Looks like we're unable to authorize your purchase using Bill Me Later®

ConfusedandMad
New Community Member

What gives?  I too have been getting this message with an attempt to make a purchase on eBay.  I have plenty of "buying power" as BML calls it.  The purchase is for less than half of what I have in buying power.  What gives?  This was the first attempt to use this service and it is fast looking like it will be the last.  What is the purpose of this service when it does not work?  Also, what is with the run around that eBay, PayPal and BML are giving everyone?  Just own up, say there was indeed a glitch and fix it.  This service is completely pointless if it is unusable to a customer that had an account in good standing and plenty of "buying power" to cover a purchase.

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29 REPLIES 29

jcummings81
Contributor
Contributor
After speaking with a Bill Me Later rep who advised me to make sure everything on my Bill Me Later account and Paypal Account matched and then having Bill Me Later look into my complaint with an email result showing nothing found, now it has been working for all other purchases. I did change the phone number on my BML account to my home phone instead of my cell (which is my primary #) so I'm not sure if that played a part in it, but I havent't had any problems lately. Good luck everyone.
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Cobra450
New Community Member

This is absolutely amazing.  I have been a member of Paypal for about 4 years, have spent thousands and thousands of dollars through there system.  I have had a Paypal Smart Connect account for the past year and have probabably put 2,000 dollars through it alone, and have paid the balance off everytime within a few months. 

 

I now have 100 dollars in my balance to pay off, and a FIFTEEN HUNRED DOLLAR credit limit!  I can't buy a 30 dollar part with my smart connect now.  I have tried to buy things as cheap as 30 dollars up to 500 dollars and get the same **bleep** error message.  Then if I change my payment to pay directly from my linked checking account the purchase goes through with no problem.  This is really starting to **bleep** me off as I have e-mailed Paypal and got no response whatsoever.  I'm now paying off the 100 dollars in the account and leaving Paypal for good unless this gets sorted out, and sorted out soon. 

 

OH and by the way, THANKS FOR THIS JUST IN TIME FOR CHRISTMAS SHOPPING PAYPAL!

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arrrrrrrrrggggg
New Community Member

Same problem here too.   At least the good people at paypal/bml are on top of things and responding to the messages quickly and with good answers.

 

Oh, sarcasm font above btw.

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IrishRock1987
Member
Member

To add my two cents:

 

I've been getting the same problem with my Paypal/BillMeLater. However, after talking to the BML people (very helpful actually,) they determined that it is in fact Paypal not transmitting any information over at all... I called Paypal to ask them about this and all they did was feed me apologies. Now I understand if you're having technical issues with this sort of thing (it happens,) but to just sit there and ask questions to your customer about things that have nothing to do with the situation is just absurd. The lady who worked for paypal that I spoke to asked me if I've ever made purchases at the site I was attempting to with Paypal and choosing the BillMeLater option. I told her yes. She kept asking me about eBay and I told her I want to do nothing with eBay and want to use the sites that offer Paypal or BillMeLater. She finally got BillMeLater on the phone again and he confirmed that everything was green on their side, they just needed to have Paypal send the info over. I was furious at this point. I demanded to speak to her manager. When the manager came on he tried telling me that their "Security Model" was denying the payment. I was a wee bit confused. How can you deny your business partner's funding? The manager seemed to be confused about this question. After carefully explaining it to him, he understood and had no answer, just more apologies. 

 

Well, I was certainly frustrated and ready to pay off all of my BillMeLater debt and never use either service again in my lifetime. Until I had a wild hair. I went onto the site that I was originally trying to make my purchase on. They advertise BillMeLater so I thought I would try and check out as I normally would using a credit card. Well what other option should appear than a BillMeLater option. I clicked it and instead of going through PayPal, it went DIRECTLY through BillMeLater and the purchase was a SUCCESS! I was so ecstatic! 

 

So here's the reader's digest version of this wall of text:

BillMeLater works if you have the option to use it without PayPal (usually retailers will have a seperate option for BillMeLater other than a PayPal option. Just keep an eye out for it.)

 

Guys, I hope PayPal fixes this issue soon. From what I have been reading, they have been causing a LOT of grief with many, many folks. Here's a little ray of hope that maybe you can get some last minute shopping done online! Cheers everyone!

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James_Mandible
New Community Member

Having loads of problems here too. Bought a 300 dollar item when I signed up, no problem at all. Won a 120 dollar item a few days later, go to bill me later to pay, they say they can't authorize the payment even though there's 200 dollars left in the credit line. It is NOT that the merchant does not offer bill me later. I've tried doing it through paypal and doing it straight through bill me later, neither will work. 

In addition to this, I can't get my billmelater and paypal accounts to connect. I don't know if the problems are related or not, but it's frustrating.

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KASEY54
New Community Member

Billmelater may tell you one thing and paypal another, but billmelater website has been down for at least 2 days. Cannot log in, look at statements or make a payment.  Pretty shabby I'd say, and not someone I want with my info, so I will cancel if I can ever get on to do it.

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en
Contributor
Contributor

Having same problem.  Bid andwon an item on Ebay. Tried using Bill Me Later for the first time.  Will not let me do it.  Now seller is angry with me.  Been on phone with Pay Pal and Bill me Later  for 2 days now.  Still nothing resolved. 

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Khalista
Contributor
Contributor

I am having the same problem. I was able to buy something a few days ago but now I cannot. My husband even tried creating a new Bill Me Later account and it gives him the same message. Has anyone been given any kind of estimate on when this will be fixed?

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temp20120102x
New Community Member

Bill Me Later is a farce.  I have plenty of available credit yet can not use it. I have contacted their customer service and am told they can't see why purchases were declined.  They open an investigation to determine the cause which may take 8 business days to complete.  Very frustrating, and they offered me their services.

 

This service would be nice but my experience is that it is very unreliable.  I'm not inclined to use it anymore and would suggest others to avoid it.  

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we350z
New Community Member

Yeah same deal here - Used to work fine then just stopped working altogether.  Called 3x.  Finger pointing between PayPal and eBay ensued.  None of them know what is going on -claim everything is fine and they see no problems.

 

Try to pay with my BML account - "Looks like we're unable to authorize your purchase using Bill Me Later®".

 

Try to link my BML and PayPal accounts (which they are already supposed to be):

 

https://www.billmelater.com/linkpaypal/index.html

 

"Looks like we're unable to link your Bill Me Later® and PayPal accounts."

 

What a horrendous waste of time ... this is such a strug together piece of garbage.

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