PayPal CEO writes personal response • Hacker News Board

Re: PayPal CEO writes personal response

#41

Post by waterlesscloud » Sat, Sep 08, 2012, 10:15 PM UTC

sw007 wrote: post #30

UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #13

Why now? Why with this story? I've been reading similar complaints to that for years. Some of which were far worse in my view (i.e. taking money out of banks to repay people who weren't even seeking a refund because PayPal changed its mind about someone's product or service). Why does PayPal suddenly care? Is it because there is viable competition now?

Classic case of someone who just can't win whatever he does. People have been crying out for PayPal to change - he notices this, he emails the guy with a first class email but still gets criticised. Criticise him if he doesn't act, don't criticise the guy for being big enough to say 'hey, we have a problem, I want to fix it' - that should be applauded, even if it's come later than people would have liked - at least i…

Honestly, that's the job he took.

Apparently he was ok with that, and I'm sure he's being well compensated for it.

PayPal has built up a lot of ill will, and no, it doesn't just go away with a promise to change. It is in fact going to take time.

Let's keep in mind that this offense just happened. It's not the distant past.

Re: PayPal CEO writes personal response

#42

Post by yuhong » Sat, Sep 08, 2012, 10:17 PM UTC

rhizome wrote: post #40

noonespecial wrote: post #38

This isn't special... Yet. What happened here can happen even in the most dysfunctional customer service paradigms. A promblem randomly and luckily escalated from the people who can't do anything about the problem to the people who (generally speaking) won't do anything about the problem. As a lucky break, the person/department who generally won't do anything, decided in their mercy to do something this one time. IMH…

The thing is, this "fix" only came about outside of their entire customer service mechanism (AFAICT). How many more disenfranchised customers are going to get "a direct line" to @davidmarcus? My guess is "none." This is a pure PR maneuver. The proof is in the pudding.

Even the email says that this is only the first step.

Re: PayPal CEO writes personal response

#43

Post by Apocryphon » Sat, Sep 08, 2012, 10:17 PM UTC

I've always wanted to have a spreadsheet or something to keep track of the "HN effect" in which companies respond to public outrages because of their publication here. Though of course they might also get attention from Reddit and other online outlets as well.

Re: PayPal CEO writes personal response

#44

Post by a-priori » Sat, Sep 08, 2012, 10:20 PM UTC

PayPal is starting to feel the pressure of all these new payment startups (eg. Square, Stripe) springing up around them. They know that if they're not careful with their brand image they're going to quickly lose their lunch in the next few years.

Re: PayPal CEO writes personal response

#45

Post by kmm » Sat, Sep 08, 2012, 10:22 PM UTC

sw007 wrote: post #30

UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #13

Why now? Why with this story? I've been reading similar complaints to that for years. Some of which were far worse in my view (i.e. taking money out of banks to repay people who weren't even seeking a refund because PayPal changed its mind about someone's product or service). Why does PayPal suddenly care? Is it because there is viable competition now?

Classic case of someone who just can't win whatever he does. People have been crying out for PayPal to change - he notices this, he emails the guy with a first class email but still gets criticised. Criticise him if he doesn't act, don't criticise the guy for being big enough to say 'hey, we have a problem, I want to fix it' - that should be applauded, even if it's come later than people would have liked - at least i…

Oh come on. He can't "win" by solving one person's problems. Will he give his personal email to everyone who has got his account frozen or large chunks of money taken away by PayPal? I doubt it.

This is a non-solution, which is almost worse than doing nothing at all, because it's active disingenuity.

Re: PayPal CEO writes personal response

#46

Post by rhizome » Sat, Sep 08, 2012, 10:22 PM UTC

sw007 wrote: post #30

UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #13

Why now? Why with this story? I've been reading similar complaints to that for years. Some of which were far worse in my view (i.e. taking money out of banks to repay people who weren't even seeking a refund because PayPal changed its mind about someone's product or service). Why does PayPal suddenly care? Is it because there is viable competition now?

Classic case of someone who just can't win whatever he does. People have been crying out for PayPal to change - he notices this, he emails the guy with a first class email but still gets criticised. Criticise him if he doesn't act, don't criticise the guy for being big enough to say 'hey, we have a problem, I want to fix it' - that should be applauded, even if it's come later than people would have liked - at least i…

"Real bad boys move in silence" --KRS One

Re: PayPal CEO writes personal response

#47

Post by rhizome » Sat, Sep 08, 2012, 10:23 PM UTC

yuhong wrote: post #42

rhizome wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is, this "fix" only came about outside of their entire customer service mechanism (AFAICT). How many more disenfranchised customers are going to get "a direct line" to @davidmarcus? My guess is "none." This is a pure PR maneuver. The proof is in the pudding.

Even the email says that this is only the first step.

Which leaves us only to assume there will be a second step.

Re: PayPal CEO writes personal response

#48

Post by gabaix » Sat, Sep 08, 2012, 10:24 PM UTC

UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #13

Why now? Why with this story? I've been reading similar complaints to that for years. Some of which were far worse in my view (i.e. taking money out of banks to repay people who weren't even seeking a refund because PayPal changed its mind about someone's product or service). Why does PayPal suddenly care? Is it because there is viable competition now?

disclaimer: I work for eBay Inc.

David Marcus was CEO of Zong, a small mobile payment startup who got bought by PayPal last year. When buying the company, the CEO of eBay Inc. asked him to change quiet a few things in the company culture. This email is one of the first step to improve customer service. Will he succeed I don't know, but you gotta give him the credit of trying.

Re: PayPal CEO writes personal response

#49

Post by comex » Sat, Sep 08, 2012, 10:25 PM UTC

skennedy wrote: post #12

Why now? Why this situation is it finally hitting home? What confuses me is that David acts as if these are new stories of accounts frozen, staggered access to money, and blocked recourse to customer chargebacks. This has been happening for years with hundreds of publicly written stories of bad will by PayPal.

The email mentions that this CEO took over only five months ago.

Re: PayPal CEO writes personal response

#50

Post by robbeezy » Sat, Sep 08, 2012, 10:26 PM UTC

The most effective way to show displeasure with a business is to stop being a customer. Period. You can't blame the CEO here - he's simply trying to stop the bleeding before Hacker News reopens it with a machete.

I've briefly worked for a payment processor - and I'm not overstating here - but this industry doesn't give 1/2 a st about your feelings of them, their customer service, or what you think of their CEOs. They only care about getting as much money as possible. Period.

Peteris, keep posting of your experience and let's see if the CEO follows through. If he doesn't he'll lose twice as much respect and twice as many customers. If he does, then know you got some very expensive customer service, my friend.