Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Restaurant at the End of Universe Hitchhikers - Meridian Equipment Warning to PayPal users

I just read on an auction that eBay are making it compulsory for sellers to offer PayPal. Gulp!

I read in a recent Which? magazine about another guy who got into a similar scrape as me and for whom the threat of referral to the Financial Ombudsman got him a positive result. Same old story. Seems one needs to know their consumer rights and avenues of recourse and be prepared to fight their corner and to not be fobbed off by Paypal (or any other company for that matter)...

Mark

I've never sold anything on eBay, and I am now much less inclined to if I can't prevent someone with a "bad" PayPal account associating it with mine.

Wow, it does not surprise me though, they are sharks.

I sold a DVD player on eBay a short while back and the buyer opened a dispute saying it did not work. Paypal put the money in my account on hold whilst it was sorted. The DVD player worked fine when I sent it via recorded delivery and looking through the buyers feedback he had purchased the same player only a month before off another seller.
The buyer then sent me an email saying he had purchased the other but it had broke and thats why he was buying mine, also could I refund him before I received the player back as he needed to buy another.
Paypal were no help and just kept the money whilst I sorted it. Someone gave me the advice to ask him to return the player so I could check the secret mark I put inside the player along with the serial number.
Surprise surprise it started working....
Paypal would have given him his money back regardless of whether he did send me a different player back as I could never prove it was a diffent player to Paypal regardless of serial numbers or secret marks. I would of had to contact the Police and report it which would have led no where.

I'll have to remember that trick.

The issue I have with PayPal is their inability to intercept money as it passes between PayPal accounts when sent by e-cheque. I have had a couple of issues with them, both resolved ok in the end.

1) I bought approx �2,000 of industrial imaging equipment from a seller in the USA who I had bought from previously. The payment went via an e-cheque for a reason best known to PayPal, this takes up to 10 days to clear. I informed the seller and she was cool about it. About 8 days into the 10 days I got an eBay message from a US Sherrif's office asking me to contact him. This I duly did, he wanted to know the wherabouts of the equipment that I had bought (and it's serial numbers), I said that I didn't have it yet, explained about the e-cheque. He said that he had good reason to believe that it was stolen and I gave him my sellers address details (I had them from previous shipping paperwork). PayPal would not put the payment into dispute until the money had hit my sellers account, at which point it then took a further 30 days for PayPal to refund my money (nice earner that one)

The goods themselves disappeared into this air as it appeared that my 'trusted' seller had not yet received them from her contact.

2) The second one was more recent, I sold a Meridian 562 via eBay to a guy in Poland, after 4 weeks the equipment had not turned up so he put in a dispute. After a brief dialog, I refunded the buyer (it went via e-cheque) and lodged an insurance claim with Parcelforce. Then 2 days later the goods turned up with my buyer. I contacted PayPal and explained the situation and they said that there was nothing they could do apart from emailing the buyer and asking him to resend the funds once he had received the refund. I too emailed the buyer and in this case fortunately he was honest, a less scruplous buyer wouldn't have bothered and just taken the kit and not paid for it (and I'm in no position to chase a couple of hundred pounds in a foreign country). If PayPal could have intercepted the funds transfer then it could have neen easily resolved.

Generally though I have had over 1,500 transactions where PayPal has worked fine, I just think that some of their resolution methods need to be looked at if they want to become a serious banking player.

Mr Perceptive

Good points raised about e. cheques. I had this issue recently when a paypal 'direct debit' payment was set up by Paypal to be paid by e. cheque. I queried with my bankers as to why paypal could not pay by the normal dd method through my current a/c and was told that if Paypal does not have a secondary method of payment ie. credit card details on file it will automatically be sent by e. cheque. In my case my credit card details had just expired and when these were updated all was normal

Rod

Rodders

I have always had a valid credit card attached to my PayPal account, the first one wnet by e-Cheque apparently beacuse of the amount (but I had plenty of limit available on my CC) and the second one they just took the refund from my bank account and gave me no option of using a CC for the refund.

Mr Perceptive

One thing I've yet to clarify is whether when you use your credit card via Paypal do you get credit card company protection on the purchase as normal. I'm sure I read somewhere that you do not because Paypal's transaction is simply to take money from your CC and only then pay for the item for you, eg your credit card isn't used to buy the item and thus you have no recourse to your cc company if anything goes wrong with the purchase...

CAVEAT EMPTOR!

Mark

Mark_H

I believe that your understanding is correct, your Credit Card transaction is with PayPal and not with the goods/services bought and therefore the protection does not work.

This is why PayPal offer certain levels of Buyer/Seller Protection on some eBay auctions.

It's really just a case of Buyer and Seller Beware! but in my case approx 999/1000 transactions are completely trouble free.

Mr Perceptive

Mark,

I am currently going through an "issue" with Paypal. The long and short of it is that I sold an item on eBay, was paid by buyer and Paypal have refunded buyer as they have old me it was a fraudulent transaction. Unfortunately they told me that it was a fradulent transaction 8 days after the original payment so I had already shipped the item. Fortunately I had transferred the money to my bank account so my Paypal account is now in the red. Paypal have refused to give me any more info, stating data protection policies, on the transaction, I have however raised another dispute and am awaiting their reply (not holding out much hope though as their initial investigation involved them sending a few emails - laughable).

Can you tell me how you worded the email / letter to Paypal regarding taking the matter to the financial ombudsman please? (send me a PM if you don't want to post on here).

Thanks to George Mills for opening my eyes to Paypal with this post (I have taken a further look at www.paypalsucks.com). There are some real horror stories on there.

Any help would be much appreciated.

Keith.