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Upvoted because I think it's a good find and does being into question the OPs motives. But there is enough evidence out there to suggest absolutely minimising P

Upvoted because I think it's a good find and does being into question the OPs motives. But there is enough evidence out there to suggest absolutely minimising PayPal's access to your funds regardless.

youssefabdelm 4y ago
How does it bring into question his motives? Did he say anything contradictory in this post? He did say it happened recently, but 5 months is still recent -- He may have simply been reminded of the pain of that experience recently
- joemi 4y ago
  The more that someone posts about their single bad experience, the more bad experiences people will remember, since they likely won't remember if it's the same person posting about the same experience multiple times. Although admittedly, in this case it looks like their previous post was just a comment somewhere, not a full Tell HN post like this one. So I wouldn't get too bent out of shape over this case.
latchkey 4y ago
It isn't just paypal though, it is literally every traditional banking institution out there. People get locked out of their accounts (or even better, funds withdrawn by the government), all the time. I've had it happen to me. This site also has a very very US focused attitude, especially around banking and finance. I wish comments from people from other countries with far deeper issues would speak up more so that people on this site would get a better understanding of what happens to them and why this is a bigger issue than just paypal.
- jjav 4y ago
  > It isn't just paypal though, it is literally every traditional banking institution out there. People get locked out of their accounts (or even better, funds withdrawn by the government), all the time. I've had it happen to me. The fundamental difference with all these Internet-centric companies is they have no useful support channel, nobody that will talk to you, you're just arbitrarily blocked with no recourse, your money is stolen, end of story. Traditional banks have branches where you can at least go talk to people. For example in the last year I've been helping an elder relative manage their banking and that has led to the account being blocked a handful of times (somewhat sensibly, as I can see how some of it could've been perceived as unusual activity). But they have a branch with actual humans (no AI bots) so I go in and explain and provide paperwork and all is fixed. By now I'm on first-name basis with one of their support agents so I can just call them directly, they know and remember me and all the circumstances of the account and have the authority to fix things.
  - latchkey 4y ago
    Traditional banks don't make it easy to send money to a friend, pay for your electrician or purchase something online. They use services like Zelle to do this and it is a prime example of a case where you can't claw back funds.
joemi 4y ago
Most of the examples noted elsewhere in this thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34914880 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34914880) are examples of people getting scammed and temporarily not having access to the amount they were scammed out of. I'm not sure how anywhere else like paypal would be able to handle this kind of situation any differently.
ciguy 4y ago
I was trying to escalate via internal contacts and waiting to hear back is all. Once I heard back that even someone internal was unable to help I figured I'd just post a reminder for everyone here.
- VBprogrammer 4y ago
  Yeah, I didn't really doubt that you where genuine. It would have been less open to misinterpretation if you'd mentioned having posted previously or including details of the timeline in the original post is all.
  - ciguy 4y ago
    I didn't post about it...I commented on another relevant post around the time it happened. I don't think previous comments really require disclosure. It really seems like you are phishing for something here.
- momirlan 4y ago
  really appreciated. we have to defend the fort every day .

youssefabdelm 4y ago

How does it bring into question his motives? Did he say anything contradictory in this post? He did say it happened recently, but 5 months is still recent -- He may have simply been reminded of the pain of that experience recently

joemi 4y ago
The more that someone posts about their single bad experience, the more bad experiences people will remember, since they likely won't remember if it's the same person posting about the same experience multiple times. Although admittedly, in this case it looks like their previous post was just a comment somewhere, not a full Tell HN post like this one. So I wouldn't get too bent out of shape over this case.

latchkey 4y ago

It isn't just paypal though, it is literally every traditional banking institution out there. People get locked out of their accounts (or even better, funds withdrawn by the government), all the time. I've had it happen to me. This site also has a very very US focused attitude, especially around banking and finance. I wish comments from people from other countries with far deeper issues would speak up more so that people on this site would get a better understanding of what happens to them and why this is a bigger issue than just paypal.

jjav 4y ago
> It isn't just paypal though, it is literally every traditional banking institution out there. People get locked out of their accounts (or even better, funds withdrawn by the government), all the time. I've had it happen to me. The fundamental difference with all these Internet-centric companies is they have no useful support channel, nobody that will talk to you, you're just arbitrarily blocked with no recourse, your money is stolen, end of story. Traditional banks have branches where you can at least go talk to people. For example in the last year I've been helping an elder relative manage their banking and that has led to the account being blocked a handful of times (somewhat sensibly, as I can see how some of it could've been perceived as unusual activity). But they have a branch with actual humans (no AI bots) so I go in and explain and provide paperwork and all is fixed. By now I'm on first-name basis with one of their support agents so I can just call them directly, they know and remember me and all the circumstances of the account and have the authority to fix things.
- latchkey 4y ago
  Traditional banks don't make it easy to send money to a friend, pay for your electrician or purchase something online. They use services like Zelle to do this and it is a prime example of a case where you can't claw back funds.

joemi 4y ago

Most of the examples noted elsewhere in this thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34914880 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34914880) are examples of people getting scammed and temporarily not having access to the amount they were scammed out of. I'm not sure how anywhere else like paypal would be able to handle this kind of situation any differently.

ciguy 4y ago

I was trying to escalate via internal contacts and waiting to hear back is all. Once I heard back that even someone internal was unable to help I figured I'd just post a reminder for everyone here.

VBprogrammer 4y ago
Yeah, I didn't really doubt that you where genuine. It would have been less open to misinterpretation if you'd mentioned having posted previously or including details of the timeline in the original post is all.
- ciguy 4y ago
  I didn't post about it...I commented on another relevant post around the time it happened. I don't think previous comments really require disclosure. It really seems like you are phishing for something here.
momirlan 4y ago
really appreciated. we have to defend the fort every day .