you?

ambro25

bounty wrote:

always good to hear someone fcuk with the corporate weasels (i assume its a company?)

It's DHL and Intra Justitium (or somesuch, debt-chasing company). And only deservedly (Triple A-grade f*ck up by them), and only after very numerous attempts by moi to solve the matter satisfactorily for all parties in a polite and efficient manner.

Matter now pending, both put on formal notice, solicitor instructed, Small Claims Court by end of October, I reckon - teach'em to f*ck with the wrong person, with an attitude (so I'm told) and a quite-pronounced aversion to customer service ineptitude...

EDIT - thread here

woody

This is a scam used by a lot of people using eBay and paypal.


Bring them to court as it is in your favour hope all goes well as paypal and ebay are idiots as for the Garda they are useless.

All the best and keep us posted

pclancy

The whole thing was through paypal, i never had any direct contact with his credit card details. Way it happened:

1. He clicked buy now and bought laptop through paypal, paying instantly.
2. I checked the amount and transferred money from paypal to bank a/c
3. Three months later, paypal reverse the money and my paypal account is left negative the sale price of the laptop €1100+

They cant take money from my account or credit card so my account will remain negative until they block it after a month of none paypent. Then id expect someone to start looking for money.

It was a serious slap in the face to be told by someone over the phone that i was not protected by their seller protection even though i hadnt broken ANY of the terms of their user agreement! Seems ridiculous.

I just went to the paypal.ie site and the whole things down. Lovely.

pclancy

pH wrote:

Just wondering, have you still got the 1100? You said you transfered it into an Irish Bank account 3 months ago - surely it's now up to PayPal to try and get the money back?

How are they looking for the money? They can't reverse a cleared irish bank transfer without a lot of hassle, so I was wondering how they're trying to get the cash back from you?

Thats just it i dont see how they can apart from court. And i have a paper trail from when i bought the laptop to when it was signed for. Aint no court gonna ignore that.

BrianD

It'sa bit rich for this to occur 3 months after the transaction. That's three statements that the credit card holder would have received and not taken action.

Can you find out the credit card address and see if it matches the shipping address?

pickarooney

Where exactly is the laptop, does anyone know?

peckerhead

Sounds like you should hang tough, and - subject to your solicitor's advice - take them to court and sue for damages. Tell them you're going to bill them for your time at your hourly rate of €x. Preserve that paper trail and copy everything to eBay's H.O. , their European Customer Support Centre in Blanchardstown and individually to their "Executive team".

Unfortunately Paypal has something of a record in this regard - see http://www.paypalsucks.com/.

Gone West

Peckerhead: thats a bit extreme. Its obviously only a misunderstanding with paypal. Obviously they will realise the mistake soon enough(as soon as an actual human looks at the case file) and close the issue.

peckerhead

Maybe, but it sounds to me like the OP has already had a lot of his time wasted, a lot of grief, and is perhaps already on the books of a debt collection agency - and not for peanuts.

One last big feck-off letter threatening litigation, copied to multiple recipients a bit further up the Paypal chain of command, seems like a logical first step, and may avoid having to go to court at all. I'm sure eBay's shiny new Irish operation doesn't want this kind of bad press in their first year...

clearz

OMG how paypall sucks so bad. Especially for sellers. If you ever get money into your paypall account get it to hell out of there asap. And then never use them again. You should have researched this stuff before starting to sell online. You should only have shipped to paypal verfied addresses especially oversea's. This is where the shipping address and credit card holders address have been checked out by paypal. So I have to say it was partly your fault if this was not the case. You have to take some responsibility in protecting yourself when selling to overseas. I used to use ebay and paypall and would not touch either with a barge pole anymore as their whole system is way to dodgy for both buyers and sellers. It is rampent with scammers. Every time I browse ebay I come on blatent scams. Just last week I reported one and got an email back thanking me and saying that the account was now closed. Ebay and paypall are a farce and I wish ppl would look into them properly b4 using them.

If you want to start selling goods online. Get yourself a website that accepts CC's so you are nearly in total control. I say nearly because you still can suffer chargebacks but which would you rather deal with, your bank or some half assed American company with dire customer support like paypall.

A Dub in Glasgo

FuzzyLogic wrote:

Peckerhead: thats a bit extreme. Its obviously only a misunderstanding with paypal. Obviously they will realise the mistake soon enough(as soon as an actual human looks at the case file) and close the issue.

This is the way Paypal operate. No misunderstandings at all

woody

FuzzyLogic wrote:

Peckerhead: thats a bit extreme. Its obviously only a misunderstanding with paypal. Obviously they will realise the mistake soon enough(as soon as an actual human looks at the case file) and close the issue.

Extreme is all these people know, now tell me this what is happening to Mr.Thief.

Leaving all other things aside f*ck paypal and let the account go negative, as already said setup a credit card payment facilitiy paypal are no more than a middle man ripping customers off

pclancy

UPDATE:

I have since had no further decent communication from paypal, even after providing a full paper trail to Ebay. I have also since learned that the bloke who bought the laptop has pulled the same scam at least once before he did it to me, yet even still paypal happily refunded his money for a reason they dont want to tell me.

Would anyone have any idea about how to report this to the guards in a way that will get something done? i dont fancy walking into my local garda station to do it. Is there any body that protects irish sellers or investigates internet fraud etc over here? I also want to report the story to the Irish Indo or another paper, whats the best way to do this?

BrianD

I think there is a fraud aquad located somewhere. They might be your best bet rather than the local station - your problem will be the least of their worries at local level.

Get legal advice and then inform PayPal that you have reported the matter to the Gardai, you will not be returning the money to them and its now their problem.

The fact that there was a 3 month delay workd in your favour. If you have a good paper trail, I can't see why you have to put up with this nonsense.

Request a face-to-face meeting with paypal.

BTW how did you find out this guy has pulled this scam before?

pclancy

bit of deep research gave me his phone number (voicemail constantly/indian accent), bit of the business/scams he's done before, information about the building where the laptop went (shady place with "business" downstairs offering PO boxes) amoungst other past history. Communication with other ebay sellers who he's screwed over as well proves its not a one time thing. I feel a solid case developing.

thesteve

Just subscribed to this thread. I've been buying and selling (only a little) from ebay for years. I've come across a few scams, learned to read the items properly, in other words knowing it's as important whats not written and what is written in the description. This is a very interesting 'case'.

I wouldn't min taking a look into the specifics a little before commenting as most of what I would already recommend has already been suggested... Not looking for your passwords or anything, Is there any chance you can post the item number in question (if its still available), yours and the buyers username, etc. PM them even...

Getting ripped off drives me nuts, I'll see if I can help a bit, the girlfriend has a college friend who works in ebay support, I'll see if she's still in contact and if she can answer any questions...

- Steve

BrianD

pclancy wrote:

bit of deep research gave me his phone number (voicemail constantly/indian accent), bit of the business/scams he's done before, information about the building where the laptop went (shady place with "business" downstairs offering PO boxes) amoungst other past history. Communication with other ebay sellers who he's screwed over as well proves its not a one time thing. I feel a solid case developing.

Good to hear. He probably runs a forwarding business. I have recently started using OsCommerce and their web site has a number of community forums. Needless to say one of the hottest topics is how to avoid credit card scams. Makes interesting reading. Apparently one of the common scams is to use freight forwarding addresses. Item is delivered to a "respectable address" and then forwarded on to a foreign address. etc.

While this guy seems to be a scam merchant and the info from other victims will help, you need to rely on your own info and data rather that of others.

pclancy

Not sure if i want to release any detailed info yet. Sent a final email to paypal yesterday and next step will be fraud squad and solicitors letter to paypal so id rather keep things quiet and see how it goes. Ebay cant help me in any way as paypal is a seperate entity and covered by its own policies. In fairness to ebay they have actually phoned me twice to help with other stuff but to date after several weeks and about 12 emails i have ret to receive anything satisfactory from paypal. The part that really gets me is i have a right to know what happened to the transaction and for what reason it was reveresed seeing as its my money. But no, they cant tell me that sir.

Sleepy

Ask for the member of staff that your dealing with on the phone's name and then ask to be put onto a supervisor. Continue up the chain until you get someone who *can* tell you why the transaction was reversed.

ambro25

pclancy wrote:

Ebay cant help me in any way as paypal is a seperate entity and covered by its own policies.

eBay owns Paypal. While they may indeed have their own business/contract policies, they have certainly gone to town about 'integrating' both functionalities (auctions/payment proxying), e.g. witness the increasing number of eBay clickies in Paypal and vice-versa.

So once you get to someone more senior (if you can), and if it looks like you're getting nowhere, I'd have a little white lie about a friend journalist at a certain very well-known national newspaper who's doing an article about online auction sites and the eBay.ie lauch, payment woes and how to avoid them, and asked you about your experiences as a 'virtual shop on eBay, and your 'anecdote' may find its way in there at some point in a negative way (rather than positive in how they dealt with the matter to your satisfaction etc.), if it doesn't get sorted pronto... Given (i) the size of Ireland (in headcount) and (ii) eBay has just launched eBay.ie, that might put a bit of oil in the mechanism

infinite_in

I've heard that google is planning a payment processing system especially for their advertiser and perhaps it will emerge later the next of paypal. Even there are still so many payment processor other than paypal more secured and reliable too like 2 Checkout, worldpay etc.

I've recently gone through reviews of chronopay.com and find that they seems good online payment service provider and operating special reduced processing fees especially to web hosts providers, web Designer and web tools provider, perhaps this is their strategic move for increasing client base but it should be considered good approach atleast to compete paypal or similar payment gateways those seems saturated now and are just sucking.

Bamboozled

There's a special unit in the Phoenix Park that deals with internet/online stuff - I had to use them once for a different situation. They were part of the fraud squad but dealt mainly with stuff that happened online. They were great to deal with and took everything seriously. If you do get to deal with them, make sure you have originals and copies of the paper trails that you have so you can show them the originals and give them the copies there on the day so they can start straight away on it.

There was no 9-5 mon-friday business with them either. We needed them on a sunday and we met them in the park headquarters on a sunday coming up to Christmas.

I cant give any advice on the actual problem, but I do wish you luck.

wolfman

Paypal are a pack of wa***rs
<snip-snip/modedit: please read the charter>
and there are LOTS more "informative" websites out there!!
Lads have been telling me this for years but I dont listen.
I hope you get something sorted pclancy and good luck with it!

Eru

First off, for all you that are ****ting on the Gardai without having a clue what your talking about let me share something with you.

Gardai solve over 80& of all credit card frauds that they can actually get infomration from the banks on.

Gardai cannot automatically access your accouont information, we need your premission to do this. So if I find someone using your credit card in a shop (yes Im a Garda and yes this is a true story) and I know its not their card I arrest them, I question them and I get to keep the credit card and reciepts, now where do I go from there? the bank right? Wrong, a typical conversation and in fact the most recent one I had went as follows:

Hi this is Garda ...... from ...... Station and Im investigating fraud on visa ...............

Reply: yes that card was stolen/skimmed.

Can you give me the details?

Reply: no

How about the owners details? A phone number?

Reply: No

Why not?

Reply: Its confidential information and we investigate fraud ourselves.

I see, and do you know who has commited these frauds?

Reply: No.

well then how about giving me the information because I have a person in a cell at this moment in time that I caught with the card?

Reply: No, we dont give information to the Gardai without a warrant obtained by a Chief Superintendent or higher rank. We handle our own fraud cases.

Are you the Gardai? Do U solve any?

Reply: I cant help you any further, sorry.

Wham bam and the person goes home WITH your credit card and I spend the next hour cursing the arrogant ****s. So you see if you actually came in and made a report we could solve the crime.

No, I have a question of my own which is why i came to this thread. I bought of ebay using Paypal on the 25th August 2005. Paid using my credit card (TSB) and 1 week later got the product. Unfortunately it didnt have even half the additionals it was supposed to, wasnt multi region as per the ad and in fact, was broken. Complained to seller, told to **** off. Went to Paypal and lodged a complaint, 1 week later they agreed with me and promised a refund if I shipped back. I did this by registered post and provided the tracking information. 3 weeks went by, the product made it back to the original supplier but then Paypal reversed their decision as the tracking site (An Post) only displayed tracking information, not the address as well.

Finally after faxing and emailing Paypal I went to my credit card company who said they couldnt do anything as I had authorized the initial payment and I need to speak with Paypal. Would have more joy with a wall.

WTF? Surely thats not right? What am i supposed to do, legal fees for civil court would be more costly than the value of the goods.

A Dub in Glasgo

Paypal are an absolute joke in circumstances like this

I would call your credit card company again and insist on disputing the charge. They should then send out a sheet for you to sign. If they do not offer any protection in circumstances like this, I would immediately close the account and open up an account that does offer this protection.

pclancy

Karlitosway1978 thankyou for your comments, Im not slagging the gardai on the contrary for such an underfunded and government arsed police force I believe you deserve a lot of respect. I know a couple of cops personally and have spoken to them about the matter but it was based on what they said that made me feel like there was no point in going to my local station. I used to run a computer shop myself and had a couple of poeple try to screw me with stolen cards etc, the cops were very good in those instances but in an online problem like this where jurastiction is at question.

If you could suggest a which gardai station i could go to or someone to get in touch with from the fraud squad id be very gratefull.

I have sent a registered letter to Paypals HQ in the UK after speaking to another one of their reps but still no further really. He did say after the account became closed they automatically seek a debt collection agency to come collect it. Im not going to be a very happy camper if our company's credit rating is affected over this.

Eru

At this stage I think I will just write to them. My father had the same problem a while ago when he bought something online and ti never arrived. had to send a letter detailing all the various legislation that we were looking at, still he got his cash.

As far as I know I am protected because I queried a charge before without any hassles and I got a refund but that was a charge I hadnt authorized.

As for gardai, write a letter to your local Superintendent with all the papers attached (copies) and he will asign an officer to investigate. BTW, we dont like these cases because they are arkward but if you have an address for this guy it shouldnt be too difficult but remember we wont be able to access HIS credit card records.

Forget Paypal, they go with the easiest option and just talk crap until you give up. At least thats my case. If I get my CC to do a chargeback they will put it back on the seller fast enough but at least im honest.

What i dont get about paypal is why they allow this to happen, the seller in my case has a 33% negative feedback in the past month (10 and counting)

BrianD

Karlitosway1978 wrote:

First off, for all you that are ****ting on the Gardai without having a clue what your talking about let me share something with you.

Gardai solve over 80& of all credit card frauds that they can actually get infomration from the banks on.

Gardai cannot automatically access your accouont information, we need your premission to do this. So if I find someone using your credit card in a shop (yes Im a Garda and yes this is a true story) and I know its not their card I arrest them, I question them and I get to keep the credit card and reciepts, now where do I go from there? the bank right? Wrong, a typical conversation and in fact the most recent one I had went as follows:

Hi this is Garda ...... from ...... Station and Im investigating fraud on visa ...............

Reply: yes that card was stolen/skimmed.

Can you give me the details?

Reply: no

How about the owners details? A phone number?

Reply: No

Why not?

Reply: Its confidential information and we investigate fraud ourselves.

I see, and do you know who has commited these frauds?

Reply: No.

well then how about giving me the information because I have a person in a cell at this moment in time that I caught with the card?

Reply: No, we dont give information to the Gardai without a warrant obtained by a Chief Superintendent or higher rank. We handle our own fraud cases.

Are you the Gardai? Do U solve any?

Reply: I cant help you any further, sorry.

Wham bam and the person goes home WITH your credit card and I spend the next hour cursing the arrogant ****s. So you see if you actually came in and made a report we could solve the crime.


.

I don't suppose you can march into the bank HQ (if in Ireland) and arrest this chap for witholding information????

BrianD

pclancy wrote:

Not sure if i want to release any detailed info yet. Sent a final email to paypal yesterday and next step will be fraud squad and solicitors letter to paypal so id rather keep things quiet and see how it goes. Ebay cant help me in any way as paypal is a seperate entity and covered by its own policies. In fairness to ebay they have actually phoned me twice to help with other stuff but to date after several weeks and about 12 emails i have ret to receive anything satisfactory from paypal. The part that really gets me is i have a right to know what happened to the transaction and for what reason it was reveresed seeing as its my money. But no, they cant tell me that sir.

I think you need to notify the Gardai as a matter of priority. It may not move you any quicker towards resolution but will certainly signal that you consider this to be a crime. It will also assist if a debt company attempts to pursue the amount.

pclancy

yeah we have the fraud boys looking into it. fingers crossed!

Eru

BrianD wrote:

I think you need to notify the Gardai as a matter of priority. It may not move you any quicker towards resolution but will certainly signal that you consider this to be a crime. It will also assist if a debt company attempts to pursue the amount.

Its a case of conflicting laws. We can seize anything and everything as evidence and yes, trefusing is a crime however there are conflicting laws requiring that he NOT give out information.

Bottom line, they dont give it out because they dont want to. I have found any company with an investigation section are very unhelpful. they have small dog syndrome.

pclancy

The End. Or so it seems.

Again dont want to go into massive detail but the end result was that we are not covered by Paypal's user policy because the address was unverified even though it had been used hundreds of times by others and we had identified four other people that had been caught by the same scammer. Garda Fraud squad did a good job but in the end we had no comeback against paypal.

Be warned. If you trade with unverified addresses you do so at your own peril of having no comeback whatsoever if something goes wrong. Lesson leaned.

parsi

And the problem is that most (if not all) European members have unverified addresses...

pclancy

yep