4 ms·

Do business with your bank. You have a person you meet face to face whenever you need and who's going to crawl within the organization to fix that kind of probl

Do business with your bank. You have a person you meet face to face whenever you need and who's going to crawl within the organization to fix that kind of problem. What PayPal did is pretty logical given the number of fraud they get everyday. e-mail has got no legal value and from the outside what they did wasn't very rigorous.

adnam 17y ago
> e-mail has got no legal value How's that?
- shin_lao 17y ago
  No signature.
  - sailormoon 17y ago
    .. only an electronic paper trail a mile long. Email is absolutely of legal value.
    - shin_lao 17y ago
      I'd like you to exhibit cases where e-mail was ok to grant a copyright permission. My lawyers always told me the following: everything formal must be fax, snail mail or signed with an electronic certificate (I declare and pay my taxes with the later for example). Copyright handover is not just "ok we're going to buy you 2 computers" kind of e-mail.
      - eli 17y ago
        And I'd like you to point out the law that says all contracts have to be written. With a few specific exceptions, they don't. Sure, you should get them in writing and signed to cover your ass, but an email contract is still perfectly valid in most cases. Just like a "handshake agreement" can be legally binding.
        shin_lao 17y ago
        Which country are you referring to? In France this is not the case. If there is a disagreement and nothing is written down you're screwed. edit: I've checked up a bit. There is such a thing as "oral contract" in French law but it's very strict and limited to certain transactions. The legal definition of contract doesn't say if it must be written or not (http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichCodeArticle.do?cidTexte=LEGITEXT000006070721&idArticle=LEGIARTI000006436086&dateTexte=20091217 http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichCodeArticle.do?cidTexte=...). It's extremely rare (read: never) to start a work without a signed fax or letter which basically says "ok, go ahead for that price". That goes from a plumber who's going to fix your sink to me paying a designer to work on a web site. I guess in some cases an e-mail has got a valid proof, but it depends on the price of the transaction. You can confirm a 1,000 € job by e-mail, but I guess a 100,000 € transaction needs more. What you need is a proof that the agreement occurred between the two entities. When giving someone the right to sell your product, I'm quite certain than an oral agreement or even an e-mail is insufficient. A printed e-mail sent by fax, let's just not talk about it. ;)
        grayprog 17y ago
        The point with this case is that the first 2 reps told me it's ok to fax emails. And then they closed the account. And when I faxed signed paperes nobody wanted to look at them. Although they said "go ahead" and send. The real problem is that the support personnel are not the one making decisions, are not telling the same, and you can't talk to the people who really do decide. Plus, their action of closing my ability to receive payment (and provide service to my customers) without any warning is an extremely aggressive sanction, for no reason. Let's close his account and then see if he was doing legit business. In the mean time, "we're sorry for any inconvenience this may caused you". When you're doing a 2-week promotion, getting an account closed even for a week for "inspection" is not an option. After 2 weeks we were back to normal low activity, without the bundle.
        shin_lao 17y ago
        I'm sorry for your problem, it shows that they are not well organized, but as I said in my first comment the best is to work with your bank for online payment. You can offer paypal as an additional payment system, but really, work with your bank. You know the guy/girl there, and they care more about your business than paypal, because your good business means money in their vaults.
    - grayprog 17y ago
      So, is an email "signed" agreement valid or not?

adnam 17y ago

> e-mail has got no legal value How's that?

shin_lao 17y ago
No signature.
- sailormoon 17y ago
  .. only an electronic paper trail a mile long. Email is absolutely of legal value.
  - shin_lao 17y ago
    I'd like you to exhibit cases where e-mail was ok to grant a copyright permission. My lawyers always told me the following: everything formal must be fax, snail mail or signed with an electronic certificate (I declare and pay my taxes with the later for example). Copyright handover is not just "ok we're going to buy you 2 computers" kind of e-mail.
    - eli 17y ago
      And I'd like you to point out the law that says all contracts have to be written. With a few specific exceptions, they don't. Sure, you should get them in writing and signed to cover your ass, but an email contract is still perfectly valid in most cases. Just like a "handshake agreement" can be legally binding.
      - shin_lao 17y ago
        Which country are you referring to? In France this is not the case. If there is a disagreement and nothing is written down you're screwed. edit: I've checked up a bit. There is such a thing as "oral contract" in French law but it's very strict and limited to certain transactions. The legal definition of contract doesn't say if it must be written or not (http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichCodeArticle.do?cidTexte=LEGITEXT000006070721&idArticle=LEGIARTI000006436086&dateTexte=20091217 http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichCodeArticle.do?cidTexte=...). It's extremely rare (read: never) to start a work without a signed fax or letter which basically says "ok, go ahead for that price". That goes from a plumber who's going to fix your sink to me paying a designer to work on a web site. I guess in some cases an e-mail has got a valid proof, but it depends on the price of the transaction. You can confirm a 1,000 € job by e-mail, but I guess a 100,000 € transaction needs more. What you need is a proof that the agreement occurred between the two entities. When giving someone the right to sell your product, I'm quite certain than an oral agreement or even an e-mail is insufficient. A printed e-mail sent by fax, let's just not talk about it. ;)
        grayprog 17y ago
        The point with this case is that the first 2 reps told me it's ok to fax emails. And then they closed the account. And when I faxed signed paperes nobody wanted to look at them. Although they said "go ahead" and send. The real problem is that the support personnel are not the one making decisions, are not telling the same, and you can't talk to the people who really do decide. Plus, their action of closing my ability to receive payment (and provide service to my customers) without any warning is an extremely aggressive sanction, for no reason. Let's close his account and then see if he was doing legit business. In the mean time, "we're sorry for any inconvenience this may caused you". When you're doing a 2-week promotion, getting an account closed even for a week for "inspection" is not an option. After 2 weeks we were back to normal low activity, without the bundle.
        shin_lao 17y ago
        I'm sorry for your problem, it shows that they are not well organized, but as I said in my first comment the best is to work with your bank for online payment. You can offer paypal as an additional payment system, but really, work with your bank. You know the guy/girl there, and they care more about your business than paypal, because your good business means money in their vaults.
  - grayprog 17y ago
    So, is an email "signed" agreement valid or not?