As a new small seller (9 months) to Ebay even tho I have been a buyer for about 8 years, I received an email from PayPal stating that effectively immediately all funds going into my PayPal Account from Ebay sales, including the shipping paid in advance by the buyer, would be held for 21 days. The funds could be released sooner if I (1) can prove delivery via the tracking info and/or (2) the buyer leaves me good Feedback. First of all, for someone on a fixed income and having my Ebay invoice being taken from my social security check at the beginning of each month, I would now have to choose between paying a bill or buying my meds OR leaving enough money in my checking account (which is tied to PayPal) to cover shipping costs for every listing in my auctions on a 'just in case' something sells basis because PayPal won't even release the shipping costs that the buyer has already paid for in advance. This is basically telling the small seller who doesn't keep a hefty balance in his/her PayPal account to cover the shipping that only Power Sellers are the ones that Ebay and PayPal want on board. Second, buyers cannot be FORCED into giving Feedback, since even with reminders, many do not leave Feedback. To make this a requirement for releasing funds is a serious smack in the face to the seller...unless Ebay plans to end buyer membership based on their Feedback record rather than on whether they actually are good buyers who pay for items on a timely basis. According to the PayPal list of about ten criteria that they use against sellers to put those accounts into a 'funds held' pattern, I have already passed every single one of them and shouldn't have been placed on notification. When I called PayPal last week about this, I was told basically, 'too bad'...so I had to pull all of my listings at Ebay because if even one of them sold, I wouldn't be able to ship the item out of pocket. I called back again later in the week and talked to someone who told me, after looking up my Ebay account performance, that the problem was that I had never added my Ebay UserID to my PayPal account. He walked me thru that (never knew I had to do this as a seller) and said he was going to put in a 'review' request to see if my account could be taken off that list of sellers with a 'funds hold'. I am now waiting on a confirmation email from PayPal but until that happens, I am unable to sell at Ebay. Ebay gives a buyer and seller normally about two weeks or more to know about changes being made so we can 'adjust' to them....PayPal gave absolutely NO notice when they pulled the rug out from under this seller (and probably many more than just me), and supposedly all because I didn't know I had to tie my Ebay UserIE to my PayPal account. This is totally unacceptable since this tie-in was automatically assumed everytime I would click on "PAY NOW" and as buyer and when I clicked on "Print Label" as a seller.....I was automatically whisked away to PayPal. You would normally assume and believe that the door swung BOTH ways, but evidently not. With all the labels I have shipped and printed in 9 months, you would think that PayPal would ALREADY know I am a seller on Ebay and that a manual 'add in' for an account would have been unnecessary. I'm really disappointed in this new process and no notice procedure, and many other small sellers have to also be feeling like we've been 'thrown to the curb'. I just got off the phone with PayPal AGAIN, and this time was told that shipping label fees would be coming out of the PENDING/HELD funds and not my checking account. I told the woman (who I could hardly hear because there was a huge celebratory party going on in the background with cheering constantly) to send me an email verifying this statement in writing because I didn't trust her. If I receive that email, signed by her, then I will possibly go back to selling and listing on Ebay, but she also stated that it would take until May 15th for my review to be done and it would ONLY be based on whatever I sell between now and that date so they could see if I have any negative information/disputes/feedback. Evidently it doesn't matter that I already have a good selling record on Ebay...they are only going to look at whatever is sold during this one month period of time for the review. If I don't get that email, I won't be listing items on Ebay and will, therefore, have NOTHING for them to review and I will continue to have a 'funds temporarily held' status. This is insanity.
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