Double charged my account and then charged NSF fees from Bank

[milfo]

Made a payment to paypal a week ago -- came out of my bank account -- paypal still shows negative balance. Wanted to actually *use* paypal to make a purchase so I clicked on the link to resolve the negative balance -- paypal took a second payment from my bank, this time because the payment had already gone through the balance was not there and my bank charged me $45, in addition to the TWO duplicate payments to paypal which still do not show up in my paypal account!!!

Sent an email, no response except a generic template response!!

I predict a service as poor as this will not last very long. Taking business elsewhere

[kernowlass]

Takes 5-7 business days to transfer funds from your bank account to paypal if you did not select the quicker method.

Sounds as if x1 payment failed or you would probably not have a neg balance so they tried again and in the meantime you decided to try and resolve the neg balance yourself which meant x2 payments were going out and neither has reached your paypal account balance yet.  

When they do x1 will resolve your neg balance and the other will be credited and you should be able to withdraw it back to your bank account.

If there are not enough funds at the time you make a purchase in your bank account then that will mean a neg balance and paypal are not really reponsible for your overdraft fees. 

[milfo · Accepted solution]

the confusion stems from the fact that paypal advertises "instant payments" with "verified" bank accounts.

in fact the payment from my bank was isntant but paypal took 7 business days to "process" it.. (probably an algorithm waiting for the best exchange rate?)

its funny, one day an ebay payment was instant, the next it was not (using this "echeck" format). phone rep admitted the verbiage on their own site is misleading (to quote the phone rep, "yeah, bank payments arent really instant even though it says instant... would you like to add a credit card?")

it seems to me that if im using a credit card, what is the purpose of paypal? anyway rant over, if paypal is working for you thats great. but in my own experience, the process of using paypal for making payments has changed without notice, led to additional fees and delays, and the response from support is unsatisfactory (though im happy to see volunteer support on the forum -- what does that even mean, lol..)

cheers 🙂

[Toy2poos]

This happened to me as well. I got them to give me back one payment and reimburse me for the NSF fees and a week later they took the payment from my credit card. So they still got double pmt and the error was theirs from the get go.they would not refund the third pmt.

[milfo]

Update: Paypal admitted their error and sent me a letter to give to my bank - while the letter detailed the fact that the transaction was not authorized and requested the bank credit me the NSF charge, it was very unprofessional (signed by a paypal employee named "Len" -- not even a last name...) and the bank said no -- that if Paypal is admitting the error paypal should be reimbursing me. So it seems yet more hassling with paypal to get it resolved. On top of the time it took to get their useless letter in the first place, and an appointment at my bank. I'd like to send paypal an invoice for my time.

At this point, I'm just going to boycott the service.

[Cheywez]

I've been a member of PayPal for 7 years but never used it until 12 days ago when I decided to purchase summer clothes that totalled 79 dollars. I had transferred 110 dollars to my paypal acct. and you could see that it was there. I have a visa but it's a loadable one and I thought the whole purpose of PayPal was the convenience of using money from the bank. I am on gov pensions and all my money goes directly into the bank. So when I'm sick, I can't really jump and go load my visa card and THEN make online purchases. This is the whole reason I started back on paypal. Also it says "you don't need a balance to use paypal" This is another issue I had....everytime I tried to make a purchase, paypal would decline it....ask for another option payment and it would literally take me 8 to 12 hours at a time to try to make 5 small itty bitty eBay purchases. Never mind, paypal ALSO didn't accept spotify either!! I called PayPal 4 times spoke to 4 different individuals in different areas of the world and all they did is drive me crazy....all different answers all trying to convince me that I was making the mistakes....92 minutes on the phone....and then 53 minutes etc....wasting all my time. So after all this after 2 days, things and charges and returns on ALL my items happened at the bank. Total charges at first were 162 dollars for 4 returned items totalling 28 dollars. I made an appt at the bank, talked to the manager, he opened my acct up and looked at the screen and from the time I left my house and got to the bank, my charges were up to 360 dollars. For items totalling 78 dollars....when I HAD 110 dollars in my paypal acct!!!!! The manager was gracious, encouraged and warned me to close paypal, I signed documents to have every paypal transaction stopped and he returned the 360 dollars!! PayPal said it wasn't their fault. My query is, all the items have been shipped....what should I do?

[zombiasnow]

I started using PayPal a couple of months ago, even though I have had an account with them for a couple of years. It's been a mistake! On making small purchases($5.00 and under), I noticed that because of their delay system, I have been getting charged major dollars by my bank! In 2 months, I have been charged a total of $160.00 in fees from my bank! On items that were supposed to cost under $5!! Not using PayPal any more.

[jbrabec]

I think that's how PayPal remains close friends with the banks: by sending a flurry of charges at a time.  They don't care about your bank giving you the stiff NSF, PayPal will attempt again an hour later (on say, a different $3 ammount).

Thanks allot [Pay]Pal - it's banks like you which sap the energy out of the world!

[mattbingco]

I am so done with Paypal. Closing account. This just cost me almost $100 dollars. These transactions are over two weeks old! Class Action?

If interested let me know.