PayPal Incompetence

[noiserider]

I sold an item on eBay on 3/15 for $50.99.

A few days later a message appears on eBay that my funds will be available on 4/1.

I access my PayPal account several times between 4/1 and 4/27, but see no evidence of any credit to my account or any mention of the $50.99 payment.  Also, I have received no email from PayPal notifying me that I have money available.  So, on 4/27 I begin the process of tracking what happened.

First, I call eBay and they confirm the payment was made and gave me a payment tracking number of 37a741389c290680n.  I call PayPal and the representitive says there is no such number.  The rep asks for the buyer's email address and of course I have no way of knowing the email address.  I theorize I may have the tracking number wrong and offer to call eBay again to confirm the tracking number is correct.  I call eBay and confirm the tracking number is correct.

I call PayPal again and this time the representitve can use the tracking number - the same one the previous rep couldn't use.  He finds that the payment has been sent to PayPal, but has been SENT BACK TO THE BUYER because the "payment was not claimed within 30 days".  Well, how was I supposed to claim it since I received no email and there was no notification on my PayPal web page???  And why would PayPal send the payment back rather than just holding it until I made the next eBay purchase?? (I've made 5 purchases over the last 3 months)

I'm guessing it has to do with something about verification of my email address.  I should mention that I've been an eBay/PayPal user for over 15 years and PayPal has sent me dozens of messages to the same email address that has been attached to my account for 15 years.

So, what's the situation now.  PayPal has notified the buyer that the funds were returned to his account.  If he is nice enough he will go out of his way to send the $50.99 to me again to cover for the PayPal **bleep**-up.  Otherwise, it was suggested that I file a "no payment received from buyer" complaint with eBay.  This I will not do.  The buyer made the payment.  It's PayPal that has a problem.  Let's see if PayPal can satisfy this highly **bleep** off customer.

[kernowlass]

@noiserider

This is the reason for an unclaimed status.....it would have showed as unclaimed on the buyers paypal account. >>>

If the PayPal status is Unclaimed and there is not a Cancel button next to the transaction on the Overview page, then the payment needs to be manually claimed by the seller.

This might be because the seller is new and has to claim their first payment, or because you’ve sent them a payment using your debit/credit card and they either have to manually accept the payment, or need to upgrade their PayPal account to accept it.

Unclaimed is not pending so it would not show or be held in your paypal account balance, it only hits your balance once you have claimed it.

If you did not manually claim the payment by 30 days then it automatically goes back to the buyer.

My confusion is why would you send an item if you had not received the funds in your paypal account balance from the buyer??? Ebay say the funds will be available on a date BUT you are not supposed to send an item until they are showing in your paypal account balance.

[noiserider]

Great solution kernowlass if there was any indication whatsoever on my PayPal web page about the transaction.  There was no way to "claim" the money.  The only information on my PayPal web page was information on several of my recent purchases.

You asked, "why would you send an item if you had not received the funds in your paypal account balance from the buyer???"

1) the buyer had a high rating

2) the amount of money at risk was small

3) my wife wanted the stuff out of the house ASAP 

[kernowlass]

@noiserider

The 3 reasons are fair enough if you want to take that risk, BUT I have to say its hardly paypals fault if you take that risk as they say that you should never send until the funds show in your paypal account balance.

However looks as if you have an honest buyer who is going to pay again but why did you have to contact customer services just to send them a money request?

[noiserider]

You asked, "why did you have to contact customer services just to send them a money request?"

First, I didn't have the buyer's email address so I couldn't send a money request.  I had to get the email address from customer service.

Second, as mentioned in the text, all the information from eBay says the buyer has sent the funds.  Why would I send a money request (even if I did have the email address) if the funds had already been sent?  Customer service was the only source that could tell me the funds were returned.

[kernowlass]

@noiserider

The buyers email address would have been on the ebay email to say that your item had been sold.

And yes the buyer had sent the money but it had been returned, so the only way to get them back again would be to ask the buyer to pay again via money request OR invoice OR ask them to use the send money > goods option and send to your email addy.

[noiserider]

I think we'll have a difference of opinion on how to handle this matter.

Why should I have to go out of my way to correct a PayPal mistake?  If Paypal was interested in customer satisfaction they would have immediately credited my account with $50.99 and apologized for my inconvenience.  Period.

[kernowlass]

@noiserider

Because if a payment was unclaimed with or without a cancel option the mistake was yours and not paypals.

But can you do what i asked in the last post below and just confirm something for me?

[noiserider]

It's two day later.  I've not received my payment and I'm back on the phone with PayPal.  

This representative is trying her best to deflect the problem to anyone other than PayPal.  First, I should double check that the item really sold with eBay.  Second, I must not have the right email address on my eBay account.  Third, eBay didn't send the money (even though I have a tracking number and the previous representative told me the money was incorrectly returned to the buyer).

Finally, I ask for the supervisor.  The supervisor gives the direct email of the buyer and asks me to "Request money".  Finally my $50.99 shows up in my PayPal webpage as "Pending".

I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

It just shouldn't be this hard to do a simple transaction.  My time wasted.  PayPal's time wasted.  PayPal get a tarnished reputation.

[kernowlass]

@noiserider

Can you just do one more thing, just to clarify things >>>

Go and find the transaction in your “my ebay” > click to the right where it says sell similar > don't fill in anything just scroll down to the payments section > look in the paypal box > is the email addy in there correct with no spelling mistakes? If so then it would have been wrong on your finished auctions so come back for more advice.