I got some answers from PayPal today.
We've dealt with random failures of PayPal Credit payments for MONTHS. Today I got sick of the inconvenience and the implausible doubletalk answers from PayPal customer service and decided to try to get to get the the bottom of the problem. I failed to actually RESOLVE the issue, but after TWO HOURS on the phone I finally got straight answers from english-speaking supervisors in the two relevant PayPal departments "PayPal Credit" and PayPay Wallet". What they told me revealed some questionable PayPal practices and policies, but I was able to piece together an explanation of why we (and probably many of the other people here) are having these problems.
Here's my understanding:
When you make a paypal payment to a seller (ebay) or a vendor (via "send money") and choose to use PayPal Credit to fund the transaction here's what actually happens:
1.) The transaction is handled by "PayPal Wallet", the core feature/function/division of PayPal that processes all types of PayPal transactions, e.g. payments funded from your PayPal balance, your bank account, your bank credit/debit cards... AND PayPal credit.
2.) If you choose to use your PayPal credit account to fund the payment the "PayPal Wallet" function passes a request for authorisation over to "PayPal Credit" (which appears to be a different "division" of PayPal). When "PayPal Credit" receives the authorisation request they check your avaialbe credit and perhaps also run a fraud check. If you have available credit and there a no fraud alerts they approve the transaction, typically automatically and within a couple seconds.
3.) It sounds like transactions authorised by PayPal Credit are then passed back to the PayPal Wallet system which completes the transaction.
Sometimes PayPal Credit might flag or disapprove a transaction even when you have sufficient available credit. We've had instances where this happened but was quickly resolved: an agent at PayPal Credit verifies your identity, then verifies that "yes, you really DO want to make the purchase or payment". They remove the "possible fraud" alert and the charge is then quickly authorised by PayPal credit and payment goes through the PayPal system to the seller or vendor.
But if you call PayPal Credit and they say "We would approve your transaction, but no authorisation request ever came through to us, so we've neither approved it or denied it" you probably have a problem that simply cannot be resolved and is HIGHLY likely to result in being passed around to various PayPal customer service agents who will most likely give you conflicting and inaccurate explanations and ultimately leave the problem unresolved.
The problem appears to be back at Step 1 above: the "PayPal Wallet system" runs some sort of security check / anti-fraud / "loss mitigation" of it's own that the your transaction must pass BEFORE the "wallet" system forwards the transaction to PayPal Credit to request payment authorisation.
NONE of the "PayPal Credit" agents, not even the polite, well-trained and concerned supervisor I spoke to today was aware of this preliminary security check on the Wallet side, which explains why they wasted so much of my time telling me "it's a browser problem with Safari and Chrome" or "It's a technical problem with the website or PayPal Wallet" and transferring me to those departments.
Once they transfer you to the "website", "tech support" or "Wallet" department (which may or may not all be the same) you're highly likely to be talking to a non-native english speaker that probably couldn't give you a clear answer on this issue even if they DID know the answer--which I think none of them knew in any case. After an hour of absolutely MADDENING double talk and being transferred back to PayPal Credit multiple times I finally got the truth: PayPal has a top-secret security "algorithm" (computer program) that checks "a number of things that might identify this as a risky transaction", and if the computer says "no" THAT'S THE FINAL WORD. There will be no explanation. There is no appeal. The computerised decision cannot be overridden by ANYONE at PayPal. It doesn't matter of you have available credit with PayPal credit. It doesn't matter that you've satisfactorily identified yourself as the account owner and assured PayPal that the transaction is authorised by you. PayPal Wallet simply BLOCKS the transaction and never even sends it through to PayPal Credit for authorisation. And PayPal refuses to even give you any information or tips about how to avoid having your future transactions blocked because "What our security system looks at to make a decision is a secret".
We asked "Is it accurate to say that PayPal may unpredictably block our legitimate transactions at any time with no explanation or remedy?" The answer was "Yes, we block a huge number of transactions every day and it is out policy not to explain why."
So there you have it. It's not a problem with your credit. It's probably not your browser. PayPal's system is not broken. This is their POLICY. They make some feeble statements about how it's "for your protection", but the last supervisors I spoke to obviously knew that's a lame excuse. PayPal is clearly willing to inconvenience a LOT of customers and engage in a lot of obfuscation about what's going on (they don't even tell their own supoervisors in PayPal Credit the straigh story) in order to protect THEMSELVES from the risk of losing money.
There are laws and regulations about consumer credit that prevent banks, credit card companies and other lenders from playing games with credit approvals. But PayPal is being very clever. They run their "risk analysis" within the PayPal Wallet system and block transactions BEFORE they are submitted to their PayPal Credit division. That probably totally bypasses the consumer credit laws, banking regulations and disclosure requirements. For all we know PayPal's "fraud" algorithms are blocking transactions based on racial profiling or between parties where one party has a name common in countries that harbour a lot of terrorists. There's no way to tell, because the process is "secret" and PayPal has no obligation to explain or justify what they are doing.
That's their right, I guess. Hopefully this explanation I've pieced together will at least save you the frustration of beating your head against a brick wall. It doesn't sound like this "policy" is likely to change.
MCL
