PPC Submitter : Thursday, March 8, 2012, 14:41
Ripped off and lectured by Payppal
So, my story is a familiar one — on January 21, 2012 I sold a pair of tickets to the Pats / Ravens playoff game – complete with tailgate – via Ebay for $550. The buyer had a new ebay account, bblue2012, which had given me some pause but, when $550 appeared in my Paypal account, I assumed everything was on the up and up.The buyer asked that I send the pdf of the tickets to their Paypal account. I did so, and they emailed me confirmation that they received the tickets. 5 days after the game, I get an email saying a bank hold was put on the funds, and the funds were being reversed. I submitted screen shots and emails, and contacted the buyer. At no point did I hear from the buyer, receive negative feedback, or in any way have any indication that the tickets were never received – in fact, I had just the opposite. So, Paypal “investigated” the case. In the entire history of the dispute, there are no responses from the buyer, yet somehow I was ruled against. The final verdict came a couple days ago, and I’ve been emailing Paypal for an explanation. The emails are below, along with my entry on my Facebook page:
Fun with paypal… so, they allow a fraud account to fake a payment for Pats tickets, and then pull back the cash. Luckily, I already transferred the cash out of paypal, so it has a negative balance and can stay there forever. Works for me. In the meantime, we’re playing email tag… each time I’ve contacted them, I’ve gotten generic web responses – even when they announced the dispute was “resolved” it was a computer-generated mad lib. However, it turns out that hostile emails can breed real human responses.
Here’s what I sent them:
Topic: ‘Disputes’
Sub Topic: ‘Respond to/Status of Buyer Dispute or Claim’
message: ‘Hello!
So, apologies to whoever is paid to read and respond to this email. I’m not actually mad at you.
I am a victim of what seems to be a very common Ebay/Paypal reverse payment scheme, whereby an item was purchased from me, funds appeared in my account, I sent said item and then – a week after the tickets were used – funds were reversed and I’m out $550. Very cute. After a bit of research, I’ve discovered that this is – as I suspected – VERY common, and it is augmented by the collusion between Ebay and Paypal. Nice. So, I know I am [shagged], and that the company you work for is the one actively [shagging] me. Cool. So, all I have left to do now is start a facebook campaign, add to the Youtube war vs Paypal, and make sure my bank knows not to authorize any payments back to Paypal, and then wait for you to send the collection agency after me. By then, I hope to mount some sort of class action suit, as there are many, many of us out there. In the meantime, I’ll finish solidifying my proof that this was a fraudulent sale that Paypal allowed, and that Paypal knew it. As much as I’d like my $550 back, I am getting some satisfaction out of trying to turn this into more of a vocal movement.
You work for amoral [people who engage in inappropriate sexual contact with close family members]. Sorry about that.
Here’s their response:
Dear Derek Pizzuto,
Thank you for contacting PayPal.
At PayPal we always deal with our customers in as professional and fair a manner as possible. While we understand you may be frustrated with the current issues on your account we cannot condone a situation where our employees are subjected to abusive language from customers.
We kindly request that you rephrase your email and contact us again with a more suitable message. If you continue to address us using abusive language, please be aware that you may receive no further response from us.
Thank you for being part of the PayPal community.
Sincerely,
Nalina Nancy
Protection Services Department
PayPal, an eBay Company
And so, I sent this:
Here. Try this.
Hello Nalina Nancy!
So, apologies to whoever is paid to read and respond to this email. I’m not actually mad at you.
I am a victim of what seems to be a very common Ebay/Paypal reverse payment scheme, whereby an item was purchased from me, funds appeared in my account, I sent said item and then – a week after the tickets were used – funds were reversed and I’m out $550. Very cute. After a bit of research, I’ve discovered that this is – as I suspected – VERY common, and it is augmented by the collusion between Ebay and Paypal. Nice. So, I know I am golly gosh darn out some money, and that the company you work for is the one actively gosh darn working against me. Cool. So, all I have left to do now is start a facebook campaign, add to the Youtube war vs Paypal, and make sure my bank knows not to authorize any payments back to Paypal, and then wait for you to send the collection agency after me. By then, I hope to mount some sort of class action suit, as there are many, many of us out there. In the meantime, I’ll finish solidifying my proof that this was a fraudulent sale that Paypal allowed,
and that Paypal knew it. As much as I’d like my $550 back, I am getting some satisfaction out of trying to turn this into more of a vocal movement.
Beyond this, it amazes me that I received no explanation for your corporate verdict — I sent proof of what happened and proof of their receipt of the product. I have NEVER hear back from the buyer, and NEVER received any complaint or negative feedback. Why? Quite simply because it WAS a hijacked account that rerouted the sale to the location where they were, giving them free tickets while I got thoroughly shafted. So, I want to know why. My guess is it’s a fairly binary if-then statement. “Does our insurance cover it? Yes/no. End of “investigation.”
The irony that a few “bad” words spoken in irony trigger offense at your end, while I am supposed to politely smile and swallow 550 dollars of fraud on behalf of a massive, faceless corporation (yes, I know, according to the GOP and current American law, Paypal is actually a person capable of eating, making political donations, and pooping right alongside the rest of us) does not elude me. What is offensive here is the way your company deals with things. In fact, the “we are so totally, like, offended by you” email I got is the first HUMAN response I’ve had in our series of communications.
So, I await an explanation regarding your extensive investigation and your contact with Doug and Brooklyn Blue, the purported buyers.
I apologize for offending your corporate personhood.
Derek Pizzuto
What sort of company tells a customer “we don’t like your tone so we’re not going to talk to you anymore?”
Submitted By:: Derek Pizzuto
Location-: Massachusetts
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the same thing just happened to me and to stop it all off, just got an email asking if id help them with the cc company. i evern called the cops re the fraud stolen cc and they said, call paypal. the buyer didnt commit fraud on you, they did to paypal