Moneypak & Paypal Nightmare

thatonegirl
Contributor
Contributor

-sorry if this is posted twice, I wasn't sure if it went through the first time-

 

On Tuesday, I saw an ad on my Paypal account regarding the Greed Dot Moneypak option for funding my Paypal account.  I don't have a checking or savings account so I have no other way to fund it other than from eBay sales.  So, I went to an authorized MoneyPak retailer and bought two cards at $4.95 each.  Not the debit cards, but the green MoneyPak cards.  I had to buy two because they only allow a maximum of $500 per card and I had $600 in cash.

 

So I came home and followed the directions on the back of the card to transfer to money from the MoneyPak card into my Paypal account.  After entering the code from the card, my SS#, my name, etc. it recognized how much money I had on the card.  When I clicked "fund account" I rec'd an error message from Paypal telling me the transaction was declined and to phone or email them.  I tried the other card and the same thing happened.  So I called Paypal.  I was told to try going through the MoneyPak website instead and that it would work, no problem.  So I tried that with both cards, same error message.  Called Paypal back, explained the problem again and was transferred to a supervisor who finally told me that this was a "known problem" with MoneyPak and Paypal and they are working to resolve it.

 

I asked how long was this going to take and she said she has no idea.  I got the same response from email and Paypal.  Now I'm stuck with $600. on MoneyPak cards that I need desperately and cannot use.  I tried going back to the retailer to buy a Green Dot Prepaid card thinking I could at least fund a prepaid debit card with my money so I could pay my bills, they told me I had to pay ANOTHER $4.95 for the debit card and had to put money on it to activate it, that I couldn't activate it with the MoneyPak cards I already have!  I have NO cash, it's all on the cards.  MoneyPak says they will refund my cards, but it will take 7-10 days and they will send a check.  Which I'll have to pay a check cashing place to cash for me at ANOTHER fee since I don't have a checking account.

 

This has been a nightmare and I feel like I've been scammed.  Paypal still advertises the MoneyPak stuff on their website and so does MoneyPak advertise Paypal but they're not telling anyone that there "may" be an issue with random accounts where the transfer won't work and they don't know why or how long it's going to take.  Now I'm hit with late fees from my creditors, out nearly $10 in fees for the MoneyPak cards and my cash is in limbo.

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18 REPLIES 18

profdata
Frequent Contributor
Frequent Contributor

Did you try using the card 6+ hours after buying it.

 

I purchase Ebay gift cards ( I get gas credit at my store) and use them on ebay/paypal.

 

It usuall takes 2-4 hours till I can use them for Ebay purchases

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thatonegirl
Contributor
Contributor

How can I use it?  It's just a green card with a scratch - off number on the back.  I've had it since Tuesday and it's activated because I have the receipt from where I purchased it.  It's not a debit card, it's just the MoneyPak card that can be used to either reload a prepaid debit card, which I don't have, or to transfer money from it to Paypal which is what they're advertising.  I can't use it to buy anything, only to transfer funds which Paypal can't explain why it won't work, just that "they're working on it and it's a known issue"

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bp1966
Contributor
Contributor

Hi

 

Don't worry, sounds like you money $600 is still safe . Sounds like Green Dot/PayPal  need to do additional info before the money can be transfer. Could be because of the amount of cash.

 

Given Green Dot a call and i think they can sort it out.

 

 

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reversetrike
New Community Member

I've been through a similar issue.  Bought a MP from Walmart, tried to fund my PP acct shortly after and no go.  Tried many times, called MP and they said wait 24 hours.  Next day same thing.  I've bought 2 moneypak cards now from walmart for $150 each, and I haven't been able to get either one to work to fund my PP account. I applied for a refund on the first one, but I sent an email to PP on the issue just now after calling their help line twice and getting cut off after holding for many minutes.

 

I'm going to the PP "add funds" link.  Then "add funds from a greendot moneypak" which takes you to -

https://www.moneypak.com/paypal/AddFunds.aspx

It says to enter the activation code from the walmart receipt.  I do that and it recognizes I have $150 available, but when I hit fund account I get various error messages: We were unable to process your request, please try again.

I hit retry, then I get:  Due to technical difficulties we are unable to process your request. Please try again in an hour. We apologize for the inconvenience.  Or: An internal error occurred in the system. We apologize for the inconvenience.

 

I really needed to fund my account to pay for things I bought on ebay.

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thatonegirl
Contributor
Contributor

That's very similar to what's happening to me.  Now it's been going  on for TWO weeks with no resolution.  Paypal keeps advertising MoneyPak but without telling people that they are having "known problems" with random accounts.  For two weeks I've been out $600 because it's just sitting on the MoneyPak cards and I have no way to get the money back other than request a refund from MoneyPak which takes 10 days and comes in the form of a paper check.  I don't have a bank account, so I'll have to pay a %3 fee to have it cashed someplace.  On top of the $4.95 I paid twice for the MoneyPak cards.  Don't expect any help from Paypal, they don't care.

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xxeightydxx
New Community Member

Paypal really can't do anything so its really not fair to blame them entirely, mostly its the lack of care Moneypak seems to show to their customers. I too had an issue with my card transfer, Moneypak said it would be fixed in a buissness day. That was 4 buissness days ago. In short, moneypak is an over-seas piece of garbage. I would bet the 100 dollars that haven't been transfered to my paypall account that the "known problems" paypal is talking about is Moneypaks fault

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thatonegirl
Contributor
Contributor

Paypal is who keeps telling me it is THEIR problem, so I am blaming them because they continue to advertise MoneyPak without telling Paypal account holders that random accounts won't work.  Everytime I've called Paypal, they've said "We are aware of this problem and it's a technical problem on our end, our technical support team is working on it but we don't know when it will be resolved"

 

So it's more than fair to "blame" Paypal.  I blame them for not telling me in advance that this is a known problem and if MoneyPak is an "overseas piece of garbage" as you say, then I blame Paypal for getting involved with them.

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Laurent_Paul
New Community Member

 Hi Thatonegirl,

 

I read this entire post and want to thank you for posting what happened to you with this company MoneyPak. I was just trying to decide if i should use MoneyPak to speed up money transfer (bank transfer takes 3 days) but after reading MoneyPak's website I was already hesitant then reading your story is exactly what I feared that there could be some pb.

I will NEVER use MoneyPak and suggest nobody else does. I am 100% agreeing with everythg you wrote. These people should be sued and convicted for taking advantage of individuals. There needs to be more consumer protection in america. Trust me that would never happen in a more evolved country like UK or France or Germany.

 

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grampadan
Contributor
Contributor

Now they offer a $ 10.00 come-on to try Moneypak.

 

So I Google Moneypac Paypal retailer fees to see whether to use Wal, Wal, CVS or Rite - within 4 blocks of each other here - and find this horror story. - with no resolution ?

 

Where can we read that the known problems

 

   A. were due to ___ .   and

 

   B. are solved.     and  

 

   C.   everyone / someone / no-one got their money back.    and

 

   D.   NOW there is a problem path that WORKS when the next problem happens.

-----------------

A former CSR in other industries.

 

 

 

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