Do you or your parents have bank accounts in the US or in your home country? I would suggest working with PayPal to switch your account to your original country and seeing if you can then get the funds withdrawn.
I made $200K and PayPal locked my account
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Re: I made $200K and PayPal locked my account
#52Were you lying about being an american student?
No, I had an old U.S. account and I wasn't able to change the country. I created a venezuelan account later on, but I saw that the U.S. account provided some features, so I stupidly thought that was ok to then transfer the money to the Venezuelan account. I started to sell licenses while I was outside the U.S.
Exact same issue here! I moved to England and there's no way I can change my Country. So, my address is correct but not the Country! Paypal just sucks really!
I just wonder why don't you Emmanuel provide more information.
Re: I made $200K and PayPal locked my account
#53Apply for a TIN - taxpayer identification number. PayPal can use it in lieu of an SSN. This will take you six weeks. In the alternative, consult a local lawyer and have them nastygram Paypal for you.
Re: I made $200K and PayPal locked my account
#54When you say you're an international student, do you mean you're in the US on an F-1 visa? If yes, you might be in violation of your visa terms. If you have not researched this, please start reading at http://www.justanswer.com/immigration-law/330cd-holding-f-1-...
In this world, one must be born rich...
It makes it easier, but it could also be said that you should have checked the Terms and Services contract with Paypal.
Re: I made $200K and PayPal locked my account
#55From your comments, you had multiple PayPal accounts (disallowed), were in Venezuela, using a US PayPal account, then transferring the funds to a PayPal account in Venezuela, and can't provide a tax ID for the US account. At the same time, you went from zero to hundreds of thousands in payments in just a few months. To PayPal, you likely appear to be a criminal involved in some type of money laundering or tax evasion scheme. I don't know enough about student Visas and international tax agreements to say you aren't actually engaging in tax evasion, perhaps unknowingly.
It's not surprising they locked the account and asked for documentation. The tax code pretty much guarantees they would within a year in order to file the 1099-K on your account. This stuff is serious to them, both from a financial (the potential losses if this money disappears because it's not been moving legally) and regulatory fronts (US Patriot Act among others requires banks, like those underwriting your US PayPal account, to be able to accurately identify their customers). This might not be easy to fix.
Re: I made $200K and PayPal locked my account
#56Come on guys, this is definitely a fake message used to promote his widget on HN. What do you mean by "I do not know how I made $200,000?"
This does not make any sense at all. You get email notifications from PayPal once you are paid, you have definitely received emails from customers regarding technical support and/or presales questions. Also - you say you do not have any money at the moment, yet for 6 months you have tens of thousands of dollars in PayPal and you make no effort to actually claim them? What were you waiting for - to get to 1 million in PayPal before actually getting the money, while you stay penniless and hungry? Sorry, this is bullshit.
Sorry, I do not buy it and I find this method of "promotion" lame. At least next time try to make this a bit more believable, cause now it's hilariously stupid and I am wondering how many people here fell for this cheap trick.
Re: I made $200K and PayPal locked my account
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wow, that's just...mind-numbingly awful. If that's true, the Emmanuel just forfeits all that money? I suspect that a good lawyer will be able to recover most of it for him, especially since his presence in the US was not material to the earning of that income .
IANAL (which is why the OP should definitely talk to one). If the work that generated the income was done while he was physically in the US, then the immigration folks will definitely have an opinion on if it was legal under his visa terms. This may or may not have an impact on any potential legal remedies that are available wrt Paypal.
Yeah, as someone who has held an F1 in the past, the US authorities take a very dim view of getting income while you are here without authorization. I think actually committing misdemeanor crime is of less consequence to your legal status than taking money. We were warned about it very specifically.
I heard of someone who was deported because he was painting fences for some disposable income. My guess is that the OP actually needs an immigration lawyer, not a civil claims lawyer (or whatever they are called).
It's a sticky situation, and likely depends on whether the money was being posted to a PayPal account with a US or Venezuelan address/bank account, and whether he actually performed any work on turn.js while in the US. My guess is that if PayPal are asking for the SSN, he tied it to the USA, which is going to be a problem.
Re: I made $200K and PayPal locked my account
#58Sorry to hear about the troubles :( If this wasn't the umpteenth time I've heard this story, I wouldn't say this so pesteringly: To everyone: Stop stop stop stop stop using PayPal. This happens over and over again. For once, thankfully, there are viable alternatives out there -- Stripe & WePay to name two (both of which I've had excellent experiences with). Not saying they're panaceas or that there won't be security/…
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Re: I made $200K and PayPal locked my account
#59[deleted]
Re: I made $200K and PayPal locked my account
#60First, before you do anything else, find a reputable payment provider and switch your payment mechanisms over to that, so you don't keep getting money sent into a locked account. And with your new payment provider, make sure you sweep all money you receive out of any account they have access to as soon as possible, up to whatever limits they have on how much you have to leave around for chargebacks and similar. I'd g…
An International Student is unlikely to have a visa that allows them to start a company in the US.
You do not have to have a visa to start a company in US. Actually, you can start one without even being in US. Opening bank account for such company - is what tricky without being physically in US.