From The People Who Brought You The Amazing Disappearing Bank....
Written: Mar 14 '01 (Updated Apr 28 '01)
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Pros: Handy way for US Citizens to send and recieve money on-line
Cons: Constant radical policy changes. Unreliable website. Extremely unprofessional company behaviour. High Fees
The Bottom Line: While Paypal has the monopoly on International payment methods of this sort. The unprofessional behaviour of the company and the crippling policy changes turn a good thing into something useless.
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| mickp's Full Review: PayPal |
Several months ago I would never have thought that I would be writing a scathing report on the evils of Paypal. After all, it was proving to be a handy tool which complimented my Ebay business perfectly when the long awaited International service arrived.
Paypal as every man and his dog knows, is a web site which allows members to send or receive money to "anyone with an email address" as the marketing division of Paypal likes to blurt out. I am not going to write the 357th Epinion outlining just what Paypal is. If you want to know that then read the blurb outside this category. I have different fish to fry in this Epinion.
Funds can be added to your account via the use of a credit card and up till recently funds could be withdrawn (obviously as a seller this is the big issue for me) to a credit card or to an American bank account. This was all well and good until a few weeks ago when it was suddenly decided that it would no longer be possible to withdraw money to credit cards. It is claimed that this is the fault of Visa, but whatever way you slice it, the very same company who screwed over thousands of X.com users has handled this latest situation with exactly the same poise and grace - All the poise of a blind, one legged hippo on roller-blades.
Despite the claim that emails were sent to all members, it came as a bit of a shock when I went to claim my latest payments only to be greeted by a friendly little screen asking me for the details of my U.S. Bank account. I could not even accept the payments and have been forced to reject them and apologise to my customers, explaining that I can no longer accept Paypal as an acceptable method of Payment.
I did attempt to contact Paypal work something out. I had asked if they could please transfer all of the payments I was unable to claim into my girlfriend's Paypal account or even just auto-accept them for me (or allow me to accept them so I could send them to her myself). The customer service person who replied seemed either not to care or was so tied up by bureaucratic red-tape that all she could do was send me a generic form letter explaining how I could add a US Bank account. (As though it is really simple for people living half-way across the globe to obtain a US bank account. I wonder how well it would go down if members were suddenly required to hold Australian bank accounts).
I asked why I could not just accept the payments and send them on to my girlfriends account (who being an American has a US bank account and could cash out and send me a Cashier's cheque or wire) and the answer was that "We don't want people to claim payments and then not be able to withdraw them". This is code for "We don't want stupid people to accept payments and then be unable to cash them out and in order to protect those stupid people from themselves, people like yourself who would be able to send the money out of your account by other methods must be denied the ability to do so". Protecting the stupid from themselves is something we see far too much of in the computer software and Internet words and Paypal is a glaring beacon and example of the rot that has well and truly set in.
The Paypal web site is reasonably easy to navigate when it is working properly. The problem is that as often as things are working well, they are completely stuffed up. Clicking on a certain link does not always take you where you would usually expect and the whole site has the feel of one that is constantly being tinkered with by a novice, Frontpage Express wielding maniac.
Paypal has the potential to be a great service and despite the fees (which are a little steep, especially for non-US citizens) and the flaws in functionaility, had become an invaluable avenue for non-American ebay sellers. Unfortunately, the unpredictable and grossly unprofessional nature of the same company that thinks it is ok to close a bank down with just two weeks notice has struck here again with regular gross policy changes which wrong-foot and hinder the customer on almost a weekly basis. US citizens might find Paypal a worthy venture, but the International service now leaves much to be desired and makes International cashing-out of Epinions seems like a summer stroll in the woods, (perhaps past a picturesque lake where you might stop to feed the cheerful ducks) by comparison.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
mickp
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Member: Mike Price
Location: Aussie in Las Vegas, Nevada
Reviews written: 431
Trusted by: 270 members
About Me:
An Australian living in Vegas - Eating too much buffet and writing too many Epinions.
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