Wow, I thought I must be imagining my current experience with PP until I read all these posts. I have news for ya'll: getting verified is merely the start of your nightmare, so if you can, run like **bleep** now.
Bit
I've had 2 premier, verified accounts for about 10 years, one buiness and one personal. Both are linked to bank accts and always have been. My nightmare started with an email that looked just like the scammers who pretend to be PP, wanting me to log in to my biz acct and then change my password. One of the links started http instead of https, just like the scammers. So I opened a new window and typed in the usual address instead of using any of the links in the email... just in case. The email had said there'd been some unusual activity on the acct so they needed some information but I found absolutely no evidence of ANY activity in 6 mos. Nobody had logged in. So before I signed out, I changed my password back to the original.
I'd been wanting to cancel a credit card on that acct so I could use it on the personal one but still couldn't access my acct and so I called and spoke to a nice gent in customer service. Very helpful guy who wanted me to change my password, and watched on his screen as I did so; he also asked me to answer the 2 security questions, which I did correctly. Then he said the limits on my acct were lifted. I didn't know any had been placed on it. After hanging up the phone I went ahead and switched the card to the other PP acct.
One reason I wanted to move the credit card was that I was going to list several items on ebay that were over $1000 each, and to have more options for spending/retrieving it I wanted to get a PP debit card. Twice I'd had one but let them expire. Well, my application was denied, which seemed really odd, but not nearly as odd as the email I got moments later. It said that PP was unable to verify my ID based on the information listed on the debit card application so they needed more information. Specifically, they wanted photo ID, a copy of my social security card, and a copy of a utility bill in my name at my address. They have no business having these documents on file and are incredibly nuts to think I trust them to safeguard these items. Nobody has ever requested my SSN card before, most certainly no other service I was paying for ever did.
Questions:
Why insist that I change my password and watch me do it? And don't feed me some line about an account being compromised and needing straightened out.
Why do you suppose PP is now using the exact wording as the phoney emails? I'm not mistaken, and there has to be a profitable reason they do it.
Anyway, be glad you don't want to get verified, as this is what you face next. I have a feeling there'll be no end to the private information demanded of us. So for me it's goodbye ebay and goodbye paypal. I still have 8 days before my account becomes "restricted", whatever sinister meaning that carries. It feels kinda like a game show where the host asks that critical question: do you want to play on and risk your winnings, or take the money and run? What bs! I'm taking my money and running before PP finds a reason to hang on to it.
