I recently had a situation where a buyer on eBay initiated a return, and eBay held the money from my PayPal account. Some other charges went through and because an eBay hold is not considered a normal charge my account went into the red. Because this is a hold, it didn't bother to transfer funds from my checking account to cover it, nor did it bother to send a notification e-mail to inform me the hold put my account in the red.
Here is where PayPal logic falls apart. They don't consider a hold to be a normal transaction, but the effect it potentially has on your account (goes negative) has consequences. So this is happening without my knowledge, and a subscription payment comes due, is pulled from my business checking account, and I don't think twice about until the vendor starts sending me late payment warnings. I'm confused because I see the payment was taken from my bank account and posted.
I finally check PayPal to discover the payment to the vendor is held because the account is negative. So after a bunch of arguing with a PayPal employee who just wanted to pass me off to eBay was I to discover that A) eBay holds will not trigger any kind of notification e-mail, even if it puts your PayPal account in the red B) they will not automatically pull funds from your bank account because its not a normal "transaction" c) They will block/delay any other transfers (but they will take your money and hold it) until the account is resolved. All this and no notification or warning of any kind.
I don't think its too much to ask, that if the account is in the red and that alone will put other transactions on hold, I should get an e-mail so I can act to resolve the issue. I hope PayPal does something about this.
