wanna bet? ill write a contract with you ..sell me something on ebay for 10 bucks ... and send it ... ill pay you for it .. get your proof of shipping ..even with signature...
this is one of zillions of places to read
http://www.paypalsucks.com/forums/showforum.php?fid=3
ill bet you 1000usd that i get my 10 bucks back and keep the item. on top of that i bet they lock your paypal up and you start receiving automated emails about blah blah blah ... we are fighting for you ..blah blah blah ..with no phone numbers ..and when you eventually find a number ..its some schmuck that says there is nothing they can do ... email the safe harbor department ..and they don't have a phone. then you start receiving the same old boring automated emails.
paypal is NOT a bank and they make their own rules. I'm not flaming you or anyone else ..but simply stating facts. i know someone on the west side of chicago that brags about it ..and does it almost daily with 6 or 7 different names. He does it with items less than whatever amount that makes it impossible to prosecute ..and even then ...there are no real laws in place to prosecute under ...at least not yet and i sure hope there will be.
If you really truly believe that ebay and paypal are safe and their seller protection is true ..why is it that 99.8% of their chargebacks are not reputed? its because paypal is only a middleman with credit card transactions .... and to avoid their processing rates going up they almost always side with the buyer ..no matter what ...even with overwhelming evidence.
so ... seller sells say a video card ... buyer buys it ... pays with credit card ... tells credit card company that the item is broken ...or was different that what was said it to be. ... this is where people like YOU and ME (honorable people) would think we are safe ... but NO.
the argument here is .. you coulda put a brick in the package. maybe a bunch of rocks ... how about a big rubber band and some popcorn. What i'm saying is ... the buyer could say thats what was in the box ... or even that the box didnt have anything in it. and then YOURE STUCK ..they IMMEDIATELY refund the money to the buyer and take it from YOUR ACCOUNT ..and then lock up all the money in it for 180days ..and if they aren't satisfied then .. they will take money from whatever account you have linked to the paypal account.
I say this strongly ... NEVER EVER EVER link a checking account to a paypal account. NEVER.
and if you really want me to post facts ... i would take more than what is allowed to upload que on this forum. I filed suit against them for this very fact ..and won... well sorta ... because they were holding several thousand dollars because a buyer did this.
all you gotta do is this ..go to youtube and search for paypal. if that doesn't suffice just google paypal ..or paypal problems. there is a current class action suit against paypal for this very thing
so if that isnt insulting enough ... to even try to get a mediation (paypal is the mediator too) guess what .. the seller has to pay for that too. So after you lose your money ..and your account is locked ..and someone else has your stuff .. you go to mediation and if you are part of that .2% that actually wins your mediation ..then you get your money back maybe .. minus the headaches of 180days of them locking your account ... minus the mediation fees. So if the item was 100 bucks ..mediation cost whatever ... then you get the difference.
you don't have to take my word for it ..but paypal/ebay has ruined thousands of lives ... people that followed the spirit of the original ebay ... where people could sell and make money ..and honest people purchased ... and many thousands became "merchants" where they based their livelyhood and job on ebay. then some crap like this happens.
lastly, before you start gibberish about what i say here ... you dang well bet your ass I'm not full of crap. I wouldn't waste my time typing this in here if it was fictional. If you don't believe what i am saying ... or the videos and zillions of posts throughout the net aren't enough for you ... then it wouldn't matter anyway. I'm just looking out for you and my other fellow osnners.
again ... look around the net ... some estimate that 1 in 5 (probably more like 1 in 10) transactions on ebay using paypal are fraudulent. this is why you see more and more links to outside processing.
FYI ... ever wonder why its so hard to use your own merchant account on ebay? And if you do .. there are many things you can't sell ... which is against the very laws that dictate credit card use ...which is why there is a class action suit in progress.