paypal.com seller protection copout. I owe them £870!

[martin.sarrionandia]

Dear Consumer Action Forum,

I am currently in a spot of financial bother and owe £12,000 on a credit card.

Things have gotten a little out of hand recently and I am no longer in control of my spending.I am currently in a spot of financial bother and owe £12,000 on a credit card.

I decided to get realistic and take the step of selling whatever I can to try and pay off my debts. Maybe even my house if it comes to it.

I started by selling my gold chain on eBay. I was under the impression that this was safe and secure and that I would be protected by paypal.com. This however has not been the case. Please read on.

My gold chain was on Ebay for 1 week before somebody purchased it with Buy it now for £870 including postage.

I was very pleased with my sale and felt relieved that I had finally taken steps to sort out my debt. I was mistaken.

I was contacted by the buyer several hours after the chain was sold. He wanted to know Courier details. I posted the chain that day. I used the paypal.com “Print Postage Label” to obtain the address for the buyer. The chain was posted using Royal Mail Special Delivery.

Everything was great. I felt like I was making steps to recover from my financial situation, even though it was only a small chip, it made an emotional difference. I was telling myself that change was happening.

I drew the money down from paypal.com into my bank account straight away so I could start paying off my debts.

Two days after the chain was posted I received an email from paypal.com. Essentially the buyer was claiming that somebody had used his paypal account fraudulently. Paypal had set my account to £-870 whilst they were investigating the issue. They requested courier information, which I provided immediately.

The day after paypal.com informed me they had conducted their “Investigation” and found that no fraud had taken place. They put the money back into my paypal.com account which was now £0.

I was under the impression that their investigation was a bit lackluster and complicit. Given the fact that it only took a day, and that without inspecting the buyers PC for malware and remote control software. Not visiting the buyer and interviewing him, or even going anywhere near the delivery address and almost certainly not contacting the police. Any sort of investigation to electronic fraud would have to include the following.

 

1. Retrieve IP addresses for paypal.com transactions and perform whois lookup. Then contact the relevant ISPs against these IP addresses to obtain postal addresses and compare these against the register address of the buyer. This would take at least a week. Not a day.
   
2. As a secondary point of investigation I would ask the ISP for a list of traffic destined to the users IP address and make sure that their machine was not compromised or under remote control during these transactions. This would indicate fraud.
   
3. Contact the police. As fraud is a criminal offense I would imagine that any sort of investigation would hold a relevant crime reference number. Any sort of investigation by police would not be conducted and closed within 1 day. This leads me to believe they did not involve the police at all.
   

I would imagine that the “buyer” of this chain was genuinely defrauded. I checked his purchase history and it was all second hand dvds (not even good ones I'm talking IMDB 5.1) and tit-tat. The most he ever spent was about £10 pounds on a item. I can imagine that they tried to bend him over and recover the cost from him by feeding him lies! I didn't care about any of this though because I had my money. However I did not have it for long.

The buyer decided that he didn't want to take it from paypal.com, and so he approached his bank and requested that they reverse the payment. ( Please see the email below ). Paypal.com bent over and obviously succumb to the banks request. Even though this contradicts their previous statement that they could find no evidence of fraud. I mean really why would you pay money out if no fraud was committed. This I could not care about. Unfortunately for me paypal.com decided to pass this reverse charge to me. My paypal balance is now at -£870.

It's all good though right, because I am covered by paypal.coms amazing “Seller Protection”. Well no apparently not as it turns out. Please see the email from paypal.com below.

I decided to get on the dog and bone and speak with paypal.com. Their highly trained staff informed me that my item was not illegible for Seller Protection, and that is why I owed them £870. I inquired as to the specifics of item illegibility. Their highly trained staff didn't have a clue.

I put my inquire in writing, as trawling through the web site revealed nothing. There is no available policy on item illegibility. Is this something they make up as it suits them? What is and isn't illegibility and why? Not even paypal.com know the answers to these questions.

Every email I send them regarding this query results in poorly constructed response pointed me to the web site and their eligibility policy. This policy does not dictate item illegibility in any way. They haven't even read my question! How does one communicate with a party that can't communicate. Where do I go to find the answers to these questions. It's not like I am asking them for the meaning of life. I just want to know how items are classified as illegible. They are the ones that made a decision based on this policy after all. WHERE IS IT? Obviously they don't have one or if they do they can't find it, or haven't read it.

I am now in a situation where I owe paypal.com £870. The money from the sale is safely in my bank. So I need somebody with some common sense and experience and brains (Oh blast you can count me out) to answer the following questions.

 

1. Will paypal.com attempt to peruse me for this money and do they employ debt collections agencies or hit men?
   
2. Can I take paypal.com to court for weaseling out of their “Seller Protection” in an attempt to get my balance back to £0. And is it worth the hassle?
   
3. Can I just close my paypal.com account without paying the balance.
   
4. Do paypal charge interest on negative balances? Will I owe them £10,000 in a years time.
   
5. Should I go to the police? Would they care or investigate?
   
6. In the film “Fight Club” featuring Brad Bit. Does he manage to blow up paypal.com at the end. If not WHY? WHAT WAS HE THINKING? Why can't this be on the alternative endings on DVD?
   

When answering these questions please bear in mind I WILL NEVER USE PAYPAL.COM AGAIN. Not even if I am selling a penny sweet.

I simply can't believe how appallingly they handle any difficult situation. They seem to turn their blame and financial burden to the easiest target at a moments notice, without caring who it affects as long as it's not them.

Any help or advise would be greatly appreciated.

Regards,

Martin.

Dear PayPal

 

I recently sold a Gold Chain on Ebay for £870. The buyer purchased the item and it was posted immediately to the Address listed under "Print Postage Label" within PayPal.

The buyer first disputed the claim with PalPal insisting he had been defrauded. You decided that no fraudulent activity had taken place. At first you moved the money out of my account during the investigation and then back in when you were satisfied the transaction was not fraudulent following your investigation.

 

Then the buyer then decided to reverse the bank charges at his local bank. Please see the email below from yourself. You have decided that my item was not covered by seller protection due to certain eligibility criteria. I contacted your call center and was informed that the item was not illegible and this would be apparent in the transaction details. I can find no evidence either way to suggest the illegibility of the item.

 

Also I am having difficulty in locating a classification criteria for eligible items on the PayPal website. Please could you send me the information regarding item classification. In particular please can you highlight the relevant sections and how they would apply to a gold chain worth £870.

 

I have found the following in your Terms & Conditions but it doesn't clearly state which items are and are not eligible and your classification criteria.

 

1. The item purchased must be a physical, tangible good that can be posted. (YES A GOLD CHAIN IS PHYSICAL)
   
2. The transaction must be marked by PayPal as eligible or partially eligible for PayPal seller protection on your Account “Transaction Details” page.
   


1. If it is marked eligible, protection for both Unauthorised Payments and Item Not Received will apply. If it is marked partially eligible, protection for only Item Not Received will apply. (NO DETAILS ARE LISTED AT ALL FOR THE TRANSACTION!)
   
2. Items sold on eBay will be marked eligible even if the shipping address is marked unconfirmed. Generally, items sold on websites other than eBay will be marked eligible if the shipping address is marked confirmed and partially eligible (that is, eligible for Item Not Received only) if the shipping address is marked unconfirmed. (THE LISTING HAS BEEN REMOVED BY EBAY)
   

 

[*]Post the item to the shipping address on the “Transaction Details” page. If the item is delivered in person or if the Payment Recipient posts the item to a different address (for example, if the buyer asks that you send to another address on the basis that it is a “work address” or a “gift” address) then you will not be eligible for re-imbursement under the terms of the programme. (YES POSTED CORRECTLY AND TRACKING NUMBER PROVIDED TO PAYPAL)

1. You may access the “Transactions Details” page by logging into your PayPal Account, selecting “History” and then selecting “Details” for the transaction.
   

 

[*]Follow the postage requirements described below. (YES)

[*]You must accept a single payment from one PayPal Account for the purchase. (YES)

[*]Respond to PayPal’s requests for documentation and other information that is reasonably required by PayPal to investigate the matter in a timely manner. (YES HAVE DONE)

[*]Your primary residence, as listed in your PayPal Account, must be in the United Kingdom, Ireland or Sweden (however, different levels of protection apply for each region, please see section 11.2 above). (YES IT IS)

I would very much like for you to clear this up for me. When responding to this email please take the time to read it carefully and answer all of the questions clearly and respond to all parties.

 

 

Regards,

Martin.

 

 

 

 

-----Original Message-----

From:

To: Martin xxxxxxxxxxx

Sent: Mon, 18 Jun 2012 14:48

Subject: Notice of Payment Reversal

---------------------------------------------------------------------- Bank Issued Payment Reversal ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Dear Martin xxxxxxxxxxx, Transaction date: 13 Jun 2012 Transaction amount: £870.00 GBP Buyer's email: Buyer's name: Your transaction ID: xxxxxxxxxxxxxx The buyer or the buyer’s bank requested the above payment be reversed. Bank reversals occur when the buyer or the buyer’s bank reports that the transaction was not authorised. Although we’re required to return the payment to the bank in these instances, we don’t debit your account if the payment is covered by our Seller Protection. This payment wasn’t covered by our Seller Protection so it was deducted from your PayPal balance. If a payment is eligible for our Seller Protection it will be marked as ‘Eligible’ or ‘Partially Eligible’ on your Transaction Details page. To learn more about our Seller Protection, visit and click ‘Safety Advice’ near the top of the page. We appreciate your business and regret that you’ve experienced this problem. Yours sincerely, PayPal ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Help Centre: Safety Advice: Please do not reply to this email because we are not monitoring this inbox. To get in touch with us, log in to your account and click "Contact Us" at the bottom of any page. Copyright © 2012 PayPal. All rights reserved. PayPal (Europe) S.à r.l. et Cie, S.C.A. Société en Commandite par Actions Registered office: 22-24 Boulevard Royal, L-2449 Luxemburg RCS Luxemburg B 118 349 PayPal Email ID PP412

[martin.sarrionandia]

P.S. I won't be donated to this site using paypal.com . Sorry about that.

[traffer]

It does seem that paypal will respond to a request for a reversal.

Same happened to me for something I sold over 3 years previously.

Now receiving letters from debt collector and their solicitor.

I wonder what a judge would make of that! (credit card chargebacks are usually no more than 120 days after transaction)

Paypal response to the matter was pathetic. They share no information.

I am not going to use them again.

[bigegg]

Print out several copies of all your communication with both the original buyer and paypal - include screenshots of the original ebay ad, "sales order details", invoices, paypal "you have received payment" emails.

EVERYTHING.

 

make several copies, and keep them safe in seperate locations (like your parent's house, in your locker/desk at work etc)

 

Wait for Paypoo to set a debt collector onto you.

Send an "account in dispute letter" and invite the debt collector to take you to court.

If (big "if") you end up in court - show the judge copies of all the correspondence, and let him decide how much, if anything you owe.

[Bang!]

That's a shame paypal losing their money!

 

Never mind!

[andydd]

agree with bigegg, in fact unlike many peop[le who have PP disputes, it would appear that you have done everything correctly and in accordnace with their T&C's.

 

Alas there is little more you can do, you cant reason with them, they wont see sense.

 

As you dont want to use PP again you wont have to worry about your account, you may well get hassling DCA letters, you could throw them in the bin or write back asking on what legal basis you owe the money (as far as I can see you have complied with all laws of the UK and PP T&C's). The chargeback should be against PP, not you personally.

 

1. Yes..but they are pretty lacklustre.

 

2. I suspect you would have a case in court, but youve nothing to gain (youve got the £870) so prob not worth the effort.

 

3. Nope..you wont be able to login and use it without paying the money first, it will just exist in limbo, ive got an account like this.

 

4. Nope. It will stay at -£870 seemingly forever !

 

5. Maybe, defintaley if you wanted to start court action but prob not worth the effort.

 

Andy

[Bang!]

Right - moving on to the important issue, were there any charges or insurance you paid on your £12K credit card debt?

[martin.sarrionandia]

Thank you all for your responses.

 

Bang! The credit card is a Virgin and there are only interest charges, so I'm moving the funds via a balance transfer to deal with that. There is no PPI.

 

As for paypal.com I have decided to take them to small claims court if they don't provide an adequate response within 14 days. I would rather deal with the problem than wait for them to instigate action. As far as I'm aware they can't chase me for credit which is currently being disputed. Small claims process usually takes about 6 months.

 

Once again thank you all for your efforts.

 

Regards,

Martin.

[andydd]

Before rushing to take PP to court I's advise following the CPR Pre-Action Protocl, his should give both sides a chance to see each others point of view and (importantly for you), exactly what parts of the T&C's and law they are going to rely upon, etc.

 

This means you should be able to view the evidence before taking the plunge and starting a claim, dont forget this will cost you, and further (although limited), costs should you lose.

 

Andy