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Abiword's PayPal Donation Fund Robbed

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the some-scum-can-walk dept.

SabberFlapper writes "According to this Announcement to the developer list of Abiword the Abiword fund was robbed. Dom Lachowicz writes: 'I'm duty bound to let you all know that the AbiWord Fund/Tip Jar has been robbed approximately three weeks ago. I'm telling you this now, rather than sooner, since I believed that Paypal would do something about my complaints during the interim, and that this would all be resolved quietly. Today, 23 days later, this does not look like it will happen. [..] I do however, recommend doing several things: 1) Writing to Paypal, in letter, email, or fax form alerting them to this travesty. 2) Calling Paypal on AbiWord's behalf. 3) Writing or calling your Congressman/woman, pointing out that Paypal is acting like a bank, but not operating under formal banking laws. 4) Boycotting Paypal because of these reasons, and the fact that their system is notoriously insecure, and encouraging others to do the same.'" Of all the groups to steal from -- AbiWord?

8 of 510 comments (clear)

  1. What surprises me by einhverfr · · Score: 5, Interesting

    is that any business which faces any regulatory liability would not stand by their customers, esp. under a threat of letter writing campagns to congressmen who have the potential to do some real damage via congressional inquiries....

    --

    LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
    1. Re:What surprises me by alexburke · · Score: 5, Interesting

      PayPal isn't a bank. They don't claim to be a bank. They are not insured like a bank. So why should they have to act like one? They are a payment clearinghouse.

      I call bullshit -- or at least misinformed.

      Not only do you accrue interest on the cash balance in your PayPal "account", they also have a money market fund you can invest in.

      If they aren't trying to be a bank but saying otherwise, I... never mind.

      My point is that PayPal are whores with the ethics of a petty thief, and I sincerely hope eBay straightens them right out.

      However, since I read about the debacle of eBay CSRs getting told off for shutting down questionable auctions because those auctions belonged to Power Sellers (eBay's most profitable customers), I'm now questioning eBay's ethics/morals as well.

      *sigh*...

    2. Re:What surprises me by SurfsUp · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Western Union isn't a bank, and neither is PayPal.

      Why did you just post 17 articles in defense of Pay Pal?

      --
      Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
    3. Re:What surprises me by mosch · · Score: 5, Interesting
      I've had to deal with amazon.com's customer service, and it's no problem. They don't have a phone number, but they answer emails quickly and helpfully.

      sprint on the other hand is a really disappointing company... i'm getting rid of sprint, though for entirely different reasons.

  2. Pro-bono lawyers might help here by no_such_user · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I hate to jump to "lawsuit!", but this is an instance where a sternly-worded letter from a lawyer might at the very least get their attention. Unfortunately, you'll end up spending more than the stolen funds to pay said lawyer.

    Any lawyers out there willing to help out AbiWord pro bono?

  3. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  4. Done and Done... by Incongruity · · Score: 5, Interesting
    After reading about all the trouble with paypal, I have cancelled my account. I will now also be sending their customer service folks an email explaining why I cancelled my account.

    Even if they do outsource their support to India, I'd bet they keep some sort of stats about emails and the issues covered...maybe if enough people complain and cancel their accounts someone will listen...unlikely but it's worth a hope.

    -tcp

  5. Pay Pal is sleazy by SurfsUp · · Score: 5, Interesting

    My wife opened a Paypal account for me, and one for herself, then transferred $6,000 from my account to hers. We didn't see that money again for three months, as they pretended to be "investigating" the transaction for possible fraud. Never mind that we talked to them many times on the telephone, and send proof of our ownership of the accounts several times, and pleaded with them to resolve this, as we needed the money.

    The delay was beyond any point of being able to pretend that they actually made any effort to resolve the situation. It was in fact more than 10 days after we first contacted them before they would even open what they call an "investigation". They claim that their procedures are set up to combat fraud, but it's just a way of establishing deniability. That is, they pretend that they have no intention whatever of stringing me along as long as they can, while they collect interest on my money. (And no, they never did offer any compensation for the lost interest, let alone the many hours we were forced to spend pursuing them, to get our money back.)

    You think mine is an isolated case? It is by no means. Just do a web search for paypal+complaint. See all the distressed people. See the lawsuits.

    It's a transparent scam: by locking up the money of only a certain percentage of their customers, and treating the rest reasonably well, the people who claim that Pay Pal engages in a pattern of sleazy misconduct will never be believed, because they will always be outnumbered by customers who have never had a problem.

    That doesn't make it right.

    --
    Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.