Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal • Hacker News Board

Re: Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal

#11

Post by njstartups » Thu, Jun 30, 2011, 5:48 PM UTC

Hi, saw that you are based in northern NJ. I have started a group on Meetup.com for startups in NJ and it would be great to have you in our group:

http://www.meetup.com/njstartups

Re: Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal

#12

Post by shinratdr » Thu, Jun 30, 2011, 6:33 PM UTC

> PayPal is not for entrepreneurs and I should of known better than picking them as a choice.

I don't think PayPal can be blamed for being aware that there are already thousands of small time deal sites and most have no discernible business model whatsoever, not even a potential future buyer.

Frankly, you have no idea what the rate of chargebacks is. You've barely run the thing yet. I would expect the company that processes millions of transactions a day to know what puts them at risk for chargebacks. I also don't see daily deal sites having a high rate of chargebacks is such an outrageous idea. Sounds pretty reasonable to me, they are exactly the kind of customers who would file a chargeback.

I'm no fan of PayPal on the vendor side either, but this sounds like poor planning to me. Not factoring in a 2nd payment processor just in case you have trouble with the first one is a bad idea, especially when you are in such a risky, fast-growing sector.

Re: Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal

#13

Post by shinratdr » Thu, Jun 30, 2011, 6:35 PM UTC

elb0w wrote: post #5

patio11 wrote: post #3

You're going to get variations on that quite a bit when looking for a merchant account, since what you are doing actually is very risky. This is not a Paypal issue so much as it is, shall we say, a divergence in perceptions of reality vis-a-vis how much payment processors care that your business requirements are their business requirements. Supporting pays-only-if-event-happens is your business requirement. It is ver…

Yeah, they should really make this known before invalidating an account based on it.

OP also should have secured a backup payment processor for such a risky venture.

Why lament over the thing that will never happen instead of focusing on the solution you can use easily by yourself?

Re: Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal

#14

Post by justhw » Thu, Jun 30, 2011, 7:18 PM UTC

Tip: you might wanna delete some of the info on the github readme file. I am not sure if it is real but you have CC acct numbers and passwords on there.

Re: Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal

#15

Post by ig1 » Thu, Jun 30, 2011, 8:11 PM UTC

elb0w wrote: post #10

ig1 wrote: post #7

It sounds there was a miscommunication, PayPal is pretty explicit on their website that you need approval for Website Payments Pro (it's on their "Getting Started" page when you apply for an account). When you were speaking to the rep they perhaps should have gone into more detail about the process involved, but it doesn't seem that they purposefully misled you. Miscommunications happen in business, it's one of those…

They should not allow you to use the service if it is not approved. A bank wouldn't let you spend the money before you get approved for the loan.

Ah ok, I see what you mean, I assumed you were just using normal Paypal before hand.

Re: Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal

#16

Post by optimus » Thu, Jun 30, 2011, 11:50 PM UTC

Off-topic, but how did you gain your initial users for what was, apparently, a successful local deal?

Re: Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal

#17

Post by MatthieuStone » Fri, Jul 01, 2011, 8:28 AM UTC

I'd had great experience with paypal. Were you getting lots of chargebacks?

Re: Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal

#18

Post by johnsocs » Fri, Jul 01, 2011, 5:17 PM UTC

dpapathanasiou wrote: post #2

Check out WidgetPay ( https://widgetpay.me/ ), which is built on top of the Stripe API ( https://stripe.com/ ), and run by my startup. I've compared using it vs PayPal on my blog: http://denis.papathanasiou.org/?p=572 If you're comfortable with coding, though, you should just go to Stripe directly.

But Stripe.com is not even available publicly yet ?

Re: Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal

#19

Post by rexreed » Thu, Jul 07, 2011, 4:02 PM UTC

I know Authorize.Net was ruled out, but couldn't you just use the Authorize.net CIM to avoid storing credit card data? We've been using Authorize.Net and the CIM and it's been great - and they are professional.

Re: Tell HN: We just got screwed by PayPal

#20

Post by proexploit » Thu, Jul 07, 2011, 8:08 PM UTC

rexreed wrote: post #19

I know Authorize.Net was ruled out, but couldn't you just use the Authorize.net CIM to avoid storing credit card data? We've been using Authorize.Net and the CIM and it's been great - and they are professional.

Yes, this was my thought too. Through their API can't you essentially mimic the same functionality as if cards were stored on your servers without having to deal with PCI compliance?