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FCC Nixes PayPal's Forced Robocalls Plan

Posted by Soulskill on from the don't-call-us,-we'll-call-you dept.

jfruh writes: As part of a new user agreement created in preparation for its spinoff from eBay as an independent company, PayPal told users that the only way to avoid advertising robocalls from PayPal and its 'partners' was to stop using the service. This caused something of a firestorm, and now the FCC is saying the policy may violate Federal law, which requires an explicit opt-in to receive such messages.

10 of 122 comments (clear)

  1. Oh. by HideyoshiJP · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I hadn't bothered reading the new terms of service. Had I read about this before this FCC news, I would have cancelled. They've always been a little shady anyway, always wanting to ride that line between a service and a bank, while not wanting to fall into bank regulations.

    1. Re:Oh. by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      They've always been a little shady anyway, always wanting to ride that line between a service and a bank, while not wanting to fall into bank regulations.

      Although eBay/PayPal appeared to be one company, they were separate business entities inside the company. I worked help desk for them prior to the Great Recession. Any hardware with an asset tag and licensed software got separated for either eBay or PayPal, as PayPal fell under the banking regulations and played by a different set of rules than eBay. If you were employed on the PayPal side, your credit record had to be in excellent shape or have your employment terminated. Just like working at a bank.

  2. Thank you FCC by ITRambo · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Lately the FCC seems to be the only competent part of the federal government.

    1. Re:Thank you FCC by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Lately the FCC seems to be the only competent part of the federal government.

      "Rachel from Cardholder Services" would disagree with that assessment. How come the NSA can track every phone call, yet the FCC is too incompetent to find even the most egregious robo-callers?

  3. Lawyerly bullshit .. by gstoddart · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Yes, but PayPal is making the bullshit argument that continuing to use the service is opt-in.

    Because PayPal is, and has always been, ran by assholes who don't give a shit about their users.

    And when it can come down to "let us spam you or lose access to our service", they're just doing more of the same.

    For some reason we've accepted that corporations can change the terms any time they want to, and claim to have implied consent because you didn't stop using it.

    Which when you're talking about entity which might have your money or impact your livelihood, is a pretty douchebag move.

    Which is exactly why I'll never deal with PayPal.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    1. Re:Lawyerly bullshit .. by Col.+Klink+(retired) · · Score: 4, Informative

      RTFA: "FCC requirements ban requiring a customer to consent to receive autodialed or prerecorded telemarketing or advertising calls as a condition of a purchase..."

      --

      -- Don't Tase me, bro!

    2. Re:Lawyerly bullshit .. by gstoddart · · Score: 4, Insightful

      We are supposedly a country of rights and laws

      Well, that used to be true.

      Now you're a country of corporations, profits, and lawyers.

      Since you can't afford to bribe the politicians as much as the corporations do, what you want doesn't matter.

      Welcome to the dystopian future, now fully equipped with an oligarchy to ensure you get fucked in the process.

      --
      Lost at C:>. Found at C.
  4. I would drop them like a fucking rock by Tyr07 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Right now I use them for my payment gateway and online transactions.

    If paypal demanded I receive robo calls on my fucking phone line as part of their fucking service, as someone who has been completely happy with paypal up to that point, I'd drop them like the biggest fucking rock into the biggest fucking ocean with a large karploosh like someone taking a giant shit and flushing it down the fucking toliet.

    It's bad enough that ads all over visually and sometimes audio ads on webpages. You think my person communication device for talking to people I know is another platform for fucking advertisements? Fuck you you fucking bastards, I'd close my fucking account so fucking fast.

    It would be the god damn end of paypal. Everyone would switch back to using their CC online or another provider would step in and paypal would hopefully be permanently fucked hard.

    If anything they'd piss me off so fucking much that I would personally find each paypals employee phone numbers for their cell phones and robo call the fuck out of it, Always going "Do you like this? How do you fucking like it? I say you agreed to it by annyoing the piss out of me. Do you like this? How do..."

    1. Re:I would drop them like a fucking rock by Jiro · · Score: 4, Informative

      That is not true. Paypal's language uses collection calls as an example, but is written in such a way that they can robocall you for any reason or no reason.

  5. Please, someone imlement this: by Sqr(twg) · · Score: 4, Funny

    From TFA: "[Pay Pal's] general counsel, Louise Pentland, wrote in a blog post last week that its customers can choose not to receive autodialed or prerecorded message calls by contacting customer support."

    So, could someone, please, build a system where anyone can fill out a web-from and it robo-calls PayPal support using text-to-speech. The call would go something like this.

    This is to inform you that your customer. John. Smith. Is requesting not to receive automated phone calls.
    The user name of. John. Smith. is. J. S. M. I. T. H. 1. 2. 3. He, or she, is requesting not to receive automated phone calls.
    The reason that. John. Smith. has given is: Go. Fuck. Yourself.

    Message repeats. This is to inform you that your customer. John. Smith. Is requesting not to receive automated phone calls.
    The user name of. John. Smith. is. J. S. M. I. T. H. 1. 2. 3. He, or she, is requesting not to receive automated phone calls.
    The reason that. John. Smith. has given is: Go. Fuck. Yourself.

    Message repeats...

    If the system is not able to reach customer support, then it could switch to Pentland's home number instead.