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I thought the finance industry is highly regulated? Can a company really "hold any funds in your account for up to 180 days" just willy-nilly? And what does t

I thought the finance industry is highly regulated? Can a company really "hold any funds in your account for up to 180 days" just willy-nilly? And what does this mean: Fun bonus, they hold $80,000 I won't get back. Has anybody ever really been completely robbed by PayPal and never gotten their money?

madsbuch 3y ago
I thought it was common knowledge at this point that there is this risk using PayPal and it was generally not recommended for anything but hobby use. PayPal has been seen using several jurisdictions, eg. Luxembourg, France, Germany. When maltreated customer try to sue and get their funds back, they will ping-pong people around in different orgs across these jurisdictions. In the end you would need several very persistent lawyers across several jurisdictions, which is more expensive than loosing 100.000 EUR. (There is a specific case on this that was shared on HN some time back).
- dewey 3y ago
  Paypal only being for hobby projects is a bit of an exaggeration if you see almost every e-commerce store at least in Germany supporting it.
  - madsbuch 3y ago
    Many people do risky stuff against recommendations. And yes, I am aware that PayPal is particularly popular in Germany.
    - dewey 3y ago
      Every third party integration a company relies on is risky, I just take an issue with spreading FUD and calling a probably top 5 by market share payment provider only fit for hobby projects. If you are searching for Stripe or any bank you'll find an equal amount of horror stories which are of course always louder than the millions of accounts and transactions that go on without an issue.
      - drcongo 3y ago
        It's not FUD if it's true. The fact that it's popular in Germany doesn't mean that they don't randomly shut down people's accounts and access to their funds. PayPal has a long and storied history of doing this.
        dewey 3y ago
        Search for any other payment processor and you‘ll find similar stories. These services very often work on a „block first, ask questions later“ basis. Search for „Stripe blocked“: - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30705500 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30705500 „TELL HN: Stripe STOLE OUR $159k“ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36967159 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36967159 „Stripe is no longer a suitable payment processor“ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34614844 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34614844 „Stripe Holding my money for 120 days“ - etc.
        madsbuch 3y ago
        Well, I wouldn't recommend for using Stripe for anything but hobby projects either. Unless you have an account manager at Stripe. My guess is that OpenAI will do just fine using Stripe.
        justinclift 3y ago
        PayPal has an outstandingly bad reputation though, in a different (much worse) class to the others.
      - madsbuch 3y ago
        What I am hearing you are saying is that you can not recommend against big brands? I am currently looking for a new monitor, and according to your sentiment, all negative reviews of, eg., a Phillips monitor would be spreading FUD?
dathinab 3y ago
yes its not that rare of an story
epolanski 3y ago
> Has anybody ever really been completely robbed by PayPal and never gotten their money? On both ends of the spectrum of being an ebay buyer and seller. Once I sold a WoW account, and as soon as the buyer got the account charged back the payment. Another time I bought a piece for my motorbike. Never got anything. Asked for a chargeback. Got nothing. Did not use their service and I am still livid for their lack of transparency, consistency and honesty.
- helsinkiandrew 3y ago
  Surely both of these had nothing to do with PayPal? (this is an honest question - I'm not trying to defend PayPal) If the buyer did a charge back on their credit/debit card, PayPal gets charged and passes it on to you. Likewise if you as a seller didn't get the chargeback isn't that on your card company?
  - shiroiushi 3y ago
    For many years, eBay owned PayPal, so OP was likely referring to incidents that happened during that time frame.
  - epolanski 3y ago
    I don't remember the details, but I remember you could open a ticket on Paypal for a refund if you didn't get your items. So when I sold and the person asked for a refund, he got it immediately, even though he received everything. When I bought and never got anything for months, Paypal refused to even put me in contact with a human for weeks. So on both times I got screwed.
dkjaudyeqooe 3y ago
It says they'll release it in 180 days, don't know why he figures he won't get it. What's missing here is a description of what he was doing to generate that money. Maybe he was completely legit, but we don't know anything. Does he perhaps have a reason to think he won't get his money? Maybe he was getting a lot of chargebacks or some other negative metric. https://www.headshotpro.com/ https://www.headshotpro.com/ seems to be his business.
- emmet 3y ago
  Literally every time these things come up it's because the person was doing something dodgy and refuse to admit it.
  - dkjaudyeqooe 3y ago
    Why shouldn't the question be asked? Just because someone claims something it doesn't mean we should accept it at face value. Doesn't mean they're doing something dodgy but there may be more to the story. If we dig deeper we may learn something useful. If this guy wants unquestioning sympathy he should look to his loved ones, not the internet.
    - droopyEyelids 3y ago
      You can tell because the poster is evasive about what exactly they’re selling. That is pretty strong evidence in itself, because everyone who isnt shady ties an explanation of their business into everything they talk about out of pride and desire for free marketing.
- mpeg 3y ago
  If I had to guess, I would say the reason is that they're getting a high amount of chargebacks because the website marketing copy promises "14 days money back guaranteed" and even highlights that their competitors don't offer a "refund after usage" But then, in the FAQs, you can see the refund policy specifies they will only refund if you haven't downloaded any images. I imagine some people sign up to try it, then go refund if the quality is not as expected (textual inversion generators like this can be a bit hit or miss) and find they can't.
Mountain_Skies 3y ago
Know Your Customer, anti-terrorism, anti-drug money laundering, and many other laws have been enacted to keep "the bad guys" from being able to operate efficiently. Unfortunately, and perhaps even sometimes by design, these laws have created all kinds of loopholes that allow financial institutions and governments to prey on innocents, especially those who aren't doing anything illegal but sometimes things that are unwanted. It all does seem to be designed to strongly discourage the possession of cash and cash equivalents by anyone not in the right circles of power.
- im3w1l 3y ago
  It's gone way too far. My bank refuses to cash international checks (no banks in my country do). IRS refuses to do international wires. The result is that the united states government owes me money I can only claim if I actually fly there which is expensive enough and too much of a bother for the sum involved. Like if even the fucking IRS isn't trusted enough to push money through the system then it's a complete joke.
  - ThePowerOfFuet 3y ago
    TransferWise (now called Wise) would give you a US account number they could pay you with.
    - TheCapeGreek 3y ago
      Wise also has their own fair share of related drama like PayPal these days. Service quality has dropped and I've had friends have their funds locked for arbitrary requirements. Nevermind them changing their US payment details on a dime last year. Great for moving funds through, but don't keep any money there.
  - is_true 3y ago
    The more I get involved with banks the more I understand the crypto bros. I'm on the same boat as you, my bank wont take the check paypal sent when they limited my account, or they COULD take it but with a 25% commission and 60 days waiting for the "procedure".
noirscape 3y ago
It technically is. A bank iirc cannot do the sort of black box of terminations PayPal likes to do with its customers. The problem is that PayPal isn't legally considered a bank in the US but a payment processor, which gives them a lot more freedom to run their service in the way they're infamous for. In the EU, they are a bank, which permits you much more rights but you have to drag them kicking and screaming to enforce your rights. (Among other things, they're homed in Luxembourg and basically employ all the competent financial lawyers in that country, making it basically impossible to get legal representation without getting rejected on a conflict of interest basis.)
jsjohnst 3y ago
> Has anybody ever really been completely robbed by PayPal and never gotten their money? Yes, speaking from experience. It’s been 22 years now and policies / laws have changed, so circumstances would certainly be different if it happened today.

madsbuch 3y ago

I thought it was common knowledge at this point that there is this risk using PayPal and it was generally not recommended for anything but hobby use. PayPal has been seen using several jurisdictions, eg. Luxembourg, France, Germany. When maltreated customer try to sue and get their funds back, they will ping-pong people around in different orgs across these jurisdictions. In the end you would need several very persistent lawyers across several jurisdictions, which is more expensive than loosing 100.000 EUR. (There is a specific case on this that was shared on HN some time back).

dewey 3y ago
Paypal only being for hobby projects is a bit of an exaggeration if you see almost every e-commerce store at least in Germany supporting it.
- madsbuch 3y ago
  Many people do risky stuff against recommendations. And yes, I am aware that PayPal is particularly popular in Germany.
  - dewey 3y ago
    Every third party integration a company relies on is risky, I just take an issue with spreading FUD and calling a probably top 5 by market share payment provider only fit for hobby projects. If you are searching for Stripe or any bank you'll find an equal amount of horror stories which are of course always louder than the millions of accounts and transactions that go on without an issue.
    - drcongo 3y ago
      It's not FUD if it's true. The fact that it's popular in Germany doesn't mean that they don't randomly shut down people's accounts and access to their funds. PayPal has a long and storied history of doing this.
      - dewey 3y ago
        Search for any other payment processor and you‘ll find similar stories. These services very often work on a „block first, ask questions later“ basis. Search for „Stripe blocked“: - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30705500 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30705500 „TELL HN: Stripe STOLE OUR $159k“ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36967159 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36967159 „Stripe is no longer a suitable payment processor“ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34614844 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34614844 „Stripe Holding my money for 120 days“ - etc.
        madsbuch 3y ago
        Well, I wouldn't recommend for using Stripe for anything but hobby projects either. Unless you have an account manager at Stripe. My guess is that OpenAI will do just fine using Stripe.
        justinclift 3y ago
        PayPal has an outstandingly bad reputation though, in a different (much worse) class to the others.
    - madsbuch 3y ago
      What I am hearing you are saying is that you can not recommend against big brands? I am currently looking for a new monitor, and according to your sentiment, all negative reviews of, eg., a Phillips monitor would be spreading FUD?

dathinab 3y ago

yes its not that rare of an story

epolanski 3y ago

> Has anybody ever really been completely robbed by PayPal and never gotten their money? On both ends of the spectrum of being an ebay buyer and seller. Once I sold a WoW account, and as soon as the buyer got the account charged back the payment. Another time I bought a piece for my motorbike. Never got anything. Asked for a chargeback. Got nothing. Did not use their service and I am still livid for their lack of transparency, consistency and honesty.

helsinkiandrew 3y ago
Surely both of these had nothing to do with PayPal? (this is an honest question - I'm not trying to defend PayPal) If the buyer did a charge back on their credit/debit card, PayPal gets charged and passes it on to you. Likewise if you as a seller didn't get the chargeback isn't that on your card company?
- shiroiushi 3y ago
  For many years, eBay owned PayPal, so OP was likely referring to incidents that happened during that time frame.
- epolanski 3y ago
  I don't remember the details, but I remember you could open a ticket on Paypal for a refund if you didn't get your items. So when I sold and the person asked for a refund, he got it immediately, even though he received everything. When I bought and never got anything for months, Paypal refused to even put me in contact with a human for weeks. So on both times I got screwed.

dkjaudyeqooe 3y ago

It says they'll release it in 180 days, don't know why he figures he won't get it. What's missing here is a description of what he was doing to generate that money. Maybe he was completely legit, but we don't know anything. Does he perhaps have a reason to think he won't get his money? Maybe he was getting a lot of chargebacks or some other negative metric. https://www.headshotpro.com/ https://www.headshotpro.com/ seems to be his business.

emmet 3y ago
Literally every time these things come up it's because the person was doing something dodgy and refuse to admit it.
- dkjaudyeqooe 3y ago
  Why shouldn't the question be asked? Just because someone claims something it doesn't mean we should accept it at face value. Doesn't mean they're doing something dodgy but there may be more to the story. If we dig deeper we may learn something useful. If this guy wants unquestioning sympathy he should look to his loved ones, not the internet.
  - droopyEyelids 3y ago
    You can tell because the poster is evasive about what exactly they’re selling. That is pretty strong evidence in itself, because everyone who isnt shady ties an explanation of their business into everything they talk about out of pride and desire for free marketing.
mpeg 3y ago
If I had to guess, I would say the reason is that they're getting a high amount of chargebacks because the website marketing copy promises "14 days money back guaranteed" and even highlights that their competitors don't offer a "refund after usage" But then, in the FAQs, you can see the refund policy specifies they will only refund if you haven't downloaded any images. I imagine some people sign up to try it, then go refund if the quality is not as expected (textual inversion generators like this can be a bit hit or miss) and find they can't.

Mountain_Skies 3y ago

Know Your Customer, anti-terrorism, anti-drug money laundering, and many other laws have been enacted to keep "the bad guys" from being able to operate efficiently. Unfortunately, and perhaps even sometimes by design, these laws have created all kinds of loopholes that allow financial institutions and governments to prey on innocents, especially those who aren't doing anything illegal but sometimes things that are unwanted. It all does seem to be designed to strongly discourage the possession of cash and cash equivalents by anyone not in the right circles of power.

im3w1l 3y ago
It's gone way too far. My bank refuses to cash international checks (no banks in my country do). IRS refuses to do international wires. The result is that the united states government owes me money I can only claim if I actually fly there which is expensive enough and too much of a bother for the sum involved. Like if even the fucking IRS isn't trusted enough to push money through the system then it's a complete joke.
- ThePowerOfFuet 3y ago
  TransferWise (now called Wise) would give you a US account number they could pay you with.
  - TheCapeGreek 3y ago
    Wise also has their own fair share of related drama like PayPal these days. Service quality has dropped and I've had friends have their funds locked for arbitrary requirements. Nevermind them changing their US payment details on a dime last year. Great for moving funds through, but don't keep any money there.
- is_true 3y ago
  The more I get involved with banks the more I understand the crypto bros. I'm on the same boat as you, my bank wont take the check paypal sent when they limited my account, or they COULD take it but with a 25% commission and 60 days waiting for the "procedure".

noirscape 3y ago

It technically is. A bank iirc cannot do the sort of black box of terminations PayPal likes to do with its customers. The problem is that PayPal isn't legally considered a bank in the US but a payment processor, which gives them a lot more freedom to run their service in the way they're infamous for. In the EU, they are a bank, which permits you much more rights but you have to drag them kicking and screaming to enforce your rights. (Among other things, they're homed in Luxembourg and basically employ all the competent financial lawyers in that country, making it basically impossible to get legal representation without getting rejected on a conflict of interest basis.)

jsjohnst 3y ago

> Has anybody ever really been completely robbed by PayPal and never gotten their money? Yes, speaking from experience. It’s been 22 years now and policies / laws have changed, so circumstances would certainly be different if it happened today.