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Paypal Won't Release Funds To Slain Soldier's Family
robustyoungsoul writes "Popular sports blog Deadspin established the Adam Knox Fund for the purpose of raising money in honor of the fallen soldier who was killed in Iraq. They took the donations through a PayPal account.
Turns out now, however, PayPal will not release the money due to the way the account was set up on their end."
"Paypal Won't Release Funds To Slain Soldier's Family"
That isn't quite true, they are holding the funds until mid April, probably due to somebody screwing up. I'm not convinced that it was Paypal's mistake to begin with.
"Paypal Doesn't Want Slain Soldiers' Families To Receive Aid"
Come on now, yea, there may have been a mistake made, but it has nothing to do with the money going to a Slain Soldiers' Family.
Why the need for so much drama?
It could be worse, it could be Monday.
A more accurate summary should have indicated the money is frozen by policy for 180 days. So, paypal is not saying they won't release the money, they won't release it until April 13.
It probably sucks for the people who raised this money, but it also sucks for paypal that too many people set up these kinds of things with intent to defraud.
Hopefully with the noise raised and ruckus caused by sites such as slashdot, the resolution will become before April 13.
FTA:
Hopefully Adam's family and platoon isn't so depleted to not be able to function until April 13. Hopefully if this is so, paypal will figure out a way to disburse earlier.
Meantime, deepest regrets and best wishes to Adam's family for their loss.
They took the donations through a PayPal account. Turns out now, however, PayPal will not release the money due to the way the account was set up on their end.
"Paypal: We don't care. We don't have to."
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
I suspect that PayPal will release the funds within 24 hours of the /. report.
No one wants that kind of bad PR.
But this time, it's the real PayPal. I never trusted them, but this? The circumstance is already something that should have flexability, but they are just making fools of themselves either way. I've never set up a PayPal account, and I don't think I ever will. Thanks again, you caught these losers.
While I hate large corporations ripping people off as much as the next guy, I don't think this says anything that bad about PayPal. This is my guess at what happened:
So it doesn't seem the company is trying to rip anybody off or laugh over the graves of the dead. In this case.
SomethingAwful.com ran into a similar problem when they set up a paypal donation fund, to collect money for the Hurricane Katrina relief efforts. They intended to give the money to the Red Cross.
After more than $20,000 had been donated in a day, PayPal froze the account. PayPal insisted that they would be unable to donate the money that had accumulted before the freeze to the Red Cross, tho bizarely said they could donate it to the United Way. After finding that the United Way had a reputation for inefficiency, SA finally just threw their hands up in disgust and told PayPall to refund the money to the donaters.
Wikipedia has a brief writeup of the issue in their SA article, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somethingawful
Think about it - they are going to give up the money - but they must hold it for 180 days FOR WHAT FREAKING SECURITY (etc.) PURPOSE?????????
The ONLY reason for them to keep the money is to earn interest.
ANOTHER reason why Paypal should be considered a bank, and I'd like to see state and/or national legislation to due so. (Then I'll get back ALLL that money they owe me....)
THIEVES!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The reason why Paypal does this is because creating a charity account without being able to provide documents proving your charity status is suspect. It's a red flag. Another red flag is having a new account suddenly receive a massive amount of funds from many individuals.
To make things clear, the types of accounts that is:
A) New accounts
B) Unable to provide documents
C) Receiving many funds from many separate individuals
If you can't guess already.... accounts created by phishing scams!
The fact that this person is not a phishing scam is a travesty on the part that they were suspended, but the FACT REMAINS that they have no possible means to prove their innocence.
Yes I said prove their innocence. This is a company, not a trial. Likewise, they haven't been found guilty either. The reason for the 180 suspension is obvious:
If the people who sent them money start to increasingly cancel their money payments, then, bingo, the account is a scam. If they don't after a given time, say... 180 days, then hey the account is legitimate.
Paypal sucks, but not in this particular case.
Lesson learned to all: if you're going to claim you're a nonprofit organization, BE A NONPROFIT ORGANIZATION.
This site was not nonprofit, and was having the funds sent to their own, private account.
Yes it's sad, but ask yourself the following: could you trust a nonprofit paypal donation if you knew that they only had to casually mention that they were nonprofit? That they didn't have to prove it?
There's nothing stopping the people who run that website, other than personal honor, from pocketing the cash and giving the finger to everyone who donated. And THAT is why PayPal has those policies. I'm surprised that they'd even hand over the cash after 180 days in fact.
It's sad, yes: but in the future, they should know to make an actual nonprofit organization with its own account. Doing such a thing isn't that hard: you just have to apply, and make a seperate checking account. My club at High School did it, and the people in that club were a bunch of idiots, especially in High School (myself included).
-Vendal Thornheart
PayPal did the same thing when Dan Savage of the Savage Love sex column took up a collection for charity. PayPal refused to release the funds to him and would only donate them directly to United Way, a charity with a very questionable reputation. Don't take charity through PayPal, people. They're sketchy enough when you're buying and selling like they want you to.
Did you actually read the article? Oh wait, this is slashdot. Of course you didn't. Even the guy's personal blog admits that they will, indeed, get the money, and that they didn't set up their account correctly for this sort of online dontation gathering. I'm really not seeing how this is Paypal's fault. They have to have some safeguards in place to prevent fraud. And this has nothing to do with Paypal not 'wanting soldiers to get their money'; that implies someone actively made a decision to withhold the money on the basis of where the money was going. Sure, maybe they're being a bit inflexible, but that might get worked out in the coming weeks. That has nothing to do with Paypal actively withholding money from soldiers.
the CEO of Paypal must be a Michigan grad...
Help me take back Slashdot. When did 'News for Nerds' become 'FUD and Conspiracy Theories for Extremist Nutjobs'?
January 10, 2007 + 180 days != April 13. Something's fishy.
The deadspin folks claim that paypal wrongly flagged the account as a charity account, and that they (deadspin) did not ask for the acount to be flagged as a charity account. If that is true, paypal has no right to be witholding the money, and they are also obliged to correct their classification error.
Perhaps now would be a time to kick the tires on Google Money. Paypal is not the only 800lb gorilla around.
No matter what the "factual" details are, if you're on the same side of a dispute as a dead soldier's family, there's no possible way you can be wrong.
& I wish I knew the password to your heart . . . &
It's so gross to see a company pulling off this whole "we're not a bank" lark.
I think its about time that paypal were held accountable in a more regulated way, not saying it would stop this from happening, but you'd be sure as hell they wouldn't have phone monkeys telling customers there account was frozen because of a technicality on the signup form - I imagine the FSA would look pretty unkindly on a bank for saying "its just policy sir".
I've used paypal a bunch of times for merchant facilities, but decided it's not worth it after our first encounter with the supposed support people
</rant>
LOL, they think the United Way is less efficient than the friggin Red Cross?
Sorry but I have personally been through several disasters (hurricanes) and the Red Cross was the least helpful and had some of the rudest people I have ever met working for them. The Red Cross is a commercial entity by the way and have been nailed several times for inappropriate use of funds and fraud (Google it, I'm lazy).
The United Way on the other hand was very nice to work with as was the US Army. I'm not saying the United Way is perfect but they can't be any worse than the Red Cross.
They have the worst customer service I've ever run into
I didn't see anywhere that the donors were forbidden to retrieve their donations, or the account holder unable to refund all donations. If either of these were possible, then all the effort spent in complaining could be replaced with retracting the money and sending to a new account ( paypal or otherwise ).
The article has a post by someone who mentions haveing a charity account problem with Paypal in the past where they told PayPal to refund everyone's money. If that's possible then the money could be pulled out of the account by the donors and re-sent in less time than the current 3 month delay . Because they're pissed the authors make a stink about the 180 freeze, but since it looks like it based on the October creation date of the account April is only 90 days away.
Problem #1
A charity can not be set up that benifits a single individual or a small number of individuals and be non taxable. Thus to keep the IRS happy Pay Pal will have to see the not for profit documents.
Problem #2
If the fund is taxable, Pay Pal has to take care of the IRS paperwork for withholding the federal and state taxes. This money will be taxed twice, once when the fund creator gets the money and second when the money is distributed.
Pay Pal is stuck no matter what, the IRS will be all over them if they distribute the funds without following the correct procedures. If they don't distribute the funds, then the public is all over them.
Bottom line; the fund creator screwed up big time by not getting the lawyers in on this at the start. No good deed goes unpunished.
The same thing happened over the summer when a fund for the families of the firefighters killed in a wild fire was created. The IRS wanted to take half of the money. A special law was proposed to get around that (I don't know if it ever passed).
"Hi I'm from the goverment, I'm here to help you!"
Read the article, and it will be obvious that the person who set everything up is not only and idiot, but they are rude and foul-mouthed as well.
PayPal is doing what they have to, giving themselves time to investigate to make sure it isn't a scam. Scams like this are rampant, both with soldier funds and hurricane relief funds.
Considering the guy did NOT set this up as a non-profit, he is going to be in for a rude shock come tax time. Once PayPal releases $20,000 to his PERSONAL BANK ACCOUNT the bank will file a "suspicious transaction report" with the gov't. I wouldn't be surprised it HIS BANK didn't then freeze the funds for 30-90 days.
Assuming it is then released, the IRS is going to count that $20K as INCOME and will want 20-33% tax from this person. All his protestations of "but I gave it to the widow's family as a gift!" won't amount for shit.
Sure, he meant well, but he is going to be a living example of "The Road to Hell is Paved With Good Intentions" because PayPal is only the beginning of his descent.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Service members are entitled to a thing called SGLI. It's $5/month for $500,000 policy. It usually pays within a week of the death. I have seen it not pay when the member committed suicide or died in a DUI.
SGLI isn't required, but it's highly recommended. To deploy to Iraq without SGLI, a will, a living will, and multiple powers of attorney is actually more difficult than just getting them.
No one should be in Iraq without at least a $500k policy!
So, why does this guy's family need money from paypal?
I'd rather you do it wrong, than for me to have to do it at all.
Google Checkout was never intended to be a direct PayPal clone (AFAIK).
Google will never launch any product that directly competes with anything EBAY owns or does. Why? Because EBAY is (judging by the number of sponsored links and such) the largest advertiser on google by a large margin.
Someone could always get a loan (maybe against their house) and then send the money a little late. A loan would probably be 20-40 per 1000 borrowed. That really isn't that much to fix this, frankly.
Laboratree - Scientific collaboration based on OpenSocial.
Anyone who doesn't know that Paypal is famous for being customer-unfriendly has not been paying attention. Anyone who knowingly uses Paypal anyway, should not be too disappointed when the experience turns out to not be a positive one. It's entirely predictable.
An "exclusive relationship with the united way"
That sounds dangerously like theft. If a bank pulled that crap the treasury department as well as the justice department would be getting involved.
Your accepting money for a charitable cause. Specificly set up as a legal charity or not you accept the money like a bank. It tecnically belongs to owner of the account. No matter how you set the account up. If you refuse to release the funds to one relief organization but your willing to give them to another. That sounds alot like conspiricy and colusion to defraud.
This definetely falls under the catagory of illegal. Why cant the corperate officers be arrested?
Over the past few years, eBay has been slowly tightening the screws to get people to switch to "Business" accounts (i.e., the ones they get a percentage of every transaction on) as opposed to "Personal" accounts. First they made it so that you couldn't accept credit card payments on your personal account. (OK, fine, credit cards charge fees.) If you received a credit card payment on a personal account, you had the choice of upgrading the account or denying that charge. Then they made it so that you couldn't sell on eBay accepting paypal and NOT take credit cards, which meant you had to get a business account. (Not so fine.)
But what really pissed me off was the fact that, sometime in October 2006, they changed the rules again without bothering to tell anyone. They disabled the Deny button for PayPal payments for eBay auction if you had a personal account designated for that auction, and also made it impossible for the Payee to cancel the transaction! Before I just denied the charge, then sent a bill from the my business Paypal account. But now neither I nor my winning bidders could cancel the transaction! And both eBay and Paypal customer service (the phone support of which has been is a pay call to a call center that's re-routed to India) refused to do anything about it. I finally had to wait until it aged out of the system after 30 days, because I refuse to upgrade with a metaphorical gun to my head.
There was no e-mail or account notice of this on Paypal or eBay, just an update to the Terms of Service buried somewhere on their respective websites.
Thanks a lot, eBay. Way to ensure that GCash has an audience ready and willing to switch from Paypal at the first opportunity thanks to your heavy-handed tactics. Ditto for a GAuction, when it comes...
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Notice the use of the word "Had." I'm sorry, but responding to a problem like that with that sort of language is somewhat ridiculous. Paypal is supposedly following their own policy. You can respond to it by acting professionally, writing it up for the public, and then returning to PayPal and trying to get access to someone higher up the command chain, or you can do what they've done, and mouth off about it. Considering the way they reacted in text, I have a hard time believing that they acted professionally enough on the phone to make the PayPal representitive honestly feel they were there in good faith. As well, their request that people assault PayPal with phonecalls and other contacts is somewhat petty. Honestly, I'm not a fan of PayPal in the slightest, but this isn't the way to react to such things.
If I read correctly, the money is not for the family but is for care packages for the people in the unit he was in.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
I thought PayPal protected me from this sort of thing, and that I had credit card protection on top of that. Turns out when you sign up for PayPal you agree to waive your credit card rights (so no chargeback or refunds). The guy hadn't transferred all of his money out of the PayPal account (latecomers to the sale). I complained straight away, and did get my money back. But many people didn't!!! The ones that said "let's wait and give the guy a chance because maybe he's had an emergency?" were the ones that got shafted.
PayPal provides not protection. I've a friend who on eBay bought an 8Gb flash card (which was 4Gb under the sticker, and a factory QA reject) and a laptop that didn't work (made from parts of other laptops and the bad CPU didn't even fit the socket) and eBay/PayPal did nothing for that. There are often stories on the news about people ripped off usually laptops or jewelery.
Use PayPal or eBay at your own risk. Many do, but I won't.
LOL, they think the United Way is less efficient than the friggin Red Cross?
Yes, it is. The level of payment to executives and executive benefits is higher at the United Way. The percentage of payment that directly helps people is greater with the Red Cross, even if the people helping are rude.
Learn to love Alaska
They have every right to withhold the money until they prove it is an error. Just someone claiming there was an error in how the account was flagged isn't enough. It's very likely that on creation, the deadspin inadvertently said they were non-profit, since they are, just not documented.
Paypal has to put these sorts of safeguards in place since, as has been pointed out elsewhere, the way this account was set up looks *exactly* like a phishing scam account.
Your logic sounds like a lot of wishful thinking to me. Paypal is not a bank. Paypal has no rules or regulations to follow other than those they make up on fly, and there have been numerous instances of Paypal not paying or holding onto money for little or no reason. Go ahead and trust them. I have never used them. What's worse than a pay in advance credit card? Paypal!
I just wanted to say that I am glad that my community has taken a much more reasonable look at this situation. The title and tone of this post really makes me sad that they could be so vicious. Seems to really taint the service of Adam with all the profanity and ill will. From someone who served in the military this should come as no surprise to his family, hurry up and wait is the motto of all volunteer members.
God bless you and your family Adam, thanks for your service, and god rest your soul.
Your family will receive the support, be patient, greive for your loss.
If you have built castles in the sky, your work need not be lost. That is where they belong, now go out and build the fo
Someone made a mistake. Possibly Paypal, possibly the organizers of the fund.
My guess is that they had never set one of these up before and when setting up the Paypal account was asked many questions and they ticked of the wrong box.
This is not unreasonable due to those who tend to set these accounts up as scams. But putting the hold it forces the legit people to justify themselves and the bogus people to jump through hoops.
Now if you really want to be upset at someone it's the bankers who try to pull scams that caused these types of rules in the first place. The banking regulations that were tightened in the 90's. The Sarbanes/Oxley regulations that have caused increased accountability and paperwork.
Maybe but I said they didn't help and were rude on top. Lord help you if you make more than $10k/yr and need food from the Red Cross (probably doesn't help being white either).
At least in my experience the United Way helped everyone without prejudice.
Expect it to get bombed again... now that they've pissed off the military.
The level of payment to executives and executive benefits is higher at the United Way.
Yep. That's one of the two reasons I refuse to donate to them. If I'm going to donate to a "charity," they had better be sending as much of that money as possible on to the actual people in need, not lining executives' pockets and sending big contributors on fancy vacations.
The other is their insulting method of "partnering" with big companies to make it seem like you're required as an employee to donate.
"...always new atoms but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday." -Richard Feynman
mod parent up
too many con artists use paypal. a few delayed payments is worth catching these scum.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Recently, my dog and my girlfriend were attacked by a Staffordshire terrier ("pitbull") that was allowed to run off of his lead. Due to the extremely high vet bills for my dog, a friend of mine set up a donation fund and created a new paypal account. I didn't know about it, and then was surprised with a nice gift from my friends to help me through a rough time; it was all very touching.
However, Paypal would not let me associate my bank account with the account he created, since it was already associated with my account. So, we just forwarded the money in my friend's account to my account, where I then moved it to my bank account.
Apparently this set off some red flags for Paypal. They called my friend not once, not twice, but five times, each time asking him to reiterate why he created the account, what the money was for, and why I was putting it in my account. Each time he told them what it was for, why it was set up, linked them to the donation web page, etc., and the next day, they would call him back. Apparently they never made notes of the fact that they called him the previous day.
I'm very glad that I removed the money from my account as soon as possible, Paypal has been known to freeze accounts for various reasons, and it seemed like they were looking for a reason to do so in this case. The thing that I found most odd is that they put you through hoops to speak to a real person over there, but try to do something nice for someone, and they grill you like a criminal in an interrogation room.
If Paypal weren't so ubiquitous, especially among eBayers, I would never touch it again.
Whoops, your comment made me realize I was thinking "Salvation Army" not United Way.
Yes, the United Way sucks balls more than the Red Cross. Salvation Army was better than the Red Cross.
Let's take a look at it from the PayPal perspective.
1. An account is opened.
2. A LOT of people pay towards this account, within rather little time, accumulating also a LOT of money.
3. The amount should be withdrawn, all at once and also rather shortly after it's been set up.
Where do I know that from... Ah heck, pick your favorite fraud scheme, I'm not teaching scamming 101 here.
It certainly isn't in PPs intention to keep a soldier's family from receiving their money. But I can well understand that they want to make sure that it does INDEED go to the family and not to some con artist.
Or we'll soon see headlines akin to "PayPal helps con artist to pull off scam", and people will get their undies in a knot because PP doesn't do jack against them and doesn't even try to stop these things from happening.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"Paypal Doesn't Want Slain Soldiers' Families To Receive Aid"
PayPal is EVIL. It went from being merely obnoxiusly intrusive and officious to being downright EVIL when it was bought out by eBay. Both companies are all about greed and neither give a shit about fucking over their userbase. The problem with eBay is that Jane Average doesn't realize that there are better auction sites for anything more significant than "collectibles". If you are into books, music, tools, videos, firearms, art, high-fashion, etc. there are plenty of better online marketplaces that won't rip you off the way eBay tends to do. Just do a Google search on "online auction" + a keyword or three related to what you want to buy or sell.
PayPal is particularly pernicious. Most people don't realize that PayPal charges a small fortune for nothing more than a little convenience...and it isn't terribly convenient when one gets ripped off by eBay the way the family of this slain soldier are.
Remember, friends don't let friends use PayPal. It is anything but your pal!
"You're young, you're drunk, you're in bed, you have knives; shit happens." -- Angelina Jolie
If one sets up an account as a charitable org 501c.3, and accepts donations it is absolutely required (under Bush era anti-terrorism laws) to provide proof of standing. Just because this was done by someone to benefit a "soldier", that in no way makes them exempt from the law. My own experiences with PayPal have convinced me never to utilise their (so-called) services again, in this instance however their hands are tied by the Federal Government. They should not be expected to carry the can for this. The neanderthals who could not/would not read the setup instructions need to crawl off of their high-horse & quit trying to rally the hyenas for an attack against a company that is obeying the law & refuses to make an exception simply because the beneficiaries are in some perceived privileged group.
Paypal are cunts along with lots of these internet businesses. Because they are an "internet" business they think they can fuck around and steal things. Google shuts down accounts in its adsense program on whims... with no response other than a form letter. They claim they are "protecting advertisers" yet they dont refund the money to them.. instead they keep it. Paypal does the same "freezing accounts" or in other words "increasing bottom line profitability". etc etc.
Scams the lot of them. If paypal REALLY cared about fraud it would require ID like a bank does before you open an account. But of course, that would fuck em wouldn't it?
May be alittle off topic, but in regards to the exclusive charity relations. When i worked at UPS, they had an exclusive relationship with United Way. Whoever donated the most out of ones paycheck would get a prime parking spot close to the guard gate. A buddy of mine who also worked at UPS had an experience through his church where, they were organized to do some sort of charity work with constructing a domicile of some type(?) Point is, towards the end of all the work these local joint churches did, a woman who represented United Way came to the site and passed out free United Way t-shirts, then did some photo-ops with the tshirt clad churchgoers. The paper read something along the lines of `United Way helps people in need'. They did no work and took all the credit. Combine this with the corporate environment and this story/stories. Im losing confidence in most charity establishments.
Lern2Paypal IMO
Once the money is not going for the stated purpose, isn't this the only alternative?
I had a similar "assets frozen" experience with E-Trade. E-Trade makes a big deal about their 2-second guarantee - that you can make the trades you need to make when you need to make them. Well, I needed to do a trade to protect against a decline in a stock price but they wouldn't let me do it until a 6 month waiting period had expired. The stock price did decline and I lost about $20,000. That's large corporations for you.
Buddy, if your definition of evil is PayPal then you need some serious help.
I have read the Paypal horror stories. I still have and use it though but with caution. I set up a bottom of the line free checking account at a local bank and use if for nothing but Paypal. I even have a Visa attached to my Paypal account but that Visa is a debit card from the same checking account. When I want to buy something, I transfer money to that bank from my real bank or make a local deposit with just enough to cover the cost and then use Paypal. I guess my thinking is if I'm going to be buying stuff from FleaBay, I might as well use a Paypal account instead of sending money orders like I used to do in the past. I only buy a few things a year so maybe that is why I have not experienced an issue yet.
On that note, I may be back here next week with my own horror story about Paypal and saying the same thing as you are now.
Bad boys rape our young girls but Violet gives willingly.
The douche on the phone -- whom we hope goes home tonight and is fucking beaten by Jason Kidd's wife -- said that he understood the situation and that it was "unfortunate" but that "we have our policies. If you contact us on April 13 [the 180 days date] we will be reminded to deposit the funds, because the suspension would be over." That's the word that dicknob used: "Suspension."
The "douche on the phone" doesn't make the rules. He's not deliberately trying to piss you off or screw you around with your money. He is the messenger. Calling some call center employee names or wishing physical harm on them won't help you get your money out of the account any faster than insulting the kid in the drive through window at McDonald's will help your hamburger taste better.
Indeed. We all know that Ray Romano is the true definition of evil.
... and then they built the supercollider.
Why have the complaints and horror stories been non stop ever since they started then? If this was part of just a small number of isolated cases, swell, stuff happens, but this isn't the first time the bank that isn't a bank has engaged in "irregularities" with other people's money. They are allowed to get RICH using OPM, at least they should be more intelligent and professional about it. Comes a time you have got to separate some sort of normal profit from bung hole stupidity and greediness.
With that said, I have never bothered to get a PP account, based totally on the horror stories I keep reading about. Cheap debit cards that you charge up before a purchase and keep mostly empty are good enough for most merchants, paypal isn't worth the extra few seconds convenience. You can type in a few details in a form readily enough, paypal isn't even needed. Good idea, bad implementation, medicore to absurdly crappy corporate personality.
Consumer shunning is the easiest way to vote in our society. The political vote is a big fat joke, but the wallet vote is immediately effective for the individual, because you the wallet voter always win when you don't give your cash to nimrods. When all some company or even a project has is a paypal button, tough noggies, no cash from me. And for folks who say "big deal, they won't even notice", that isn't how you look at it, that's a who cares? deal, because using the consumer wallet vote, I win when I save my cash for something better. It's not about making them lose, it's about making you win. Extremely easy to do as well.
They do that where I work and I fucking hate that. Our supervisors go around with this line about how they "expect us to top last years numbers" and my boss in particular gives you that long, thoughtful exhale followed by the head shake when you tell him you're not participating.
Fuck the United Way. It's inefficient to the point of being a scam. The only thing worse is the people who call my house every three months wanting me to donate to some kind of police officer charity fund. It's for the families of officers killed in the line of duty and obviously that's a good cause. I donate to another organization here in Houston that does the same thing so I don't deal with the people on the phone. It doesn't slow them down in the slightest however. I've actually explained to them why I wasn't going to donate, told them I wasn't interested, hung up on them, and then been called back by the same person who got rude about my hanging up on them. I wouldn't piss in those peoples mouths if their throats were on fire much less give them any money.
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
This is just another example of how they're an unaccountable batch of trouble.
If your bank said "we have your money, but we're not going to give it to you for 6 months" you could work your way up the bank chain, or to the appropriate government agency.
Same if your employer said "yeah, we owe you money, but we'll pay it out in June".
Paypal? Nothing. They say no, and you're screwed. And they say no a lot. I think they just hired David Spade, actually...
What tweaks me is that in other cases (the Katrina fund issues, specifically) is they said "nope, sorry, we can only donate to United Way (?!?)... but here, they say "sorry, we think you're a bad man... so we're going to make you wait 6 months, and then put the money directly into your account. WTF? Paypal thinks that bad people are also chronically impatient?
I would love another company (BidPay?) to step up here and create an easy effective method of dealing with nonprofit or charity collections like this. I don't think it would take much change in their existing infrastructure, and the good PR and long term advertising benefits would be substantial. The question is, who's gonna step up to the plate?
If I knew the wedgies I gave you back in 6th grade would have resulted in this . . . I might have taken a moments pause.
Sorry bud I was thinking "Salvation Army" not United Way.
I agree the United Way sucks more than the Red Cross. It's the Salvation Army that I had better experiences with compared to the Red Cross.
they just might send in the US army to Paypal's headquarters and go get it (yeah, it's all digital but come on, you know imagining it is fun)
Google's Super Secret Search Algorithm: SELECT @search_results FROM internet WHERE @search_results = 'good'
I just spent some time reading the articles on deadspin, along with a myriad of comments that really don't paint the complainers in a very good light either. Sure PayPal's policy might be annoying in a case like this, but name calling, mud slinging, foot stamping and whining is not the way to make your case. They're not keeping the money... they're following the policies they've put in place, and publicly posted, to protect their own interests as well as those of the vast number of customers they serve every day. In case you haven't noticed, there's a shitload of bad people out there who spend every waking hour of the day trying to take hard-earned money out of our pockets with a never-ending parade of scams, rip-offs, lies, etc... and many times try to do so using PayPal. Making it inconvenient for a few might just possibly be saving tons of money for many would-be targets. It's not a desire to piss you off, it's a by-product of doing large scale business in a hostile environment. If you think ganging up on PayPal is going to force them into changing their policies, you're most likely in for yet more disappointment in your life. Maybe it would be more beneficial to take some of the energy being put into slamming PayPal and redirecting it towards public education.... and no, I don't mean letting the world know that PayPal sucks.. I mean let your readers benefit from your situation by describing what went wrong and how they might avoid the same trap if they choose to use PayPal for such an activity. It's called constructive journalism.... it wins awards and shit... really.
chown -R us
On that note, I may be back here next week with my own horror story about Paypal and saying the same thing as you are now. acts like a bank + not actually a bank = asking for trouble
see: payday loans, pawn shops, tax refund advances, paypal
banking laws exist for a reason
I don't think that follows. If Google competes with eBay, then eBay still has to advertise, and Google is still the place to do it. If anything, they might have to advertise more to keep the competition at bay.
... and then they built the supercollider.
This is a case where it sucks that I did in fact RTFA.
I feel sorry for Adam Knox, his family, and his platoon.
I don't feel a damned bit sorry for Deadspin. And I hope "The douche" who wrote the story on Deadspin "goes home tonight and is fucking beaten by Jason Kidd's wife" and then "have their entrails dragged through the street".
And I wish Slashdot could learn to not hype stories where there really is no big story, and to check all the facts before they post it. But that's about as likely to happen as it is for me to win tonight's Powerball drawing (that I didn't buy a ticket for).
I feel the sudden need to go buy something and use PayPal...
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
The longer they can tie up your money, the more interest they'll make. They've locked countless accounts permanently, keeping the money for themselves. Blah blah blah. Rabble rabble rabble. This is nothing new. Hardly newsworthy. Beware the terms of service.
This story smells.
The site author neglects to disclose a few things:
1. Are they paying taxes on the money?
2. How did they disclose their tax status to *both* donors and PayPal?
From the article, they are at fault, not paypal. It sounds like they tried to make some tax-free cash without setting up a non-profit.
So if PayPal just gave them the money, and the IRS stepped in, then PayPal would be blasted for allowing this to happen.
I'm not a fan of PayPal, but this story smells either: bogus, or skewed. Either way it's somewhat inaccurate and shouldn't be taken at face value.
Seriously. I'm down to my last $4 until payday (next Monday) and this story reminded me that I have $150 sitting, untouched, in my Paypal account. WOOT!
/. was good for something! ;)
I knew
1 is the square root of all evil.
No matter how much proof you show these bastards, they will do what they can to keep as much money as they can. Unethical and completely immoral.
http://www.fuckpaypal.net/
No, not Paypal. The /. community. It seems like every other post here is Google=GOD!, eBay/Paypal/MS/everything-not-Google=EVIL!!!!
. In fact, they're FOLLOWING regulations, not flaunting them.
Anyway, Paypal is just following the "Know Your Customer" regulations of the Patriot Act (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Know_your_customer)
Perhaps, if the moron hadn't signed up the account incorrectly (who the heck signs up as a non-profit without being one?!), they wouldn't have their funds locked.
At least in my experience the United Way helped everyone without prejudice.
My experience differs. When they told a 22-year-old me to "move back in with your parents" I decided they'd never see a red cent from me.
Both companies are all about greed and neither give a shit about fucking over their userbase.
Of course, and your baker makes bread because he thinks you're a nice guy and wants to help you out. Right.q
\u262D = \u5350
Okay, assuming unequivocally that Paypal irrevocably sucks, please name an alternative.
(Whether Paypal sucks or not is irrelevant to me: I'd just like to hear your recommendations for a like-for-like drop in replacement for auctions, donations and other internet transactions.)
In a situation like this the money probably doesn't belong to the account holder yet. It probably belongs to the one who sent the funds. But in either case, the money most definately does not belong to Paypal. Paypal releases the initial funds after 6 months in these cases (a rather extraordinary length of time) but Paypal is not entitled to the interest garnered on frozen funds no matter what the circumstances. Whether the charity is legit or not, I want the interest on my donation for the time period in which paypal held the frozen funds returned.
Whether you group those whose funds have been frozen by paypal, or you group those who donated the funds there is definately a class action to be made here. Paypal freezes accounts when they have accumlated large sums and then pockets the interest; they need to be stopped.
Umm, are there stories that show Paypal in a good light? I haven't heard / read any...
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
I actually came here to post exactly this. And the problem with United Way vs the Red Cross is that the United Way pays their management hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to do jack shit. They waste huge amounts of donations on unnecessary expenses, and they use strong-arm tactics to 'encourage' these donations at large companies. United Way is a morally corrupt vehicle to enrich the company's directors, and SA did not want to contribute to that.
PAYING with PayPal is rarely the problem. It's GETTING YOUR MONEY BACK from PayPal where all the issues come up. All their policies are designed to do one thing: keep the cash in their accounts, earning interest for them, for as long as possible. As a payer, I've never had any issues.
Dude, I think I can see my house from here.
1. Use Amazon.com Honor System.
2. Everyone who added money to the fund, demand a refund.
3. Don't trust Paypal with large sums of money ------EVER!~!~!~!~!
\
This would seem to imply that the Deadspin funds will have to go to the United Way. Of course the Paypal weenie was quoted in the article as saying that the funds would go to the "bank account on file" after 180 days, which would imply that Paypal doesn't consider it a charity account - otherwise it would have to go to the United Way.
So which is it Paypal?
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
The constitutions of big business (anything with widely held shares) pretty much says that they're out to make money. They are their balance sheet, and anything that the CEO says will help the balance sheet is what gets done. If you've seen the corporation, you'll understand this.
Small businesses, on the other hand, are often there because the owner likes what (s)he is doing and they get to make a living doing it.
I, for example, love solving people's problems. Many of the jobs I've had, I'd do for free, if I had the money from an independent source. Other friends of mine are completely mercenary about their jobs.
I guess that what I'm saying is that small businesses are an expression of their owners .... larger businesses too, but shareholders tend to be only interested in the profits.
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
You make some very good points, and yet...
Never underestimate the contribution of a bad user interface.
I have several times poked at the interface for collecting donations through PayPal, concerned about exactly the question that this whole thing hinges upon: Charitable Status. I'm not a charity, but could imagine accepting donations from people who want to support some of the sites I've created, as long as people clearly understand I'm not a charity. Yet it's hard to find anything in the PayPal user interface or documentation that reassures me that I will not be mistakenly offered by their software as someone fraudulently pretending to be a charity. So I've never done it.
I suppose what it takes to actually set up one of those things is a belief that "the right thing will magically happen", and I'm hardly surprised that this kind of misunderstanding happens when that kind of dicey analysis is what one is reduced to. So while there may be some sensationalizing in the story, and the story may even be focused on the wrong issues, I think the underlying problem of PayPal failing to deal with this issue explicitly is a real one. And it's hardly surprising to me, at least, that someone managed to get confused about what the effects of their setup actions might be.
It would be useful if PayPal went to a lot more trouble in its help documentation, its UI, and on the icons/buttons themselves to say whether the target was purporting to be a charity or not. (For example, the words "Make Charitable Donation" or "Donate (Charitable)" or "Donate (US Charity)" or "Donate (deductible)" might be good ways to highlight charitable donations. The end-user-donation interface could show would-be donors about the nature of the charity.) Further, I certainly looked hard for a paragraph or even a section saying what my obligations might be as a non-charity to disclose the fact in a way that was visibly apparent to people, but I found none such. Of course, if someone thinks I just overlooked something obvious, maybe they can point me to a definitive statement in the online button-making factory or the long, tedious documentation, where I definitively say "No, I'm not a charity, don't pass me off as one." and it definitively acknowledges "Ok, I understand you're not a charity and I'll make sure people know not to treat you as one". I'll be quite happy to find clarifications/corrections attached to this message.
Kent M Pitman
Philosopher, Technologist, Writer
And where, exactly, in the article, did they say they couldn't provide such documentation? In fact, I thought the article said that, at least according to Paypal's records, the account was listed as not-for-profit.
That didn't magically happen.
But, this is slashdot, lets just take the smallest amount of biased information and extrapolate that any corporate entity is Satan.
Obviously, MMO Patching Problems==Real World Money Transferring Problems.
The fund in question was set up (possibly improperly) with an explicit, legitimate purpose that all donors can be expected to know about. That means that it is not phishing.
No it doesn't. All it means is that the person who created the account CLAIMS it's not a phishing scam. Someone who was running a phishing scam would say EXACTLY THE SAME THING that these people are saying. They would CLAIM that they were running a charity donation drive for a soldier's family, they would CLAIM that they were going to send the money to them, and then when Paypal put the money in their bank account, they would wire it to Russia.
The way you do this RIGHT is you set up a separate, legal, non-profit entity, and in the ARTICLES OF INCORPORATION state that the purpose of the organization is to benefit John Smith's family, and that funds may only be distributed for that purpose, and then you open an account in that organization's name, not in your personal name. Then when you advertise that you're a charity, sign up for a charity paypal account, and people pay you through paypal and paypal says you're a charity, you can actually get your money right away.
Paypal is doing the right thing here. There is simply no other way that paypal can offer a donate to charity function without this policy. Does it suck for this partciular 'charity'? Yes. Is it ENTIRELY their fault? Absolutely.
paintball
IF the money is donated to the person whose house burnt down, and you collect it for them, it's not income for you, and you don't pay taxes on it. You can even collect it, deposit in your checking account, and then write a check to that person, still not taxable.
Additionally, if the money donated by one person to this person is less than the annual federal gift exemption ($12,000 I think), it's also not taxed. And even if it's over, as long as the donor doesn't exceed their $1 million total exemption, STILL not taxable.
So, no, no taxes.
paintball
Eh?
There's absolutely NOTHING new in Paypal doing this. They aren't regulated, so they can do what the hell they want to in effect. and you can notice this.
On top of that, atleast in one point, even fscking janitors could get to see your account info there!
It does get better tho... Rather than working honestly, in one case i had, i got a fraudulent order, found out about that myself
a day later, e-mailed them about the transaction needs to be reversed. This got to happen due to the fact, that they do not require any authentication at all to deposit more into paypal, as long as you have username & password.
I explained what has happened in detail etc. meanwhile, calming the victim down (who's account was stolen, victim of a phishing attack). I wasn't going to just send the funds to her, then the insane transfer fees would be lost etc. Total amount was approximately 150.
Almost 2 months later, i finally got a word from there... Nope, they hadn't read my e-mails, it seems it was automated message, saying the funds had been refunded etc. but the thing is, who's money it was, never got it. She noticed my Myspace profile 6months later, and she hadn't got STILL got it, while paypal had taken the funds from me.
In effect: Paypal decided to take the funds, without refunding them.
Nevermind the insanely high fraud amounts with them! I dropped them, after using them years and years, guess they calculated the
one time cash was worth to them more than continuing transfer fees.
People, don't use paypal, there is honest companies out there to replace them... That being moneybookers!
Pulsed Media Seedboxes
Most people don't realize that PayPal charges a small fortune for nothing more than a little convenience
That phrase right there sums up the business model of entire industries; care to explain what's so evil about it?
It's official. Most of you are morons.
What are you smoking?
I found this list of numbers from paypal sucks. http://www.paypalsucks.com/PayPalPhoneNumbers.shtm l
I think it would be possible to /. the phone systems! It would certainly be terrible if everyone in the company recieved 1000 messages in their voicemail overnight!
Call away! I've already left 5 messages!
P.S. I think that paypal can "see" what number you are calling from. So unless you are not a PayPal member, use a calling card, payphone or block your ID in some other fashion!
-Z
Paypal wants money too!
I fear the Y2038 bug
Dude, if you cant recognize hyperbole when you see it you will ah.. end up chastising people needlessly.
:@(
Think about the ramifications!!!
They told Paypal they were a charity when they are not. It's a clear and simple violation of Paypal's terms of service. Don't lie when you're setting these things up, and you won't have problems.
Hey man, you sound like you could really help me out. Do me a favor and fly into Indy and help me work on my old Ford truck. The mechanic is too expensive, even though he loves to work on these things -- especially the '79's. Man! You would think he would just do it for free!
FairTax baby!
I sugest that you read the post again. He is saying "PayPal is evil" not "Evil is PayPal". There is a difference you know.
That didn't magically happen.
Second paragraph, first (really long) sentence:"...they set up the initial Paypal account as a "charitable organization" account. (We do not know why they did this. We did not ask them to.)"
So the article doesn't say whether or not Paypal can provide documentation that the client asked for that account type, but they categorically deny that they did.
But, this is slashdot, lets just take the smallest amount of biased information and extrapolate that any corporate entity is Satan. Yup, this is Slashdot, where people make authoritive statements about articles they apparently haven't read.Paypal has all sorts of screwy policies, and overzealous pencil-pushers who follow them to the letter. I've heard of people selling airsoft guns (The real Japanese ones, not that sh*t you can buy in walmart now.) via buy/sell/trade sections of various boards, and then having paypal close their accounts and seize the funds because 'it is against paypal policy to sell firearms'. Yes, people have gotten their accounts yanked for BB gun-running.
:O
So this kind of nonsense is hardly surprising, though I do feel that the headlines are attempts to exaggerate the situation.
Note: I wrote this moments after I sent an email to withdraw my Play-Asia affiliate money to paypal... Let's hope paypal doesn't decide that import videogames are illegal this week...it is a substantial sum.
Friend: "The NIC is misconfigured..." Me: "No prob, I'll just telnet in and fix it." *Silence*
I tried your suggestion with a google search of "online auction electronics"
Buyselltrades.com was at the top of the list, here are the results:
CATEGORIES
> Laptops (0)
> Apple, Mac (0)
> Drives & Controllers (0)
> Networking (0)
> Services (0)
> Printers (1)
> Video, Multimedia (0)
> Monitors (0)
> Computer Systems (0)
> Components (0)
> Peripherals (0)
> Software (0)
This may be a bad example, but it seems most consumers
don't want to search the net for auction deals.
I know where to find deals, but does Joe and Jill Sixpack?
Cheers
Compared to what we as a small shop had to pay to our credit card processing company (who was the cheapest available when the contract was signed) PayPal's rates are very reasonable.
I am not surprised by this at all. Paypal face a lot of fraud but feel that they have a right to close accounts as they see fit.............. Never leave money sitting in your paypal account!
teh omg kekekekkekekekekeke!!!!11shift!!!1one11eleven
Russia?!? WTF? U mean Albuquerque, right?
No way in heck a real live Paypal employee was making any inferences AT ALL about the account until something had made one of the computers flag it for fraud. Dozens of employees (tasked to fraud/verifications), millions of accounts, hundreds of millions of transactions per year. You do the math. Paypal depends on the overwhelming majority (99.9 and keep going) of those being totally automated.
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
Then, wouldn't it be FAR more intelligent to demand the documentation BEFORE flagging the account as non-profit? I mean, the can refuse to create the account and to collect the money, but once the money is collected they shouldn't mess with it without a REALLY good cause...
People collecting for murderers and their families should not be allowed to claim any kind of charitable status.
Hmm. Looks fishy from the start, and I actually think paypal is doing the right thing here. Regardless, it seems as though this money is going to be used to buy things for the soldiers (magazines, games, snacks, etc) that obviously don't need any more distractions. Maybe they wouldn't have been ambushed in the first place if they weren't eating combos and whacking it to playboys...?
I know where to find deals, but does Joe and Jill Sixpack?
:-( Most suits know more about PR and especially damage control.
Fair enough. I tried http://www.onsale.com/ after searching with Google for "online auction consumer electronics". Not a bad site. I've shopped there in the past. Your point is valid. Most people do not have a clue as to how to pose a query to a search engine. PayPal/eBay get into financially raping such innocent people.
I'm surprised that no exec with a clue at PayPal didn't realize the horrible publicity they would obtain by ripping off the family of a slain soldier.
"You're young, you're drunk, you're in bed, you have knives; shit happens." -- Angelina Jolie
Compared to what we as a small shop had to pay to our credit card processing company (who was the cheapest available when the contract was signed) PayPal's rates are very reasonable.
Let me guess... You signed your contract with PayPal before it was part of eBay? And you have never sought a better alternative? PayPal is as predatory as the "pay day", "tax refund", and "auto title" loan outfits. Can you say "unethical"? Both eBay and now PayPal are milking suckers for every penny they can snag.
"You're young, you're drunk, you're in bed, you have knives; shit happens." -- Angelina Jolie
I meant signed with the credit card processing companies (who was part of Natwest as was). That said my infomation is probably out of date by now
Within the last two months, I got screwed paying and being paid. Needless to say, after I use up my current balance I won't use PayPal again.
From what I understand, the banks that issue various forms of plastic are getting more savvy about 'Net payment methods and are trying to compete with eBay/PayPal...but the latter firms got the jump when the eGold-type firms ran into a regulatory quagmire. I could be very wrong about that. All I do knows is that I used to use eBay and now warn people to stay far away from it and PayPal (which I am not gullible enough to have ever considered using).
Reputable, honest firms offer far better options for customers/clients to contact them than eBay/PayPal does. The slain soldier's family are a good example of how callous those outfits can be to "little people". On thing that saddens me is the way a large, mostly decent corporation, Google, has become dependent on the likes of eBay. At least Google has tried to compete with PayPal.
ebay/PayPal...just Say "No!"
"You're young, you're drunk, you're in bed, you have knives; shit happens." -- Angelina Jolie
Apparently not everybody loves Raymond.
Lesson learned to all: if you're going to claim you're a nonprofit organization, BE A NONPROFIT ORGANIZATION.
Guess what? Big Brother dislikes non-for-profit organizations because they interfere with taxing us to the max. It makes them jump though lots of hoops to establish themselves as such. Why not assume all organizations that accept donations from a wide, seemly unrelated set of donors are not-for-profit by default? Why not just scrap income taxes entirely? That would be too sensible...
"You're young, you're drunk, you're in bed, you have knives; shit happens." -- Angelina Jolie
Do people think setting up a Paypal account involves walking down to your local brick and mortar Paypal branch and showing them proper ID and bringing your papers? Have you ever set on up yourself? In case you havn't, here's how it works: you go on their website and click the "create a new account button", that asks you some questions (upgrade to merchant? use the money market? etc...), then it asks for a payment method (usually a credit card at this point) and that's it. Afterward, you have an account that you can attach existing bank accounts and whatnot to your Paypal account. At no point are you talking to a real person or is there really any room for screwup other than the kinds you make yourself.
Theoretically Paypal could set it up such that you have to call them and fax over documentation on your bank accounts and whatnot, but that would greatly increase the amount of staff they need and would almost certainly raise their fees quite a bit. It would also defeat the purpose somewhat of having an easy to use online payment system.
I read the internet for the articles.
Those "Firefighter Union Charities" and "Police Brotherhood Funds" that call you are basically a scam. They give the police/firefighters a lump sum and then call in their name and keep everything they collect. The overhead can be on the order of 95% when all is said and done. If you are suckered into contributing to one of those you'd better be ready to listen to your phone ring, a lot. They will promptly use your name in the other similar charity-scams that they've set up. I used to have a picture of two pledge kits from two "different" organizations (I even asked them when they called back and they denied all knowledge of each other. The two organizations were: The Brotherhood of the Police Chiefs and the Police Chiefs Brotherhood. Their logos were similar, but not quite identical, and the information packets on the inside were nearly identical. Interestingly enough, the former had pledges in the $35-$55 range, while the latter had them in the $45-$75 range.
From what I can tell, if you "pledge" but then never send in the money, eventually they'll put your name on a deadbeats list and stop bothering you. At least the volume of calls I get from "unrelated" organizations diminished a fair bit after I sat on 5 different pledge kits for a few months.
I read the internet for the articles.
You'd be surprised. Some bakers do just want to make the best bread and keep their customers happy -- the store is just an avenue of expression that means that they can afford to do what they like.. I know a few people like that.
Yeah, but Paypal isn't a baker, it's a financial institution. Bakers don't have to deal with federal regulations related to wire transfers, money laundering, etc. The sad fact if somebody wanted to create an account to help slain solders or whatever, they should have done it through a local financial institution. Then they could have linked Paypal to that account to accept funds.
With all of the people blaming Paypal on this, are they really wanting Paypal to do background checks on their account holders to make sure they are who they say they are? If not, then it's too bad that this error occurred, whether a clerical mistake at Paypal or through the way the individual set up the account, but this isn't a case of Paypal trying to bully somebody. It's a matter of following the federal regulations imposed post 9-11.
Not to Yoda.
>If PayPal wants to continue pretending to be a bank,
>they should be regulated like one.
Am I their only customer who never thought that they
were a bank?
I do some web programming on the side. I had always
been paid by check, but one of my clients happened to
suggest paying me by PayPal.
Why not? I agreed, he paid me, I transfered the money out
right away (OK, it took three days - certainly faster than
them mailing the check, me getting around to depositing
it, and the check clearing), PayPal took their cut and
everybody was happy. That same client always pays me
via PayPal now, and a few others have from time to time.
I never *thought* they were a bank, and wouldn't ever
think such a thing. They're an easy way to send some
cash over the Internet. I wouldn't use them if I needed
to process huge numbers of payments, or huge amounts; I'd
use a credit card processor. People use PayPal
specifically to *avoid* using a credit card processor!
Who *are* these mysterious people who think that PayPal is
a bank? I mean, other than those constantly beating the
regulation drum?
"Scammers setup fund to defraud slain soldiers' families"
Keep in mind that Paypal's business model is to aggregate a bunch of funds and make money off the float - collecting interest on funds stored on its system while paying out none of that interest to the account holder. That's how they can provide useful services for free. The policies that enforce delays in withdrawals can be justified by security issues. But it's also true that when they are applied across a platform of 90 million members, that extra interest adds up. But what do you bet this gets cleared up quickly.
Just remember the magic words 'ooo!! got to go, the wife just got naked for me' *CLICK*
Well, I guess that procedure is OK for a normal account... But given that it's an "special" kind of account and that you are expected to provide the documents anyway to withdraw the money (otherwise, why on earth do you want it in the first place), why not to ask them at the creation time and not when you want to get the money?
This way, they first get people's money, and then they decide what to do with it... Good business, I'd say... But just imagine you go to your bank, open an account, and after 3 months putting money in, you are told that you forgot some bureaucratic shit, or made some mistake, and that they won't give it to you... Crappy, ain't it? I think all of us would expect to be told about it clearly and at the beginning...
I'm curious as to what rights Paypal has to hold your money anyway.
[%] Cingular Ringtones
It stands to reason that eBay spends less than its total profits on advertising, and that Google only gets some fraction of eBay's advertising expenditures (though perhaps a large fraction).
Since Google knows how much eBay spends with them on advertising and can get info on eBay's profits, Google may have calculated that it's worth more to compete with eBay even at the risk of losing them as an ad customer. Moreover, eBay may well be so dependent on Google for sending customers their way that they will have to continue to advertise with Google anyway.
YES, this IS PayPal's fault and there SHOULD be this much drama over it. I can understand if PayPal originally made a mistake and that's why they wouldn't initially release the funds BUT, as soon as PayPal knew the facts (when the soldier's family tried to get their money and they explained the situation)PayPal should have IMMEDIATELY released their money and apologized for setting up the account the wrong way. PayPal doesn't HAVE to enforce their strict rules on them. By doing so, they are heartless bastards!
This reminds me of how so many other corporations get away with murder by telling their customers that "they can't do that because its against their policy" or "the computer won't let me do it". They hide behind their computers and strict policies so that they don't have to help you, even if it's their mistake. I just recently had a problem with Sprint. They made a mistake and I had to pay for it and their system wouldn't let them credit my account. How convenient (for them).
PayPal essentially has two types of accounts -- personal and business. When you create either type of account, you aren't required to provide any significant amount of documentation. This is mainly because PayPal assumes (rightly so) that lots of people will create accounts for 'business' and not everyone is actually going to seriously do business. Once the account is created, on the main overview page there is typically a link that says 'Recommended Steps for Merchants'. The price for not going through these steps is that you might run into problems later when PayPal wants to know a little bit more about who is receiving thousands of dollars.
OK - I read TFA - and of course I'm outraged. TFA suggests to call the number provided - oh as a note, you'll have to give them your Paypal account information...
Anyone else a little suspicious? How do we know they aren't just phishing for paypal accounts/passwords with a made up story about Paypal stealing from veterans widows?
Actually, Yoda would say ...
Evil, Palpal is.
The verb is either at the front of the sentance, or at the end (or both), depending on whether it includes the "to be" verb.
"away put your weapon"
"Begun, the clone wars have"
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
IIRC, Yoda's sentence structure actually fairly closely matches German grammar, rather than English.
The funds (if truly given to the soldier's family) would be classified as a Gift. According to the IRS:
Q: What is the gift tax?
The gift tax is a tax on the transfer of property by one individual to another while receiving nothing, or less than full value, in return. The tax applies whether the donor intends the transfer to be a gift or not.
The gift tax applies to the transfer by gift of any property. You make a gift if you give property (including money), or the use of or income from property, without expecting to receive something of at least equal value in return. If you sell something at less than its full value or if you make an interest-free or reduced-interest loan, you may be making a gift.
Q: Who pays the gift tax?
The donor is generally responsible for paying the gift tax. Under special arrangements the donee may agree to pay the tax instead. Please visit with your tax professional if you are considering this type of arrangement.
Some one will end up paying taxes on the money collected. The IRS doesn't care who collected it, where it was collected, or how long it was frozen before it was dispursed. They will get their cut.
- Spring
paypal's acceptable use policy lays out only one scenario for receiving donations:
/ use/index_frame-outside&ed=nonprofit
http://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=p/gen/ua
"To ensure compliance with state, federal and international laws, all charities and non-profit organizations that utilize PayPal to accept donations are required to receive authorization from PayPal before conducting such business. PayPal requires proof of tax exempt status or registration with applicable country specific regulatory bodies and takes certain due diligence measures to assure the legitimacy of the organization.
If you or your organization requires Charity or Non-Profit approval, please send your contact information, the URL address of your website, a brief organization summary and proof of your tax exempt or registration status to compliance@paypal.com."
there isn't another scenario listed for "receiving donations other than as a charity or non-profit". everything else is about goods or services. so, while perhaps noble, accepting donations when you are not officially a charity or non-profit lands you outside of their acceptable use policy.
It's far more likely that the user made an error when creating the account. That is all automated; Paypal doesn't really do anything other than provide the web site sign up. This is why the 'Paypal flagged the account wrong' doesn't fly with me.
Regardless of how crappy the procedure is (I really don't think it's bad), you're conceeding here that the error was on the part of the user (incorrectly identifying their account type or not taking the steps to verify/validate their account) and not Paypal.
It's easier to blame the corporations, though, than to blame the foul-mouthed blogger.
"What?"
The terms of service. Did you read the Terms of Service?
"What?"
English, do you speak it? Say 'what' one more time. Say 'what' one more mother fucking time.
"No, no, I didn't read it."
Then why you trying to treat PayPal like you read it?
I second that. My balance on my paypal account is zero, and it always will be. I just use them for credit card transactions and the occasional bank account instant transfer.
less is more
You sound like a
A) A proponent of small business above corporation, or
B) Communist
Business:
# a commercial or industrial enterprise and the people who constitute it; "he bought his brother's business"; "a small mom-and-pop business"; "a racially integrated business concern"
# commercial enterprise: the activity of providing goods and services involving financial and commercial and industrial aspects; "computers are now widely used in business"
# business concerns collectively; "Government and business could not agree"
# the volume of commercial activity; "business is good today"; "show me where the business was today"
# a rightful concern or responsibility; "it's none of your business"; "mind your own business"
# occupation: the principal activity in your life that you do to earn money; "he's not in my line of business"
# an immediate objective; "gossip was the main business of the evening"
# incidental activity performed by an actor for dramatic effect; "his business with the cane was hilarious"
# clientele: customers collectively; "they have an upper class clientele"
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn
Does Slashdot have a way to bring this back near or around 13 April?
Watch Deadspin?
The only thing new in this world is the history that you don't know.[Harry Truman]
I meant "payment was desired but optional." I hate making serious typos!
There is a fine line between recklessness and courage... -- Paul McCartney
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
It matches one way to say things in German, yes. But, as we all know, it's perfectly reasonable to speak the way Yoda does in English. It's just that nobody does in actuality. English does have major roots in Germanic languages after all.
A few owners of most of the US wanted to get the oil out of Iraq. The innumerable casualties include this stupid brainwashed or poor soldier. Some others have tried to accumulate donations for some reason. Paypals argument is simple: If the soldier is the type of person who goes out of his way to help the oil barons, then why should he not be of some use to them as well. After all they must at least maintain status quo.
Prof(Miss) A Mani CU, ASL, AMS, ISRS, CLC, CMS, IEEE HomePage: http://www.logicamani.in Blog: http://logicamani.blogs
> After finding that the United Way had a reputation for inefficiency
Do they?
Source please.
I've got no problem flying out to give you what help I can, but you'll have to send me an airline ticket.
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.