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PayPal Brings Mobile Payments To U.S.
An anonymous reader writes "PayPal is bringing the eastern use of the cellphone as a payment method to the United States. The company's mobile service aims to use secure text messages as a payment method for direct-marketing initiatives and other 'on-the-spot' mercantile opportunities." From the article: "To the extent that digital money doesn't feel like real money, it may increase spontaneous purchasing ... " This story offers more details on a discussion we had last month.
Now I can fall victim to a phishing scam anywhere
So, what's wrong with PayPal?
What do I need to know about PayPal and what about the lawsuit?
http://www.paypalsucks.com/
1. According to PayPal accepting their ToS (Terms of Service) in effect means you waive your rights to credit card consumer protection laws if you want to use their service, and that you may not issue a chargeback for unauthorized use of your credit card and PayPal account, or if you do, then they have the right to limit your account. Is this legal? We don't know. But it's how Paypal operates. See my credit card waiver page for more information.
2. Their customer service is horrible. They used to hide their telephone number, (intentionally - by their own admission) and only provided support via "form" emails:
"As for the customer service, Sollitto said they intentionally make the phone number very difficult to find in order to save costs."
This is confirmed in the book "PayPal Wars". If you have a problem, you are at their mercy! (And you will eventually have a problem.) The only reason their number can be found now is because they were forced to by law (EFTA Electronic Funds Transaction Act) due to complaints from users of this website. You can also click on our FAQs page. Just scroll down a bit, and you'll find their phone numbers, plus their toll free numbers as well, plus a huge list of unpublished PayPal phone numbers.
3. Their terms of service are not completely disclosed upon signup and some key "conditions" are not disclosed. They fail to mention their total lack of security to prevent your account from being compromised by phishing & spoof sites. That if your account is accessed by a criminal using one of these methods, PayPal will hold YOU monetarily & legally responsible! Also, no place do they openly tell potential members that their money is 100% at risk. That PayPal can, will, and has in the past, completely cleaned out customers' accounts, (including your checking or savings account) with no appeals process available. Instead they bury in the fine print of 37 pages of their "Terms of Service" (ToS) where they disclose to you that PayPal can close your account for any reason what-so-ever, or no reason, and then you have to wait 180 days to get your money. Think that'll never happen? Think again. That's what everyone thinks till it happens to them.
4. If PayPal feels your actions are questionable, PayPal is the investigator, judge, jury and executioner. "Telling your side" of what happened, in most cases seems to be irrelevant. They also refuse to provide you with the details of their investigation and withhold documents they relied upon to make their decisions. Your only contact will be an email that says:
Thank you for contacting PayPal. We apologize for the delay in respondingto your service request.
After review, the decision has been made to keep your account locked. This decision cannot be appealed.
If you have any further questions, please reply to this email.
That will be the end of it as far as PayPal is concerned. You can email back, but you'll just get more of the same. Oh yea, and you'll have to wait 180 days to get your money.
5. If you are a bona fide, up-standing individual with hundreds of successful transactions, but someone pays you with a stolen credit card, your account (by PayPal's own admission) is immediately flagged as being "criminal behavior" and any money in that account is confiscated. If a customer "disputes" the charge, same thing happens. (See email above.) PayPal claims that they will fight chargebacks, but read this before you fall for that one.
6. Paypal's fees for NON-credit card funding are the same as for credit cards! This is the single biggest rippoff on their site. We understand Paypal charging a fee when you fund your account with a credit card. After all, they are being charged by Visa/Mastercard, etc. And we understand there is a lot of fraud with credit card funding. However, most of the money sent withi
So, on top of the already outrageous eBay and Paypal fees, there will be text messaging fees. I'll be sure to use this on a regular basis. Paypal is already worse than my bank when it comes to ridiculous fees.
Just what we need, something to encourage Americans to make impulse purchases. As if we're not already enough of a consumerist impulse buying materialistic society already.
Hear recorded Slashdot headlines on your phone! New service beta testing. Just call (248) 434-5508
This is a logicalextension of paypal's increasingly omnipresent marketing and services.
Paypal has diversified into many diferent branches and while this new mobile payment may be subject to some criticism and a degree of scepticism it is likely that this will come to be as pervasive as credit cards.
...is to be able to take a picture with my camera phone of a barcode on an item that I want to purchase. This would bring up comparison shopping info about the item, etc. If I want to buy the item, I'd just push pound or whatever.
No parent will buy a cellphone to their kid unless the feature is disabled.
What a sensational business model.
1) Act and charge like a real bank, but don't say you're one.
2) Offer no real customer service, treat customers like thieves, offer no financial protection, unlike a real bank don't be forced to implement security and continity controls
3) Profit!
This interests me primarily because PayPal was originally designed as a mobile payment service for PDA users. Mobile phones now incorporate a substantial amount of functionality that was once restricted to the PDA.
Maybe their original idea was simply ahead of its time.
TextPayMe already provides this exact same service. I wonder if they have a patent on it.
To hear about the sheer number of horror stories the parent talks about, go here: http://www.paypalsucks.com/ I've been ripped off once, but it was a small amount. PP's customer service was in the toilet. All automated, impossible to get to a real person. And no, they do not have FDIC backing or anything. So they are free from the rules that constrain most banks/require them to insure your money. They have a monopoly and thus get away with this. Once that starts eroding, they'll actually give a shit. Just look at IE...M$ has just started working on IE7. When FF was non-existent, the world had to live for years with a stagnating standards-incompliant browser. Something will have to break eventually, and let's hope ebay doesn't have too much leverage in this market (competition is building, but it could be growing a lot more than it is).
Do not downmod posts "overrated" simply because you disagree with them.
Secure & text message don't really belong together.
SIM cards & phones can be cloned. IIRC, the text messaging network is susceptible to a DOS. Your cellphone isn't a credit card... you can't exactly charge back someone else's impulse buy.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
so far the only thing they seem to be pushing is cd/dvd sales -- how the hell could it possibly be convenient to buy a cd via paypal via phone? why would i want to send a text message, and then receive a call in order to find out the price and shipping?
if i want music, i want it now, so if i'm shopping i will buy it at the campus music store, or if i am home i will buy it on itunes. the only time i buy cd's online at all are when they are not on itunes or at the cd store.
there's still hope though!
what if i could buy my movie tickets on my phone instead of waiting in line at the theater? that would actually be cool.
-- lol pwned
All the more reason to steal someone's cell phone...
"When life gives you lemons, don't make lemonade. Make life take the lemons back!" -- Cave Johnson
So now after the hookers done, all I got to do is text her?
We'll call it Pay4Pal.
$sig$
How do they overcome the problem of the phone being lost or stolen, and somebody else just using up all the person's available Paypal account? This is a pretty serious concern.
the parent will have to learn their kid to not spend moneeeeee too, I presume.
Seriously though, even adults will have problems with this. Most people actually have extraordinarily weak constitutions, and the only thing preventing them from binge spending is laziness. If they can order/spend money on stuff instantly, on something they constantly use, we'll see the economic deficit widen even more.
The current financial system is rigged to make people go into ridiculously huge amounts of debt. Combined with the childlike nature of most people, it becomes a near certainty. Remember, whenever someone needs to go in the hole to buy something, the value of the money is decreased because the person has to spend more to pay for an item of a certain value. That, combined with a brain exodus will force us down the economic ladder. An individual cannot go into infinite debt and once his/her spending power runs out, he/she cannot buy. The inability to buy slows down the economy for everyone. In the long run, it causes growth to shrink to zero and even recess.
Sadly, nobody can do anything about smarter consumer spending. People will continue to do things no matter how much you tell them not to. THIS could sink us.
Do not downmod posts "overrated" simply because you disagree with them.
This problem has been solved years ago and the average mobile phone is more than capable of working as an electronic purse. A mobile phone needs no centralized network to process transactions and most certainly is more efficient and trackable than paper currency and Visa/MC association payments.
A tangentially related way to see how abusive things are in the association world is Walmart wants to open a "bank" so they can keep a piece of the Visa/MC Association rent.
The way this will be implemented will be the same old very inefficient way of processing payments with each company in the "chain" demanding their pound of flesh along the way.
This idea is DOA.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
I'd like to take the word tonight to whine about PayPal not supporting my country, Bulgaria.
Every time I see a PayPal donate / purchase button I'm automatically filtered out since they just don't support my country and declineto accept my credit cards if I try to sign up.
For what is considered the most popular micropayments system in the world, they'd do better to hurry up and actually support the world..
We have this in Norway already, typically you can pay for parking and charge your telephone with additional minutes of talking time.This alone is not so bad, however we have tons and tons of "SMS services", where you can participate in polls, competitions, drawing of prizes, and yes, there's the SMS sex market and SMS dating services.
Though this is consumerism at its worst, and the same people who can't resist wasting all their money on internet poker, waste their money on those SMS services. However the environment isn't going to be hurt as much by this, as, for example all these unneccesary plastic products and heavy plastic wrapping, which TV commercials and heavy catalogues already make people buy. Sometimes, the wrapping is so heavy, so you would need the very tool inside the package you try to open, to breach the plastic.
So it isn't like you have a choice anymore, to choose environmentally-friendly products. And btw. norwegians are now soon driving cars as much as americans, which means we are getting fatter too, since the oil is still relatively cheap in Norway, that is, compared to our levels of salary, an important point many spoiled norwegians don't realise.
(UN usually states that Norway is one of the world's richest countries, which is true if you look just at the average income of norwegian citizens.)
Believe therefore all these SMS competitions and poll services as described above are worse regarding consumerism, than simply being able to pay all those small fees, which demands unpractical amounts of change to reside in your pocket. Parking btw. is mostly paid for, with your credit/debit card, and not with text messages, since the latter IS more unpractical, than simply inserting your card and typing the 4 digit code. So one could say that perhaps being able to easily pay for your parking (either by credit card or SMS), is somehow contributing to 'consumerism', however paying your cinema tickets, or being able to pay for your tram ride, would not, so it would depend more on the type of service or goods you pay for, if it is consumerism, or not.
Guy: "Hi, sir, Could you help a poor man out and let me borrow your cell phone for a quick moment to call my family? I'm going to be late for my daughter's birthday." Me: "Sure, here you are" Guy: "Thank you kindly, sir.." Guy: *transfers cash to his paypal account, while pretending to have trouble figuring out the phone* Guy: "Ah ha!" *after having transferred the money and pretending that he finally figured out what to do* Guy: *fakes a call to his pretend family, while actually calling his voicemail* Guy: "Thank you sir! ^__^" Me: "No problem! ^_^" This'll be fantastic!
"Everything worth innovating today will go to court tomorrow."
What if they offered this on other handheld devices?
Then you could transfer funds without paying cellphone fees.
For example, you could make payments over the infrared interface of a PDA. You could even "beam" someone money to settle a restuarant bill.
This would also be possible with 1999 techology.
In fact it was done, and this is one of the key PayPal features from their launch. It got quietly dropped on the floor a few years later.
Does that mean we can have our own little Donate Now text message or recording on our cell phones?
I don't know if someone disagrees with the parent post. Indeed, they may have reason to disagree with it, and good reason.
Moreover, the parent post did not go into much detail. So I can even see where an ignorant modder might think that the post is a troll.
However, there have been *tons* of people cheated by Paypal in combination with real thieves. I am one of them. That is, Paypal showed that they have no incentive to either use the insurance that they advertised they had; and they showed that they had no incentive to fight or even try to determine the real thieves. So in the end, the ended up supporting the thieves against honest businesspeople.
Moreover, this issue has been rehashed much on Slashdot. There really was no need to go into detail. Indeed, there are others on this website who went into better detail.
But it is by no means a troll. So in general, I would have left this one as it was, at a score of 2. If there is a moderator around who is willing to spend a mod point in bring this back to honorable obscurity, I think it would be well spent.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
I see this as a great way to get rid or receipts. Lets face it, they always give you a receipt, but ever since I was able to look at my statement online, I've never worried about receipts. Think of how much paper this will save!
No Sigs!
What is wrong with you people? Do you read things at all?
1) Your kids can't spend your money. You still need a paypal account to buy things, which they don't have.
2) Your money can't be stolen. You text the request for money to be sent, and they CALL YOU BACK, asking for your PIN number. If you are the only one who knows your PIN, no unauthorized transactions can go through.
3) this service can be convient for magazine and catalog shopping. No need to call in, or go to a computer.
A mobile phone needs no centralized network to process transactions and most certainly is more efficient and trackable than paper currency and Visa/MC association payments.
Of course it needs a centralized network. Otherwise, what's to prevent me from hacking my phone and changing the amount of money that I have?
I understand what you're saying, in a sense: the transaction processing does not have to be centralized but it definitely must be authoritative. Without an authority, you must trust the phone to accurately report the amount of money it has -- clearly not workable. Thus, centralization is certainly needed.
Next we will explain how freedom of speech and democracy work.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Bless their hearts, but, how did the editors decide a PayPal article should be placed in the Hardware section of Slashdot? :)
Paypal has a hard on for "limiting" account access for just about any reason today. Does anyone see the nightmare of trying to use paypal on a mobile phone? You had might as well call paypal and ask them to suspend your account, because 10 seconds after you sign up for "paypal mobile" your paypal account will suddenly have "suspicious" activity (you actually using it)and will be limited for "your" protection. Paypal limited my account access when I was using my paypal debit card out of state (one state over) to buy GAS. It was just ONE transaction and -that- triggered their fraud flags?! Maybe if google was doing this, but paypal, forget it.
"Jeremy, you need to get to an internet cafe and cut and paste some appropriate sentiments about me from the world wide
Now I can lose my cell phone and my credit card at the same time!
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
Woudln't the phone need to have some way to encrypt these text messages before sending them? I know none of the phones I have had in the past do not encrypt the messages. This would also mean that if they did come up with some way to encrypt them, pre-existing phones would not have the ability to use this service.
Will they allow phones that do not suport this level of security? I would guess yes they will, because I dont think it will be secure in anyway.
TruePunk | Games
The company's mobile service aims to use secure text messages as a payment method for direct-marketing initiatives and other 'on-the-spot' mercantile opportunities.
What's a 'secure' text message?
Also as 'in USA nobody uses text messaging' who is going to use it?
People actually have to pay to receive texts in the US (utterly idiotic at best) - is this how they are going to generate (even more) revenue from users? Will we see tiered text pricing from operators as they are able to effectively tax users?
A touch of comedy with an added smell of satire is the medicine.
Short and sharp was my motto, and it will probably be my undoing.
Appreciate the added commentary surrounding my post. For right or for wrong, I can see around 50% believe it's troll and the other 50% believe its informative.
Good day!
So when are we going to be able to buy drinks from a machine using our cell phone?
This was a great idea from the 90's and I know it was put to use in Japan (don't know if it's still going well or not) but how hard could it be?
Wich means shopping outside my own country is out of the question.
I only care for MMO games especially since the answer exists. Just look at Sony. They use a company called GlobalCollect who make it their business to have payment system everywhere.
Sadly most companies online are american and they can't understand the concept of not having a credit card.
Oh well. Less chance of me wasting my money I suppose. Like on that oblivion horse armour. Credit card only you say? Oh well, wonder if someone already posted a torrent of it (and yes I did buy the original game, the collecters edition even)
Pretty smart Betheseda. Force a paying customer to piracy by not accepting non-credit card payments.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Just because it's a rant doesnt mean it's a flamebait . And about Paypal Vs CC clearing : Paypal account freezing policies are much worse that any CC clearing company , in Israel cc clearing is around 1.7%, and as low as 0.65% for gas stations and travel agencies , with no per-transaction fee at all , setup fees , monthly fees or gateway fees . .The ebay integration is what keeps this company alive and I am confident that 80% of it's revenue is generated throgh Ebay's sites .It has very little use outside it ,unless you just dont have a CC with you(or at all)
Since here (in Israel) the credit cards are the same as in any other part of the world (Visa , MC , AMex , Diners) I don't see why should small merchants pay the 2.9%+ 0.3usd per transaction in the US , and risk fund freezing(plenty of PayPal horror stories) . Paypal is used mainly for two reasons - Ebay and really small merchants
A Paypal transactions doesnt make much sence for a merchant outside of ebay . Every merchant allready pays the CC clearing fees (because no one in their right mind would actually not accept credit cards) , so a paypal transaction would just cost more , and moreover it would actually hurt the merchant's chances of getting better % from his CC clearing company .
My Starcraft 2 Blog
If you have access to the barcode on the item, you probably have access to the actual item, which means you are likely in a place where you could just buy the item without using a camera or a computer.
Then I guess I should mention Netcraft :)
But there's the "Open Phishing Databse" for you. They don't seem to have any evil firm behind them: http://opdb.berlios.de/.
The example in the article is idiotic. Who is going to pay for a CD with a cell phone via text messaging? This would be insanely slow and inconvient.
But it is ideal for vending machines. How often have you wanted something from a vending machine but had no change or cash on hand? Being able to text a message to a vending machine to pay for an ideam would be extremely handy.
I am sure that I have read elsewhere that a system like this was already in use in Europe or Japan. Can anyone comment?
Yeah, this is what we need in the U.S.: more consumers spending money at random.
We already have a negative savings rate combined with large amounts of consumer debt (for some of us at least). Thrown in the continuing increases in government borrowing and you have a royal, financial mess.
I've said it for well over a decade (maybe 2 decades) that the only reason this country keeps running is because of all the crap people buy. I don't mean necessity items like food, clothing, etc but all the knickknacks that people buy and sit on shelves doing nothing but collecting dust (and helping to contribute to their allergies).
How about we not provide a new way for people to spend willy-nilly and start doing some serious education on money management. I propose we start at the top with the Congress and White House since they seem to think money falls from the sky.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
but this one isn't? moderstors are inconsistent, which is why /. sucks anymore
When out of cash and desperately trying to get home in the middle of the night, handing over a credit card to a taxi driver armed with carbon paper is truly an unsettling experience. This would be perfect for that.
The difference, though, is that BillMonk today is little more than an electronic IOU service. PayPal handles actual funds.
I can see the two complementing each other, though. In fact, I think it is BillMonk's goal to partner up with services like PayPal.
I love BillMonk, by the way.
my CC expired, forgot I hadnt update paypal, tried to use paypal, was denied obviously, I tried to change the exp in my settings, it wouldnt let me, paypal has no way of changing a CC's exp and not the CC's number, thats how captial one does it, same CC num, new exp. So I delete the card and try adding it again, cant my card has been flagged for EXSESSIVE declines, yup, one, thats all it takes. I cant add that number anymore, after numberous calls and emailed they tell me its capital ones problem and to tell them to issue a new card.
try getting a refund from them ? expect 2 weeks. I transfered money to my wife, realized it was going to cost me $10, so she declined it, end result... wife had no money in payapl, I had no money in paypal, and refund on my CC took 2 weeks.
PKI solves the problem quite elegantly.
"Bad" phones have their key revoked.
This mentality is exactly why the Association gets to abuse individuals.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
The U.S. Navy has a decentralized payment system aboard many ships.
Practically all the cash aboard U.S. Navy ships is replaced with an electronic purse. Authorization is handled between the terminal and the card. No network required.
And, yes, the wireless providers are their own worst enemy in this situation. They definitely can't see the forest through the trees. Which is why they'll probably be the last ones to do it.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
I don't think you're correct about bashing Paypal's customer service. I buy things on Ebay all the time, and when one of my items didn't come and the seller wasn't responding, I filed a complaint with Paypal. Within a week they had contacted the seller and refunded me my money. No problems whatsoever.
> Besides. My sig is irrelevent to the point of my post. I was posting concerning the security of paypal's new service, not anything to do with the offer I have in my sig.
You were posting about how this would make other people more vulnerable to scam when you yourself are currently enmeshed in a scam. That is relevant, because it points out that you have experience with scams and how you are offering to help sign people up for one.
That said, these things are only scams when they shaft other people.
Other people are stupid.
And if you want to take your new-born child home from the hospital, this will be the defacto hospital feature; just present the barcode on the coercively-created BIRTH CERTIFICATE to their CORPORATE SOLE FICTION for which the new-born child becomes chattel to, then proceed to the checkout window to discharge the debt with HJR192-approved fiat currencies. Phone numbers are just like SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBERS: first they are voluntary, then they are a business pleasure, then they are accepted as custom, then they are demand under threat and duress and coercion. No Birth Certificate; No Shoes/Shirt; No SSN; No xxx-Insurance; No Phone Number; No e-Mail address: no service.
When a nation is at war, or customs and law interwind to irrational procedure that disturbs the peace; everyone is a possible enemy-in-the-field. Given none have ever needed do declare war, it is self-evident there has been no peace since 1933 and the Act known as TRADING WITH THE ENEMY ACT as ammended to include enemies "domestic."
without prejudice
Cell Phones are just a branch of commercial speach, one degree from the capabilities of free speach on tranceivers or related utility secured with a controlling interest and used at capacity.
Where an offer can be made, there will always be an acceptance for value: buy and sell. Presidents know this, and terrorists know this (blurry line today).
I have yet to see someone that hasn't promised an order or reservation over the phone; the primary use of a Cell Phone. And with the history of how things came about, postal letter mail at the general post has been covered if not completely displaced by the commerce brought in general-delivery of mail matter to a United States mail box brought from a City to the dense townfolk on the border.
without prejudice