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How to Get PayPal to Freeze Your Account in Four Easy Steps

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Re: How to Get PayPal to Freeze Your Account in Four Easy Steps

#51

Post by cabalamat »

I have heard enough horror stories about Paypal from others, and had enough hassle from them myself, that I never use them whenever there is another payment option.

How easy would it be to set up an online transaction site that was actually easy and hassle-free to use? One where:

(a) costs of transferring money to another account are low, and similar to the cost of performing the transaction, not the 3-5% of transaction that Paypal and credit cards charge. The only thing that might be expensive is getting money in and out of the site, because you'd have to go through the traditional banking industry.

(b) where there is no distinction between merchant accounts and other accounts. Why should there be? All accounts should be able to send and receive money.

(c) the site started off with some ways you could spend/get money, e.g. something like flickr, adsense/adwords, and web hosting.

(d) there would be no credit protection; if Alice give money to Bob and then isn't satisfied with the goods the she received from Bob, she should take it up with him not with the transaction service.

(e) the service would have apis that made it easy for other companies to build services around.

I'm assuming it would be difficult to impossible due to banking laws -- does anyone know better?

Re: How to Get PayPal to Freeze Your Account in Four Easy Steps

#52

Post by encoderer »

noonespecial wrote: post #36

Paypal is a classic example of a fossilized bureaucracy: 1) The departments within Paypal are unable to share information, alert each other of status, or become aware of what they are each doing. The first clue that this is happening inside an organization is the requirement to submit (or resubmit) the same information multiple times. 2) Complete inflexibility. If you don't fit a pigeonhole profile of previously defi…

The most valuable part of Paypal is the systems and strategies they've invented for risk mitigation and fraud prevention.

Before they developed those systems, online payment aggregators were a nonviable business.

Many people in the late 90's and early 00's felt that it was a failed experiment and that the risks were just too high. This after a long list of failed startups and failed infinitives at existing banks.

Yes, it can seem very obtuse. But they are in a risky business. Without their anti-abuse measures (which every other merchant aggregator has cloned to some extent), this niche would not exist. You would have to get your own merchant account if you wanted to sell online.

Re: How to Get PayPal to Freeze Your Account in Four Easy Steps

#55

Post by gregskloot »

thaumaturgy wrote: post #15

I have less than no sympathy for businesses with Paypal horror stories at this point. Paypal's reputation is very well known, especially in startup circles, and there are a ton of other services available that will handle payments for startups. There have been several HN threads about them, and it's not too hard to find those on searchyc.com. If you're starting a business, and you're relying on Paypal to do it, then…

Well said - I completely agree. Anytime I am speaking to a web development customer that wants to accept payments online, I give them the usual rant about the dangers of PayPal. It seems cheap and simple, but what's the different if they can freeze your account and leave your funds unavailable for your business? There's a cool start-up at Duke University that is developing a new way to make payments without cash that could evolve into a powerful payment system: https://www.facebook.com/NoochMoney

Re: How to Get PayPal to Freeze Your Account in Four Easy Steps

#56

Post by idlewords »

noonespecial wrote: post #36

Paypal is a classic example of a fossilized bureaucracy: 1) The departments within Paypal are unable to share information, alert each other of status, or become aware of what they are each doing. The first clue that this is happening inside an organization is the requirement to submit (or resubmit) the same information multiple times. 2) Complete inflexibility. If you don't fit a pigeonhole profile of previously defi…

Seems like in this case PayPal got it exactly right, and in a pretty timely and polite manner.

Re: How to Get PayPal to Freeze Your Account in Four Easy Steps

#57

Post by idlewords »

sedev wrote: post #8

I've stopped being surprised at this genre of story showing up - on HN or elsewhere. This story basically serves to illustrate a couple of things about Paypal that are definitely salient, but haven't changed in years. * Banks are still shitty and unwilling to actually compete, so Paypal has its market all to itself. * Because Paypal does not fear disruption or competition, it is not worth their time to invest in good…

I've been through the PayPal wringer (account frozen, then limited) and actually found the customer service to be stellar. I had a dedicated case agent who gave me his direct line, and he was always available and always polite.

There's a lot to hate about PayPal, but my impression is they have put quite a lot of effort into customer service.

Re: How to Get PayPal to Freeze Your Account in Four Easy Steps

#58

Post by mckoss »

I'm confused. PayPal offers a 3-party payment product, where you can accept a payment and split the proceeds between yourself and another seller. They call it "chained" payments.

https://www.x.com/servlet/JiveServlet/download/1044-1-1033/p...

Why doesn't this work for your scenario?

Re: How to Get PayPal to Freeze Your Account in Four Easy Steps

#59

Post by sireat »

With all these Paypal horror stories(this one you could see Paypal's side at least) of inflexible bureaucracy, what I find most ironic is that it was started with highly idealistic libertarian aspirations in mind.

Somewhere along the way something important was lost.

Re: How to Get PayPal to Freeze Your Account in Four Easy Steps

#60

Post by cabalamat »

cabalamat wrote: post #51

I have heard enough horror stories about Paypal from others, and had enough hassle from them myself, that I never use them whenever there is another payment option. How easy would it be to set up an online transaction site that was actually easy and hassle-free to use? One where: (a) costs of transferring money to another account are low, and similar to the cost of performing the transaction, not the 3-5% of transact…

Erratum: by "flickr" I meant "flattr".
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