It's hard for me to describe how upset I am at this moment. I just discovered that all my PayPal payments in the past 6-7 months were payed from my bank account instead of from my credit card. I am a software developer, and to test PayPal authentication service I had to have my account "verified". The "verification" process required linking my personal bank account to my PayPal account. During the process, I never explicitly gave PayPal permission to use my bank account as the source of funds. Yesterday I discovered that my credit card balance is unusually low, and after checking my account I learned that PayPal has been getting monies directly from my banking account! I went below the minimum balance required by my bank to be qualified for no-charge, so as the result I wll have to pay $20-30 banking service charge for this month. The only reason I didn't discovered this earlier is because I normally keep my bank account balance on the high side to qualify for the waiver of monthly charges. Also, I use my credit card whenever I can, as I get 1.5% cash back as reward. In the past 6 months I spent about $3,500 using PayPal, which means I lost about $50 only on my credit card rewards. In total, I lost about $70-80 since May. Aside from the monies lost, I consider this a big privacy issue, no matter how PayPal may be covered by "Terms and Conditions" you have to click in order to proceed. I NEVER wanted PayPal to use my credit card for payments. The only reason I went through the "verification" process was to be able to test PayPal authentication service as a software developer. I was never, at any point during "verification" process, notified that adding my bank card for authentication purpose would at the same time cause the monies to be taken from it in the future. This is a big usability issue - users are misled that "verification" is done for one purpose, while in fact PayPal is using "verification" for entirely different purpose. This morning searched the web, and sure enough, I found https://www.paypal.com/webapps/mpp/popup/about-payment-methods. All information is there, as expected from a big company which pays lawyers big bucks to get its a** covered. But an average user shouldn't have to search through fine prints on myriad of web pages to be informed about this one huge impact of being "verified". An impact this huge requires much more that "please read carefully our i-don't-know-how-many pages of Terms and Conditions". I am **bleep** off big time! I also learned it's not possible for me to set my credit card as the default payment option. As a reward for being "verified", I am getting the "benefit" of having my bank account charged by default! The only way to have my credit card charged instead is to remember to change my payment source at the time of payment! What a nonsense! Do I have a choice? Formally, yes. Was I informed about this during "verification" process? NO! I tried to remove my bank account from PayPal, but is has "pending transactions", so it is not possible at the moment. Saga is not over.
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