Pay Pal holding money for 21 days now?!?!

[Ken Walker]

This is the E-mail I received today. Did anyone else get this??????
/
/

Hello Kenneth Walker,

We're writing to let you know about a change to your PayPal account.
Starting 10/7/2011, money from payments you receive will be placed in a pending balance for up to 21 days. By doing this, we're making sure that there's enough money in your account to cover potential refunds or claims.

Even though you can't access the money right away, please ship orders quickly and communicate with your customers. After 21 days, you can withdraw money from each payment as long as the customer hasn't filed a dispute, chargeback, claim, return, or reversal.
The money may be available sooner if:

1. We can confirm that the item was delivered.
2. Your buyer leaves positive feedback. (Applies only to eBay items)

This change isn't necessarily permanent. We'll review your account every 35 days and re-evaluate if we should continue to hold your payments. If we decide to stop holding payments, we'll email you to let you know.

Why are my payments being held?
We reviewed your account and determined that there's a relatively higher than average risk of future transaction issues (such as claims, or chargebacks, or payment reversals). We understand that it may be inconvenient to have your payments temporarily held but please know that we didn't make this decision lightly.

Before deciding to hold payments, we consider many factors. These factors include account and transaction activity, the rate of customer disputes, the type of business a seller runs, average delivery timeframes, customer satisfaction, performance and history.
/
/

WHAT THE HELL? I don't run a business, and I use my account about 15 times a year at most. I have even taken payments for live performances and work I do for clients via the Internet through PayPal in the past. I guess that ends now.

[chrisso]

They treat you like no bank would/could.
And it looks like it's hard to opt out if you're using Ebay?
Another way the tech companies are trying write their own rules to maximize income and minimize responsible interaction with customers.

[ivmike]

Originally Posted by Ken Walker

This is the E-mail I received today. Did anyone else get this??????
/
/

Hello Kenneth Walker,

We're writing to let you know about a change to your PayPal account.
Starting 10/7/2011, money from payments you receive will be placed in a pending balance for up to 21 days. By doing this, we're making sure that there's enough money in your account to cover potential refunds or claims.

Even though you can't access the money right away, please ship orders quickly and communicate with your customers. After 21 days, you can withdraw money from each payment as long as the customer hasn't filed a dispute, chargeback, claim, return, or reversal.
The money may be available sooner if:

1. We can confirm that the item was delivered.
2. Your buyer leaves positive feedback. (Applies only to eBay items)

This change isn't necessarily permanent. We'll review your account every 35 days and re-evaluate if we should continue to hold your payments. If we decide to stop holding payments, we'll email you to let you know.

Why are my payments being held?
We reviewed your account and determined that there's a relatively higher than average risk of future transaction issues (such as claims, or chargebacks, or payment reversals). We understand that it may be inconvenient to have your payments temporarily held but please know that we didn't make this decision lightly.

Before deciding to hold payments, we consider many factors. These factors include account and transaction activity, the rate of customer disputes, the type of business a seller runs, average delivery timeframes, customer satisfaction, performance and history.
/
/

WHAT THE HELL? I don't run a business, and I use my account about 15 times a year at most. I have even taken payments for live performances and work I do for clients via the Internet through PayPal in the past. I guess that ends now.

A couple of questions (I'm not defending PayPal, just asking questions)

1. Do you have a credit card attached to your PayPal account?
2. Have you experienced disputes with other buyers/sellers?
3. Have you used the "gift" feature for the majority of your transactions?

I'm just curious; I'd hate it if my PayPal transactions were suddenly held of three weeks, too.; I'm wondering if any of these things are what's causing it (I'd like to avoid it as well).

[._.]

The only reason to "freeze" money is that they get interest for 3 weeks out of your money. Banks do this all the time, a bank transaction takes about a few ms to complete when someone has pushed the button, but still you'll se no money until x days, because they are keeping them to earn interest off it, and that all adds up to billions.

[imagineaudio]

It's been 5 years since I've used Ebay or Paypal.

That is all.

[ivmike]

Originally Posted by ._.

The only reason to "freeze" money is that they get interest for 3 weeks out of your money. Banks do this all the time, a bank transaction takes about a few ms to complete when someone has pushed the button, but still you'll se no money until x days, because they are keeping them to earn interest off it, and that all adds up to billions.

Tell me how a bank earns interest off your money, in their institution; are you saying that they pay themselves interest? That would imply that they can create money out of thin air.

Banks freeze your deposits (especially through ATMs) because you are deemed a risk (your credit is bad, you've bounced cheques, you've kited, you've cashed cheques that later bounced, etc). If you ant to know why your bank is freezing your deposits, it's this simple: go to the branch and ask them. They'll be happy to inform you and give you potential solutions so that your deposits are not frozen.

Back to PayPal (and the OPs topic): I'm curious to see why PayPal is doing this to this particular member (if it lands within the questions that I asked) because I'd like to make sure that I can take the proper steps so that it doesn't happen to me. If it is a blanket-policy with PayPal and they're hitting any non-merchant account, then I'll rethink my affiliation with them, after discussing it with them.

[Ken Walker]

Originally Posted by ivmike

A couple of questions (I'm not defending PayPal, just asking questions)

1. Do you have a credit card attached to your PayPal account?
2. Have you experienced disputes with other buyers/sellers?
3. Have you used the "gift" feature for the majority of your transactions?

I'm just curious; I'd hate it if my PayPal transactions were suddenly held of three weeks, too.; I'm wondering if any of these things are what's causing it (I'd like to avoid it as well).

1. No
2. No
3. No

[ivmike]

Originally Posted by Ken Walker

1. No
2. No
3. No

Perhaps it's the lack of credit card as a back-up attached to your account. I have a credit card as a back-up and PayPal lets me send and withdraw instantly.

I know that on another site that I frequent, a number of folks are having their funds held due to overuse of the "gift" feature (they'd ask that people send payment and select "gift" as the reason). In one case, there's a fellow that had a buyer send a payment as a gift and in the field where you can add additional instructions, apparently he'd written "Here's your payment for the XXX I can't wait to play it!". It seems that PayPal flagged both of their accounts for that and are holding funds going in either direction.

[chrisso]

Originally Posted by ivmike

Tell me how a bank earns interest off your money, in their institution; are you saying that they pay themselves interest? That would imply that they can create money out of thin air.

I'm absolutely no financier, or even a minor MBA, but banks don't have their own money. They take incoming money and use it before it has to become outgoing money.
At the end of each banking day banks have to reconcile the outgoing contracts, therefore they need enough money in the system to pay out what they have promised to pay.
When you start a savings account with a fixed term, the bank pays you more interest because they know they can play with that money and make money for themselves for a specified amount of time.
The same effect plays out in credit cards.
If I pay off my credit card balance in full every month, I'm effectively buying goods with an interest free loan. The banks hate that, and luckily for them, a small percentage of credit card users operate that way.

So, when banks build in a fixed amount of time, say 24 to 48 hours, before they have to make good on a wire transfer, say sending my £1000 from London to New York, my money becomes part of the bank's liquidity over that period.
Effectively, apart from some administration, my money can leave London and appear in an account in New York a few second later. But the banks absorb my transfer into their daily liquidity, as well as play exchange rates futures etc........
That's part of how they can turn in billion dollar profits in a time of recession.
When paypal is holding funds for 21 days, there is no way they are holding those funds in a 0% interest account.
It would be interesting to know if they pay you a share of the interest they make after the 21 days are up.

[._.]

A very simple way to look at things is this way: Unless you withdraw your money from your account and keep it as cash in you wallet, someone is making money on top of that money, with your money as leverage. The moment your money disappears from the electronic world and ends up in your pocket, you lose money due to inflation.

If you deposit $1000 at your bank, and you get 1% interest on that, your bank will lend 1900 to someone else and charge 2% interest on that loan. That person then deposits that money in his bank, and that bank can in turn lend 3610 to someone else and it goes on and on.

Most money is infact created out of thin air in the form of debt, only about 1 or 2% of all money actually exist in the form of cash.

This system was implemented to sustain economic growth that will always go up.

This is how the whole world economic system operates. The Gross world product is today about 62000 billion dollars, in 1950 it was 4000. This expansion is due to finiancial instruments called derivatives, credits, and debt. The total amount of money this adds up to is between 1 and 1.4 quadrillion $, this is much more than everything that has any kind of value on earth combined.

So yes you can create money out of thin air and we are very good at it. If we didn't do it the world economy would crash (sooner). Nothing that we take for granted today would have existed. And you could definitely not make money on music. Its still going to crash because of how the system works but doing this way it takes a little longer.

There must be at least 1000 good pages on these topics on wikipedia.

[Confusionator]

Originally Posted by ivmike

Perhaps it's the lack of credit card as a back-up attached to your account. I have a credit card as a back-up and PayPal lets me send and withdraw instantly.

I also expect that this is the case. My account also has a credit card attached, and I have not received an email like this one from the OP.

[Entrainer]

Originally Posted by ivmike

Tell me how a bank earns interest off your money...


That would imply that they can create money out of thin air.

Yes.





They earn interest from debt/loans collected from
government, businesses, people based on deposits.

But the amount loaned and collected is far greater
than each deposit based on a practice called
Fractional Reserve Banking.

[Animus]

Originally Posted by ._.

A very simple way to look at things is this way: Unless you withdraw your money from your account and keep it as cash in you wallet, someone is making money on top of that money, with your money as leverage. The moment your money disappears from the electronic world and ends up in your pocket, you lose money due to inflation.

If you deposit $1000 at your bank, and you get 1% interest on that, your bank will lend 1900 to someone else and charge 2% interest on that loan. That person then deposits that money in his bank, and that bank can in turn lend 3610 to someone else and it goes on and on.

Most money is infact created out of thin air in the form of debt, only about 1 or 2% of all money actually exist in the form of cash.

This system was implemented to sustain economic growth that will always go up.

This is how the whole world economic system operates. The Gross world product is today about 62000 billion dollars, in 1950 it was 4000. This expansion is due to finiancial instruments called derivatives, credits, and debt. The total amount of money this adds up to is between 1 and 1.4 quadrillion $, this is much more than everything that has any kind of value on earth combined.

So yes you can create money out of thin air and we are very good at it. If we didn't do it the world economy would crash (sooner). Nothing that we take for granted today would have existed. And you could definitely not make money on music. Its still going to crash because of how the system works but doing this way it takes a little longer.

There must be at least 1000 good pages on these topics on wikipedia.

Right, but you aren't making any interest profit off paypal's 21 day hold. They are.

[Entrainer]

Originally Posted by ._.

The Gross world product is today about 62000 billion dollars... this is much more than everything that has any kind of value on earth combined

Yes, if you are looking at gold, oil, diamonds, etc.

However, that is not the valuable commodity.

The commodity is people. Labor. Labor and people
generate energy which is converted into paper/digits
and then siphoned as interest payments and
taxes (which is ultimately converted to interest payments).

62000 billion dollars divided by 5 billion people = $12,600

Originally Posted by ivmike

That would imply that they can create money out of thin air.

It's not supernatural/magic. More illusion and alchemy. Instead of lead
being turned into gold, labor/energy is converted into wealth.

What separates a great illusionist from a novice is the sophistication
of spectacle/entertainment created to divert attention from the sleight
of hand. It also helps to control the conversation which is generally
accomplished by creating two polar opposite extremes of which the
synthesis of is the desired result. No other conversation or possibility
is permitted.



ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?!?

[UpNSmoke]

Originally Posted by Entrainer

Yes, if you are looking at gold, oil, diamonds, etc.

However, that is not the valuable commodity.

The commodity is people. Labor. Labor and people
generate energy which is converted into paper/digits
and then siphoned as interest payments and
taxes (which is ultimately converted to interest payments).

62000 billion dollars divided by 5 billion people = $12,600




It's not supernatural/magic. More illusion and alchemy. Instead of lead
being turned into gold, labor/energy is converted into wealth.

What separates a great illusionist from a novice is the sophistication
of spectacle/entertainment created to divert attention from the sleight
of hand. It also helps to control the conversation which is generally
accomplished by creating two polar opposite extremes of which the
synthesis of is the desired result. No other conversation or possibility
is permitted.



ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?!?

Hegelian dialectics explained right there!

Oh yeah, and fug Preypal!

[latestflavor]

I just received this email!!!!!

its insulting. 100% feedback with glowing reviews so good you'd think i gave the buyers *******, bought and sold many high ticket pro audio items, as well as some lower ticket items. credit card backup, stellar personal credit rating, bank account, etc.

the only thing that recently happened is i just sold / shipped a low ticket item to someone in england (from USA). This person emailed me and said their paypal couldn't check out of the BIN transaction - could I do it outside ebay. I said hell no - not my problem - - - but the guy on his 8th try got Paypal to clear the deal. So now i'm red flagged? REALLY???

I have always been displeased with the all-in fees but liked the high prices that have achieved. Things like stupid fanboys buying s****y but famous vintage guitars some cheesy band in the 70's used. These kinds of things (ie suckers) are something you aren't necessarily find on GS or TGP etc.

But now I am really reconsidering the whole thing. I AM SELLING THESE THINGS FOR MONEY now I can't have it? For what reason, I am a scammer?

I'm the kind of guy that will close my paypal account.

If i do that - does that mean ebay is basically done for me?

Do people still want to buy things without paypal?

I'm so insulted right now.

[doubledecker]

What Paypal needs is competition.

[Animus]

Originally Posted by doubledecker

What Paypal needs is competition.

Even if there was it's doubtful they eBay would even allow it. They are already all but making Paypal the only way you can pay for things now.

[divaz]

classic paypal. they try to hold on to you money with ******** exuses so they can profit out of it. they even hold my money once even thou I sent them bank stats, address, scanned bills and rest just to bypass the future hold up on my cash. nope, they held it, I call them asking what the hell is going on and the poor prick just gave me some pre-assigned answer.

[Jay-]

Just had $1000 put on hold, after 13 years and 100% feedback and getting positive feedback, funds are dead in the water.

Im deleating my ebay and paypal accounts this month.
Whats the point of selling off 3 fender guitars, paying the ebay fees, paying the shipping and getting nothing?

How much of my $1000 was ebay fees and paypal fees? Near $150 and shipping was $150 thats $300 and they already billed me for the "Seller fees" and I have never complained about seller fees.

No money,

Ebay go to hell and dry up!

[jeremy.c.]

Originally Posted by doubledecker

What Paypal needs is competition.

I agree 100% and was just considering that the other day.

I collected "donations" from my friends last October to buy Halloween costumes for kids at a domestic violence shelter. It was basically a last minute deal where someone dropped the ball on getting the kids hooked up and we wanted to step in and solicit $5 each off our friends and coworkers so I put it up on facebook to donate $5 via my paypal account and we would go out and buy the costumes and deliver them to the kids. (we managed to raise over $200 and it was a success btw)

Somehow paypal caught wind of the "donation" thing and froze my account over the $75 I collected via their service because they wanted to see my tax exempt paperwork (they took their percentage of funds off the top too). I have no tax exempt status, I will never write this off, so I emailed and even called multiple times and I never received anything more than a form email. I managed to get most of the money out before they froze it, but they still have $5 in that account and have never unfrozen it or responded to me.

Just typing this is making me rage. This is seriously the worst company I have ever tried to deal with (even considering the Honda service dept that tried to hose me).

[wildpark]

Paypal sucks
i had a lot of problems with
paypal and ebay

one time a u87i which where fresh serviced with receed !
but the customer wanted the sound of a vintage 87
and stopped the cash-flow for that reason and paypal
give him right !!

next one where a brauner vm1 customer wanted the sound of a c800 and someone told him that the brauner where right for him !
another paypal money stop.

..................


Paypal is only good if you buy something.

Ebay if you need the most cash with the most trouble.
or if you have Gear which is so special that you need
worldwide attention too find a Buyer.

Less trouble Graiglist

[Fletcher]

My world is very simple... I don't use their services - they don't touch my money.

I like it like that.

[UpNSmoke]

Originally Posted by doubledecker

What Paypal needs is competition.

Wrong...what preypal needs are RICO charges!

[tonemaker]

There have been entire websites created to just describing why paypal sucks.

I avoid using paypal almost all of the time. If I'm forced to use it for a quick small transcaction, I delete my account after the transaction clears. But recently I learned that I really don't even need to use paypal at all. The other means that I thought didn't work actually do work. I just have to make sure my bank knows I want to make overseas purchases.

I will never use paypal and probably not even ebay. I've been reading about hundreds of scams going both ways on those sites for years now.

[KT1]

I think you should all stop making.sweeping statements about what banks.do and do not do.

Fyi. A bank can totally have its own.money. many retail.institution have investment banking arms. Additionally.those investment arms take part in proprietary trading.

Yes banks can make interest. Rates exist in many forms. There is.even a global banking lending rate.

Is this why? Prob not ..simple solution. Don't use PayPal get a bank transfer.

Sent from my HTC Desire S using Gearslutz.com

[Thomas W. Bethe]

Originally Posted by Jay-

Just had $1000 put on hold, after 13 years and 100% feedback and getting positive feedback, funds are dead in the water.

Im deleating my ebay and paypal accounts this month.
Whats the point of selling off 3 fender guitars, paying the ebay fees, paying the shipping and getting nothing?

How much of my $1000 was ebay fees and paypal fees? Near $150 and shipping was $150 thats $300 and they already billed me for the "Seller fees" and I have never complained about seller fees.

No money,

Ebay go to hell and dry up!

Your EBAY client should have paid you for the shipping so you cannot really complain that you had to pay for it out of the money you made. I agree about the fees from EBAY and PayPal. FWIW

[frans]

Using paypal and then complaining that paypal are criminal, unaccountable and unresponsive is like getting in the water and complaining that you get wet.

Sorry for your troubles, but : P-A-Y-P-A-L!!!! For christ's sake, they suck so hard they are the envy of every black hole out there.

[always_ending]

They recently did this to my account as well from an eBay transaction.

It was due to the fact that I sold a piece of gear for $2,000 and the day that the money landed in Paypal I wired it directly to my checking account with my bank.

Yes, they DO make money of your interest holding your money, and that's the reason they put the hold on your account as well as mine I would suspect. They're wanting to make more money, it's as simple as that.

Sucks, but no other viable option to sell my $2,000 recording gear... certainly not many people in South MS are buying/selling/using his type of gear.