Well, that's it for Paypal...rest in pieces ya bums! =)

[Mr. Fuzzy]

Just got this in my mailbox today from paypal:


Your business is important to us. That's why we're committed to providing a fast and secure payment service to you and your customers while keeping our prices competitive. We're also committed to clearly communicating changes to our policies and procedures. So, we're writing to let you know about a change to your PayPal account.

From now on, payments you receive will be temporarily held in a pending balance. This pending balance helps make sure that you'll have enough money in your account to cover any buyer claims.

Payments will be held in a pending balance for up to 21 days. For example, if you receive a $100 payment (after fees), the $100 will be held in a pending balance for up to 21 days. After 21 days, the money will be available for withdrawal.
The money may be released sooner if:

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

We know this is a change in the way we do business with you and we hope you understand that you haven't done anything wrong. In deciding whether to apply payment holds, we review many factors including transaction activity, business type, and customer disputes.

Payment holds are often applied to new sellers who don't have a lot of transaction history, sellers in traditionally high risk industries (for example, travel or tickets), or sellers who've had a high number of claims filed against them.

If you're a PayPal Money Market Fund customer, you'll continue to earn interest on the total balance while your money is held.

To learn more about this policy change, please read our latest funds availability policy

We appreciate your business and look forward to a continued partnership. Don't hesitate to contact us with any questions.
Thanks,

PayPal

[micksimmonds]

Yeah I know on eBay they have done this practice for a while on certain areas of selling, seemed like eletronics, cell phones and the like, higher dollar items??? but if this is across the board will become a real pain, yeah its good for the likes of buyers where there is potential to be scammed, couple of arcade parts sellers spring to mind but it basically saying we dont trust anyone now, they know thou they have the market pretty much tied up 

[number six]

I don't think I'd sell anything on eBay/Paypal if that was the case.

Once again, seems like they are doing everything they can to screw over the sellers which makes absolutely no sense given that it's the sellers that provide the revenue. It's like they are begging somebody to come a long and offer a high profile alternative.

GoogleBay, come on!!!

[micksimmonds]

I guess without buyers, then eBay fails, and they know there will always be sellers wanting to sell their old crap, so look after the buyers as main priority, and screw the sellers over with stupid rules, and make them jump thru hoops and wait for their money, so if Super Auctions sold your games and you had to wait 21 days to get your money ,whilst the buyer took home your Jakks PnP and then filed a complaint as was not a real Arcade Game thats okay? 

everyone I talk to, every message board says the same thing, eBay sucks, so give it time and their share will drop and maybe someone else can make a better place for sellers as well

[k7]

eBay and paypal suck azz.

there's nothing you can do to prevent buyers from pulling scams on eBay. nothing.

i stopped selling working laptops 2 years ago on eBay. people will open them, pull the motherboard and screen, then file a claim. even with tamperproof labels, paypal sides with buyers.

i want to cut meg whitman and john donahoe.

[TheBatman]

I haven't received that email from Paypal yet, just transferred some funds out of paypal a while ago.  I agree though, it's all about making it risk free for the seller at any cost, they figure if buyers are afraid to buy they will go out of business.  It USED to be better before they blocked all the user ID's and user to user contact, so people could help self police the site from scammers.  They've shot themselves in the foot. Nowadays it's a crap shoot for sellers, hoping you'll find an honest buyer and all goes well.  I had a claim against me for a coat I sold a while back, I had PROOF with pics the buyer was lieing and told Ebay, they decided to refund him his money anyway without even investigating or asking to look at my pics!!!, but fortuanately NOT take it out of my account either as a courtesy (probably since I have 2,000 all positive FB and no claims ever), so they picked up the tab to make us both happy.  That's fine, except the buyer got away with a free item after a false claim, which really pisses me off.  It's very easy to get away with it these days, and the Ebay scams seem to have shifted from being perpetrated by the sellers to now being perpetrated by the buyers.  OR maybe it's now a little of both, but either way the HONEST people are sick of it.

[Miracleman]

I am sorry you feel this way.
The coat still fits fine, btw.

[Niloc]

I don't think I'd sell anything on eBay/Paypal if that was the case.

Once again, seems like they are doing everything they can to screw over the sellers which makes absolutely no sense given that it's the sellers that provide the revenue. It's like they are begging somebody to come a long and offer a high profile alternative.

GoogleBay, come on!!!

I'll second that, eBay has needed some real competition ever since they started. Refusing to support other online payment services when they own PayPal... well that's just crying out for a monopoly lawsuit, but the powers that be seem pretty toothless on that sort of thing lately (among other things AT&T reforming endlessly after they break it apart).

Beyond that taking a percentage of the final sale price is major bullshit. How are they entitled to that? They provide short-term web hosting and maintain the feedback system. That's pretty much it. A flat fee to post an item, that's perfectly reasonable, but taking a chunk of the sale price? Total bullshit.

Unfortunately Google makes a lot of money placing ads on eBay, and I'm sure Amazon and pretty much every other online seller (most of whom serve Google ads) won't be too happy with having to compete directly with Google either so I doubt Google will get into the auction business. They don't want to rock the very profitable boat they're already in, and more importantly Google is first and foremost an advertising company. Search, email and all their other services are just there to serve the advertising business.

I definitely think Google could (and should) eat eBay's lunch, but I don't think they will. The problem is, if not Google, then who? It's got to be a big company to even get a foothold, but which one? Yahoo? They used to have auctions, apparently competing against eBay wasn't profitable. Microsoft? No one uses their web shit. Apple? They don't seem interested.

[k7]

I definitely think Google could (and should) eat eBay's lunch, but I don't think they will. The problem is, if not Google, then who? It's got to be a big company to even get a foothold, but which one? Yahoo? They used to have auctions, apparently competing against eBay wasn't profitable. Microsoft? No one uses their web shit. Apple? They don't seem interested.

i've been on eBay since 1998, and enjoy finding loopholes in everything they do. they have been garbage since 2002 going forward.
yahoo auctions is still alive in japan, and is very vibrant (http://auctions.yahoo.co.jp)...their US auctions just got crushed by feebay, and add to the fact that yahoo US auctions had no listing fees, and tiny final value fees, and even those were gone for the last year of US business. they were great to buy from. i paid 1/4 of value for anything i purchased off of yahoo auctions.
we have iOffer.com, which is very easy to use, but...no advertising leads to limited buyers. and what drives buyers to a website? advertising.
buyers don't pay anything. they go to the advertised website, which is only eBay. and eBay handles all buyers and it's scammers with kid gloves and daisies.

in my experience, the safest way to pay for anything under $300.00 has always been money orders. i got refunded on 1 a month and a 1/2 after the fact.

it's going to be very hard to topple their stranglehold.

crib notes: F YOU, PAYPAL AND EBAY!!! something is weird about a website that got X.com...wtf?

[pinballpsycho]

Just got this in my mailbox today from paypal:
...
If you're a PayPal Money Market Fund customer, you'll continue to earn interest on the total balance while your money is held.
...
PayPal

And if you're not I suppose that means *they* get the 21 days worth of interest.  Chuh-fuggin'-ching.

[micksimmonds]

Just got this in my mailbox today from paypal:
...
If you're a PayPal Money Market Fund customer, you'll continue to earn interest on the total balance while your money is held.
...
PayPal

And if you're not I suppose that means *they* get the 21 days worth of interest.  Chuh-fuggin'-ching.

and times that by the millions of paypal customers and that then becomes one hell of a chunk of change

[micksimmonds]

I didnt realise eBays final fees are so high was reading on KLOV that its currently shy of 9% for the average seller, throw in paypal fees and they are taking a nice chunk of change 

[daviddnv]

I think some of it is that people have become used to the non/low fee transactions with the convenience of a business.  Businesses pay a ridicules amount of fees – bank account fees, check fees, credit card hold back on top of credit card fees and list does on and on.

So what happens is that individual buyers expect business like services from non-business sellers (reputation/feedback ratings, return polices, etc).  And that all worked fine (most of time) as long as the non-business seller did not have to pay business type of fees, now they do.

If you are a non-business, low volume seller it’s becoming a local/cash transaction or a transaction outside of ebay, Amazon, etc.  I think it’s a natural transition.  Full-time Businesses are used to fees and compare the pros and cons of doing business on eBay.  I think that has been eBay’s goal for the last few years – eliminate or discourage the casual non-business seller.

[TheBatman]

OK,

add me to the "F#*K you, Ebay & Paypal...I'm done" list.  I may type more when I calm down (don't feel like writing a book right now), but I had a transaction a few months ago that buyer pulled BS, wanted full refund AND keep item, Ebay automatically deems you guilty until proven innocent.  Well, it turned out they just paid off the seller themselves, and didn't take thhe was scammine money back from me as a courtesy.  I was still pissed, as I had proof he was BSing, but they ended it and closed case, so I should keep my mouth shut.  I figured after a decade on ebay and them going downhill with more and more idiocy policy changes that pretty much ruin trying to continue to do business there...well, this was first incident I had like this, but a very easy scam to pull off once everyone catches on.

Well, now ANOTHER item it's happened with, the scam has caught on.  This one was 2 sets of solar lights ($50, asking $40, I took best offer of $25 + s/h), since one was used I took offer of half the original price of both sets. Since the lady is a dumbass and can't figure out how to hook them up, multiple emails, promptly responding to every question and telling her if problems LMK and hopefully can get BOTH sets going, as she only could figure out one.  Well, she tells me she'll test the other set and LMK tonight what happens.  2 days later I suddenly have a dispute case opened, and I'm guilty.  I reply "WTF, I've BEEN helping you and open communication", she says I know, but I just wanted to open a case anyway since you hadn't replied to my last email.  I said "The one YOU said you'd LMK??? and I never heard BACK from you, besides you opening a case?" So, of course same issue as last time, they want to keep item, full refund, don't want to spend $ to ship back, I'm guilty according to Paypal, as they freeze account, and actually put a HOLD on my Paypal AND charge me back the $40 initially from this transaction.  So, as I agreed to refund this lady $12.50 for the non- working set she hasn't yet had TIME to determine if they actually DON'T work, I NOW had to re-pay Paypal $40 to clear my account, on top of ANOTHER $12.50 I had to pay to settle the dispute in order to UN Freeze my account...so now $50 up in the air I'm sure Paypal will reimburse me after they deem me innocent.  

So, she got 2 sets of lights for the price of 1, THEN gets 2 sets for HALF the price of one,  and of course I told her I HAD THEM WORKING, I know they work, but no choice but to fucking settle this damn thing, since somebody who can't wait a friggin DAY for a response (when SHE was the one who was supposed to respond) freaks out and automatically files a claim.  Because everyone is ALWAYS living online, and answers emails instantly...and not like I'm on vacation or anything either. Kinda like...why ask your neighbor to not let your dog shit in your yard, when you can just sue them instead?  People are dumb asses.

So, I've had enough.  I haven't agreed with how Ebay has made buying and selling worse and worse over the years, you can't even tell the shill bidders like you used to, I'm not sure WHO it's trying to favor, since it's not the buyers in some ways and really not the sellers either in most OTHER ways.  So, I took down all my auctions that were still up.  It's not even worth my time boxing something up and going to the post office anymore, when ANYTHING you sell the buyer simply has to file a dispute, and suddenly you don't have your item OR your money anymore once they do a charge back.  FUCK YOU, EBAY and Paypal.  Someone LMK ANY other alternative, as open to anything for smaller items not worth dealing with CL people either.

There's the SHORT version.....

[ddream]

the holding money is when you have a certain sellers rating.  once you go over that they remove that restriction.  when they started that program last summer, i got the same email and a few days later it was removed with a letter saying they made a mistake.  once you are left positive feedback your funds are released as well.