Your Paypal account can be frozen at any time, without advance notice leaving you without your money for weeks (if not forever), and there isn't much you can do about it. Paypal is currently being investigated by regulatory authorities in four states!
Be warned that Paypal is not a bank and is not FDIC insured. In fact, if you read the Paypal terms of service, you will see that you can't even sue them should you have a legitimate claim. Their terms of service make it very hard to sue them! If you follow the links below, you may find yourself reconsidering doing business with Paypal.
Any Paypal customer with a probem typically has an impossible time calling and talking to a real live person, and personal attention to electronic mail is virtually non-existent. According to Vince Sollitto (PayPal spokesman), Paypal intentionally makes the phone number very difficult to find in order to save costs. This is fine, except their Email "customer service" also leaves a lot to be desired. Many times you will get a canned response that doesn't address your initial Email message, if you get a reply at all. It doesn't do any good to complain anyway. When asked about customer complaints, Sollitto said the company reads them, but takes them with a grain of salt... (source MSNBC article, above).
Of course, none of this is very surprising when you consider that Paypal, Inc. publicly admits "we have limited experience in managing and accounting accurately for large amounts of customer funds." Their EMail "customer service" is also outsourced to a company in New Delhi, India. Additionally, regulatory authorities in four states (California, New York, Idaho and Louisiana) are investigating whether PayPal, Inc. is engaged in a banking business because of their customers' ability to retain a balance for future transfers. Because Paypal is not licensed as a bank, they are not permitted to engage in a banking business! (Source, IPO Prospectus) This could spell REAL trouble for anyone with funds "deposited" in Paypal.com!.
This website is a collection of horror stories, news reports and other information addressing problems with Paypal, Inc.. While we do not have the resources to verify each and every complaint we receive, we do believe that all reports posted here are true based on our own experience with Paypal and the growing number of corroborating horror stories we receive every day.
posted on January 7, 2002 10:38:44 PM new
Hee! Hee!
Some of the "horror stories" are hilarious!
I loved the guy who has no bank account, no job, no undershorts, no teeth, no dog, and no wife but complain that PP threat him badly by not giving him an account!
-babies! 