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PayPal is no GayPal: another PayPal horror story

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PayPal is no GayPal: another PayPal horror story

#1

Post by WillyDmz »

Hello HN,

One of my side projects is a small gay discussion group online. It sells certain services (not pornographic in nature, it is the digital equivalent of a support group) and I had to use PayPal for payments for certain business reasons, unfortunately.

Today my entire PayPal account was frozen, 700 dollars was stolen from me, and I can't seem to get anybody at PayPal to deal with me rationally and overturn this decision.

I believe that some automated filter at PayPal saw the phrase "gay phone sex" on the site, but missed out the total description around that text that made it perfectly clear that it was NOT any kind of gay phone sex or any kind of pornographic service.

I'm not a rich man and I depend on this money to pay rent and I'm in a real jam here. If anybody at HN has any connections at PayPal and can help me out, I would really appreciate it.

Please email me at wd1993 AT gmail if you can please help me out. Thanks.

Re: PayPal is no GayPal: another PayPal horror story

#3

Post by steve19 »

Say what you want about PayPal but they don't discriminate. They screw everyone regardless of race, religion, sex or sexuality.

To the OP: Like so many people, I lost money when PrayPal[0] locked me out of my account. No amount of faxing documents, emails or phone calls would convince them that it was my account and my money. I ended up just walking away.

A suggestion might be to go talk to a gay rights group and try turn this into a civil rights / discrimination issue ... they won't want the bad press.

[0] PrayPal: Put money in and pray you get it back out again.

Re: PayPal is no GayPal: another PayPal horror story

#4

Post by tjarratt »

Have you tried contacting any news organizations? I can imagine a few in and around San Francisco would probably be interested in this, as it has a direct impact on Gay Rights.

This seems like complete discrimination. They shouldn't be able to freeze your account for having any references to "gay X" any more than they should be able to freeze your account if you were advertising "african american X".

Re: PayPal is no GayPal: another PayPal horror story

#6

Post by tjarratt »

steve19 wrote: post #3

Say what you want about PayPal but they don't discriminate. They screw everyone regardless of race, religion, sex or sexuality. To the OP: Like so many people, I lost money when PrayPal[0] locked me out of my account. No amount of faxing documents, emails or phone calls would convince them that it was my account and my money. I ended up just walking away. A suggestion might be to go talk to a gay rights group and try…

I agree, attacking this from a gay rights angle will probably be the best approach. If he can get a major publication to run with this, PayPal will have to respond.

Re: PayPal is no GayPal: another PayPal horror story

#8

Post by rottencupcakes »

tjarratt wrote: post #4

Have you tried contacting any news organizations? I can imagine a few in and around San Francisco would probably be interested in this, as it has a direct impact on Gay Rights. This seems like complete discrimination. They shouldn't be able to freeze your account for having any references to "gay X" any more than they should be able to freeze your account if you were advertising "african american X".

Let me know if you feel otherwise, but it could be reasonable for paypal to want to distance itself from "african american phone sex."

Re: PayPal is no GayPal: another PayPal horror story

#9

Post by logic »

I love a good PayPal bashing as much as the next guy (I've had my own poor experience with them), but there is a significant amount of detail missing here.

It's unclear to me that you've actually contacted them - by phone, not via email or their online support gadgetry. Have you? If so, what (specifically) was their response?

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