Paypal is a b*tch.

[Longmarch]

Check out this bologna:

We're writing to let you know about a change to your PayPal account.

Starting 7/24/2011, money from payments you receive will be placed in a pending balance for up to 21 days. By doing this, we're making sure that there's enough money in your account to cover potential refunds or claims.

Even though you can't access the money right away, please ship orders quickly and communicate with your customers. After 21 days, you can withdraw money from each payment as long as the customer hasn't filed a dispute, chargeback, claim, return, or reversal.
The money may be available sooner if:

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

This change isn't necessarily permanent. We'll review your account every 35 days and re-evaluate if we should continue to hold your payments. If we decide to stop holding payments, we'll email you to let you know.

Why are my payments being held?
We reviewed your account and determined that there's a relatively higher than average risk of future transaction issues (such as claims, or chargebacks, or payment reversals). We understand that it may be inconvenient to have your payments temporarily held but please know that we didn't make this decision lightly.

Before deciding to hold payments, we consider many factors. These factors include account and transaction activity, the rate of customer disputes, the type of business a seller runs, average delivery timeframes, customer satisfaction, performance and history.

21 day hold = paypal is useless to me

I haven't sold anything on ebay in months.  I suspect that this is related to a couple of bitcoin transactions I've made.  Though I haven't sold bitcoins, so the question of chargebacks is arguable.   

I wonder if they're just going through their records and crippling everyone who's got any involvement with the BTC?

[giantdragon]

21 days is enormous long, for many businesses it is unacceptable.

[spruce]

They did the same thing to me recently and I have more then 300+ feedback on eBay and all are postive.

Any mention of bitcoins in your auctions?

[ctoon6]

WELCOME, in the new world of bitcoin, a business who thinks they own the world is not able to arbitrarily hold your money for ANY reason, even if they have government ordinances from the highest authority.

[supersonic3974]

What item were you supposed to deliver?

[spruce]

WELCOME, in the new world of bitcoin, a business who thinks they own the world is not able to arbitrarily hold your money for ANY reason, even if they have government ordinances from the highest authority.

But you do sometimes have to worry about the government ordnance that can be brought to bear. If they don't want you around, legality or illegality isn't always a major factor.

[enmaku]

WELCOME, in the new world of bitcoin, a business who thinks they own the world is not able to arbitrarily hold your money for ANY reason, even if they have government ordinances from the highest authority.

Exactly. We should publicize this heavily as a prime example of why bitcoin > paypal. Arguments like "bitcoin > USD" are tough to argue and require that the audience either know or be taught on-the-spot some basic economic concepts, but showing it to be a better digital payment method than paypal requires none of that and we now have at least one definitive example that doesn't require citing the politically-charged WikiLeaks case.

Congratulations LongMarch, your story just became my new biggest talking point.

[spruce]

They did the same thing to me recently and I have more then 300+ feedback on eBay and all are postive.

Any mention of bitcoins in your auctions?

I've never sold bitcoins on eBay or through PayPal.

Thank you. Googling it shows it is a new policy that is quite widespread. See http://www.markjohnsonblog.com/2011/07/17/paypal-payment-holds-policy-begins/ for instance.

[Smalleyster]

http://paypalsucks.com/

read it and weep

Go bitcoin!

[enmaku]

From the article Spruce linked:

Though we can’t include every reason your account may have been affected here, here are some common reasons:

• You have limited history or selling activity with eBay and PayPal
• You have low Detailed Seller Ratings, negative Feedback or other indication of below-standard performance on eBay
• You have a high rate of customer refunds, disputes, claims or chargebacks
• You’re selling in a high risk category or industry such as, but not limited to, tickets, travel, gift certificates, computers, consumer electronics, or cell phones
• Your business or selling activity is inconsistent. For example, you have a spike in selling activity, your average selling price changes, or you started selling in a new category without an established history in that category
• The account information you have provided is incomplete or inaccurate, or we’re uncertain with the information you’ve provided
• Your withdrawal activity has changed

So basically... We hold your cash if we feel like it.  

[Longmarch]

Thank you. Googling it shows it is a new policy that is quite widespread. See http://www.markjohnsonblog.com/2011/07/17/paypal-payment-holds-policy-begins/ for instance.

You may have received an email or notice when you logged in to your PayPal account about the new PayPal Hold Policy that is affecting ALL customers regardless of their status or past history.

Well good.  If they're doing this to everyone then maybe they've seriously wounded themselves.  I mean honestly, the only reason anyone uses paypal in the first place is that everyone uses it.  

[Jaime Frontero]

"ALWAYS FREE!  We make our money on the float."

maggots.

[bitrebel]

I fear this will be the end of paypal.

Wait a minute. I fear not. 

[cypherdoc]

wow, that is sad.

[bitrebel]

wow, that is sad.

Yeah, but expected, right?
What do you expect from a company that is intimately tied to the US dollar and controlled by central banking systems. It was totally expected by me. I have great ebay feedback and never sold or bought with bitcoins PRECISELY BECAUSE OF THIS.

Ebay and Paypal and the Kings servants. Like Goldman Sachs.

Fuck Paypal. Lets just pour salt on their wounds while we take over the system ourselves. We can do anything now that we have bitcoins. We'll take the knife and slay the beast and drink from the blood while we confuse it with wine in celebration. 

[enmaku]

We'll take the knife and slay the beast and drink from the blood while we confuse it with wine in celebration.

And in the master's chambers, they gathered for the feast...

[bitrebel]

We'll take the knife and slay the beast and drink from the blood while we confuse it with wine in celebration.

And in the master's chambers, they gathered for the feast...

They gathered with their bitcoin knives and finally killed the beast.

[Oldminer]

haha paypal..

Shitty service IMO

[enmaku]

We'll take the knife and slay the beast and drink from the blood while we confuse it with wine in celebration.

And in the master's chambers, they gathered for the feast...

They gathered with their bitcoin knives and finally killed the beast.

Last thing I remember, I was logging off of TOR... I had to find a way to live with the cash I'd trusted before...

Relax, said Satoshi, they're all built to deceive. You can log off any time you like, but you'll no longer believe!

*plays awesome solo*

[BusmasterDMA]

Perhaps we should email paypalsucks.com to request Bitcoin be listed as an alternative.  Currently that is linking to a CC processing service.