Live data from Hacker News

PayPal introduces new fee for dormant accounts

theguardian.com

61–70 of 136 posts

Re: PayPal introduces new fee for dormant accounts

#61
What's up with the few monopolies left over tightening the screws to squeeze every penny out of their "customers"? YouTube playing ads every two minutes, RedHat stopping CentOS, AMZN dumping parcels somewhere in your neighborhood so they can claim to have delivered, now PayPal "introducing" (as if they could unilaterally) fees. To those always apologizing just how much of a suck the web has become: it's not like we didn't tell you all the time.

More worrying is the outright nerviness - as if those companies know there are no alternatives left, or know something about our grim economical outlook.

Re: PayPal introduces new fee for dormant accounts

#62
post #3

Well, I'm glad I don't have money left there, because I had two factor authentication turned on, and for some unforseen circumstances, I lost my phone number. PayPal customer service is actually quite hard to contact, because every possibility they give you requires you to log in. I found an email address somewhere, but when I wrote them telling them about my situation, I got an email that if I log in I can check the…

> when they make it impossible to contact them

Funny (and infuriating!) to be in the same situation. I have lost access to my account and the money in it, because they have the wrong phone number on file. In their support forum, there are pages of people with the same issue - they're locked out of their account, with seemingly no way to contact anyone at PayPal to resolve it.

I hope they get sued for this practice of abandoning their customers, cutting off contact, and keeping the money.

Re: PayPal introduces new fee for dormant accounts

#64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nice, a bailin. But sure, most banks have fees like that, and typically don't for a few years just to attract the broke people that were looking for an account with no fees. Then they turn them on.

> But sure, most banks have fees like that A bank account with fees? I've never seen that. They make money by loaning out your money, so they don't need to charge a fee.

Welcome to a low interest rate world. Things are even worse at Japanese banks.

Re: PayPal introduces new fee for dormant accounts

#66
Google Pay and Apple Pay can surely substitute Pay Pal quickly. Alipay and WeChat Pay in Asian regions. Other, less famous alternatives as well. All of them are more consumer-friendly than PayPal itself. So far, only adoption from the merchants is lacking.

Re: PayPal introduces new fee for dormant accounts

#67
There is a way to regain access to your Paypal account. I used this when I forgot to change the 2fa phone number before they started enforcing it, thus leaving me no way to log in.

Use a browser / computer you haven't ever used for Paypal. Incognito/Private browsing mode will probably be sufficient.

Go to the normal Paypal login. Try to reset your password via "forgot my password". Follow the instructions; security code etc. Set a new password and confirm it. Paypal will now log you in.

Re: PayPal introduces new fee for dormant accounts

#68
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similar here. I've been using PayPal to receive our Patreon balance each month and pay various project (sqlitebrowser.org) related experiences. Just over a week ago, when I tried logging in to PayPal (2FA is not enabled) a new screen appeared saying they'd sent an SMS with code to my phone number, and I need to type it in. Problem being, the phone number they displayed is not mine. I've never given them my mobile num…

Hack: As soon as you start speaking to their robot and he asks "why you're calling", say something like "speak to a human". After robot tries to evade it with further programmed bullshit, say: "GET LOST!". He will quickly respond "It seems I am having problems here" and connect you to a human. Worked perfect for me several times I had to contact their customer support with the identical problem of being locked out du…

Tried multiple variations of that already.

Ironically, swearing at the bot memorably just ended up in an automatically dropped phone call pretty much right away.

Not sure if that was due to them just dropping the call anyway (guessing so), or there's detection for people swearing.

Re: PayPal introduces new fee for dormant accounts

#70
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similar here. I've been using PayPal to receive our Patreon balance each month and pay various project (sqlitebrowser.org) related experiences. Just over a week ago, when I tried logging in to PayPal (2FA is not enabled) a new screen appeared saying they'd sent an SMS with code to my phone number, and I need to type it in. Problem being, the phone number they displayed is not mine. I've never given them my mobile num…

> PayPal is the main reason I'm not positive on Elon Musk's history... they've been "known bad" for many years, including when he was there. He started his fortune from building a company that knowingly scams people. :( There's plenty of possible things to criticize him for, but this seems like a weird one. PayPal was started by Confinity. He founded X.com in 99ish and they merged like a year after, but then he got t…

Ahhh, I haven't really had a close interest in Elon's stuff. Only really know of him as PayPal -> Tesla -> SpaceX.

Re: PayPal, just knew he used to run it, and they've been scammy pretty much from the start. Thus the poor impression from that.

Also Re: PayPal: I used to know a guy that worked there from the very early days, and he told wild stories about employees freezing people's accounts and withdrawing the money for their own use. Apparently it was widespread, and pretty common.

Post reply on HN