PayPal hit by class-action suit

A class-action lawsuit has been filed against PayPal, days after the company's successful initial public offering.

Filed Wednesday in California Superior Court in Santa Clara County, the suit charges PayPal with illegitimately restricting customers' access to their money. The suit asks for an unspecified amount of damages.

PayPal frequently locks customers' accounts if it suspects that fraud played a part in a transaction, even if the amount in doubt is a fraction of the total amount in an account, said Gail Koff, an attorney and founding partner of Jacoby & Meyers, which filed the lawsuit.

The result is that customers can't accept any more payments via PayPal, pay anyone through the service, or withdraw any of their money until PayPal clears the transaction. That can often take days or even weeks, customers charge.

"Under the guise of needing to protect consumers from fraud, they themselves are guilty of fraudulent abuse of their customers," Koff said.

A PayPal representative declined to comment, citing the company's post-IPO quiet period.

The suit is only the latest legal trouble to befall the online payments company. A lawsuit alleging patent infringement filed earlier this month forced PayPal to delay its IPO by more than a week. The company is also involved in a patent dispute with Tumbleweed Communications, although that has not gone to the courts.

Meanwhile, Louisiana has asked PayPal to cease offering its service to the state's residents until the company receives a license to transmit money from the state. And state banking regulators in New York, California and Idaho have raised questions about whether PayPal operates an unauthorized banking service.

PayPal customers have repeatedly complained about how the company handles cases of suspected fraud. Several Web sites, including PaypalWarning.com, have been set up to give voice to disaffected PayPal users.

In regulatory documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, PayPal warned that while it had taken steps to reduce fraud, it still incurred "substantial losses" due to merchant and consumer fraud.

During the nine months ended Sept. 30, 2001, for instance, $5.8 million was charged back to PayPal due to customers who disputed purchases with their credit card companies. During that period, the company lost $9.7 million, or about 0.42 percent of the total amount of transactions through its service, due to fraud-related transactions.

PayPal raised more than $70 million in its IPO. The company, which has never posted a profit, lost $18.54 million on sales of $40.4 million in the fourth quarter last year.

PayPal Practices

How about going after them to recover funds when they submit the wrong method of payment . I was trying to close out a checking account , so I had very little in it . For an ebay purchase , I used Paypal and checked credit cad on file . They used my bank checking account , and I ecrued $50.00 in overdraft fees which they will not do a thing about . I even got the same form letter a couple of times . Don't care for Paypal at all . Wish they would have some major competition !

[babul123]

i am also suffering by paypal action.if i find a lawer i am going against them too. email [e-mail]

[vstierlen]

The exact same thing happened to me. I had provided paypal with my regular checking account and it was agreed that payments were to be made through this account. For some reason they debited my credit union account and caused overdraft fees also. I wish there was a class action suit against pay pal.

[motodude24]

wow thats all 50 dollars?.....try 930 dollars in my case someone drained my account and i dont even know if paypal will back it and if they dont...iwill be taking them to small claims court to claim even more than my loss for damages!

[tmthysttn51]

Try PayMate. I recently signed up with them and Moneybookers and so far I love them! Rates are much cheaper also and they are much more dependable with way little complications!

[bugm3n0t]

google checkout is that alternative, with much more to loose and reason to do it right. But ebay BANNED cgogoogle checkout from their entire site, and rutinely close account that accept it

[TD2K]

Don't discount Revolution Money Exchange. They're new, they're growing and they at least are backed by a bank. Check them out. It may be early for them to be accepted everywhere but keep them in your radar. Free to sign up, free to use - no fees, and you get $25 for signing up!

[whyer]

Paypal is a horror story. My account has been frozen because a person, who did not buy anything from
me, initiated a item not received claim. The month before this person had paid to my account funds , because they had sold something to me which was no where near their description of the item. So here I sit, I can't pay sellers I owe money to because I have a negative account balance. I have a negative account balance because Paypal withdrew the amount of the so called dispute. How can there be a "not received item dispute" started when the person initiating the dispute did not buy anything from me?

whyer

[EBAYANDPAYPALMONOPOLIZE]

same thing happened to me I paid seller on Jan 17 opened dispute via paypal on the 27 as seller refused and admitted in the dispute to not and would not send my item I was called a scammer etc....yet I was the one out $$ $168.00 to be exact....as she had her 2 pair of Citizens of Humanity jeans and she had my $168.00 *** with this system? I did finally get $$ back but then she went after and I really think Paypal gave her $$ my account was in the red negative all due to 1 dealing with a fraudulent seller as karma would have it her jeans sold again and she got $24 for 1 pair and $31 for the other hahahaha that was Karma I was watching til the end...not that I wished for it but felt these were my daughters birthday gift and I had paid her immediately with instant payment from confirmed & verified account...what a witch seller

[ashiesg]

They have limited my account to I would like the address and contact info for this class act suit.

[usjenn]

Is there a class- action suit going on in missouri? Paypal just took me for alot and I want something done about it. So if any one knows of one or is a lawyer would like to take them on, email me, [e-mail]. I sold my kids things under the impression that paypals were going to take legal action against me if I would not do what they wanted! Someone help me for my kids! They are looking at me for answers on why we are broke now, and all I can say is paypal stold from my kids mouth and I want belongs to me, MY MONEY!

[snoopdan]

Paypal makes a ton of money off of person to person transfers of money on debit cards during fradulant transactions. Lets say you purchase an item off of a classifed such as craigslist, or a user forum like caraudio.com - you pay for the item thru paypal and never recieve the merchandise or it comes broken or not as described. You're screwed. Paypal could care less about you because the transaction was not thru ebay - but they have no problem making money off of you no matter how YOU use their service. So basically, they have no problem with fraudulant transactions as long as they're making money on the transactions that go thru smoothly. So in my opinion, they're just as crooked as the scammer selling fraudulant items.

[scammed2008]

This TOTALLY happened to me. I purchased items from someone off of craigslist and they were fraudulant. Never sent me my items. I paid via my paypal account, not a credit card. I got 0 back from paypal, but it was "decided in my favor." Right!

[justlostn]

i agree with that person am trying to cancel my pay-pay due and also ebay site some how pay pal got my husband bank account and mine was the one listed they are NO safes as they say!!!!!

[mmitchell_houston]

I honestly don't have any feelings about this one way or the other. Most of the people I've heard about who have had problems have pretty much caused the problems themselves (like the person above (or is it below?) who had the account tied to an almost empty checking account. Or someone who opens the account and immediately tries to send a lot of money on their first transaction.

I'm not associated with PayPal in any way, nor am I an investor in it. I have been using it personally for many years, and to run my small business since 2005. I have been very happy with their service and their resolution system. I will continue to do business with them for the foreseeable future.

I just thought someone here should make a statement contrary to the rather angry posts that I?ve read here in association with this article.

[skyogler]

Well, friend, PayPal can just pull the rug out from under you for no reason at all like they just did to me. I tried to login and I was redirrected to a message that said, "Sorry-your last action could not be completed." No matter what I did, I was locked out of their website and could not even access their Contact info. I had to get their telephone # from a third party web site. Then all I could get was their automated resolution system. I followed the password reset procedure twice and still was blocked out. They have not contacted me with notification of what is wrong and I cannot contact a live person to resolve this. Fortunately, I did not have much of a balance in my PayPal account so my personal losses are minimal. However, my loss in convenience is great. I also would like to join a class action lawsuit against them.

[phat tran]

Okay so you are having everything okay with them? Congratulations. You are a very few people who can escape from their fraudulent system. Let me ask you one question? If for no reason they suspended your account, preventing from withdrawing your fund for 6 months, and forbid you not to use Paypal for your entire life, would you still feel great? When you got to that point, you would understand. Now you got no idea how it could go for you

[isgfl]

Just wait, your time will come. Paypal is a total and complete joke. Try sending money through a bank transfer. They claim they front the money and that is why they put a hold on funds. The truth is, they pull the money out of your account instantly but put a hold on it for up to 5 days while they make money on your money! It is called floating and they make millions of dollars from it. It is illegal in some cases but they obviously have found a loop hole around it. Paypal is great if you never have an issue with anything, which if you are in business or purchase and sell a lot, it will happen and when it does, forget it, your money is locked up for weeks! They deserve to be sued! And they have been sued in the past and lost big time.

[jlc90]

Talk about the fox guarding the henhouse. I purchased an exhaust manifold on E-Bay for an early 60's Ford. The action narrative clearly stated no breaks or cracks. When it arrived I sent it immediately to a machine shop to have it prepped for use. They called to say that it was, in fact, cracked. I saw the damage for myself and tried to contact the seller-no reply. I filed for the PayPal buyers protection plan to get my money back by reason that it was not as advertised. In their infinite "wisdom", they came to the conclusion that I had "altered" the item in having it prepped for use, ignoring the fact that you never place a piece like this on a rebuilt motor without some preliminary machine work. As such, they did not have to honor their policy and the seller retained their ill-gotten gains. The good news is that I live in California, within 150 miles of E-Bay Corporate and we have a date in Small Claims to discuss the decision making process of their affiliate, PayPal.

[mother_of_two]

mother_of_two September 5, 2008
We have been members of paypal for years they promise security and protection for their sellers and buyers. I'm sure people are aware that you can use your paypal acc for other purchases. My husband was purchasing some items from China to sell on Ebay and was a litlle leary about the seller since he never did business before. We called PayPal 3 times before we made the purchase and they assured us that if the seller turned out to be a fraud we where insured by them to get our money back. Well we never received our merchandise and paypal will not reinburse we list over 1000.00 dollars they gave us 3.00 dollars back don't know where that came from.They have been investing for 3mths now and when you call they give no explanation to what we where told. They are not a company of their word. I f there is any help for us out there please let me know. Beware

[babul123]

i am also suffered by paypal.i have return the money to the customers because they were not happy with the itemafter all the requirement i have met and no case have filed againest me to paypal,but they still have holding my money.in that case i couldn't pay ebay fee from paypal and ebay has suspended my membership.i would like to file a lawsuit against paypal also.i am in baltimore maryland.

[babul123]

if anyone find a lawyer who wants to go against paypal and need waitness to go to the court than email me at [e-mail]

[babul123]

i think we all should look for a lawyer to file a lawsuit aganist paypal.we all will the waitness for eachother.we all are suffering.my ebay membership is closed because of paypal.funny thing is papal holding my money after i have done all the requirement and their are no complain from anybody right now against me.goodluck to every one.

[dinnocenzoguitars]

Why has'nt anyone put it together that the fact that Ebay now owns Paypal and they are now demanding that you only accept Paypal is a violation of U.S. anti trust laws! They as of Jan 2009 will not allow a seller to accept the safe standard U.S. postal money order, or a personal or bank check or even cash? who are they to say you cannot accept any form of payment you wish? The auctions belong to the seller, Ebay is mearly a hosting site, a massive server for the auctions. You own the auction!Of course, they are sinking they're own ship, as people who have had tyransactions in the thousands are now leaving. There needs to be competion for Ebay and Paypal, and I believeit is only a matter of time!
Remeber the monopoly cable used to have. Satallite service has made cable service have to improve.
When I have trouble with my cable compnay, I threaten to get a dish. I get what I want 9x out of 10!
Congress needs to not worry of stupidity like steroids in Baseball and sopeona Ebay and Paypal to hearings. Of course that is not as sexy a story as steroids!

[www_dirtytoytrunk_com]

I use both Ebay and Pay Pal to earn a little extra cash, but sometimes Pay Pal gets a bit out of hand with the buyer disputes. Did you know that even if shipping insurance is offered and the buyer doesn't pay for it. That buyer can still win a Pay Pal claim, and get their money back. Even if you can prove that the item was lost in the mail, and that the buyer failed to purchase insurance when it was offered. Now I personally haven't lost any significant amounts of money; however, I hear a lot of people asking about bandwagon lawsuits. My advice to them would be not to jump on the bandwagon but to file a lawsuite themselves. All you have to do is contact an attorney in your area and explain your situation and your damages. Some attorneys will say that they won't get involved, but you may find one who is willing to fight against the hypocrisy of Pay Pal. Since, technically Pay Pal defrauds their customers under the gise of fraud protection. I don't understand why some of you claim to have real problems with the poor treatment you recieve from Pay Pal, but none of you, at least no one here has even claimed to have contacted a lawyer. At any rate here is a suggestion: check out
www.lawsuit-lawyers.com and see if any of the links there can lead you to some real legal help. If you dare! I say that because it seems that some of you are scared to speak up for yourselves; unless you have a mob of others standing with you. Or maybe I'm just making things out to be easier than they truly are. So best of luck with all of your Pay Pal problems.

[skyogler]

Many of us are just squeaking by, barely able to keep a roof over our heads. None of us has any spare funds to hire a lawyer; not to mention one with enough prowess to go up against a large corporation.

An elephant like PayPal isn't going to pay any attention to one little ant tapping on the elephant's toenail, but a million ants biting it's ears are going to get some results. There's power in numbers and our whole government and economic system is tuned to numbers; large numbers.

Corporations have learned that no one is going to spend tens of thousands of dollars to sue them for filching a few hundred dollars from an individual and they are taking advantage of that at an ever increasing frequency. It is time that our lawmakers give the people some laws that hold the CEO's criminally accountable for their underhanded dealings.

[ronesanse]

hi, everyone
I believe the two thief paypal and ebay never get enough, they work togeather for stealing money from peoples account. if you call them and want to know the problem why ebay account and paypalaccount is blocked, after long priod of time on line you get stupid answer, untrained employee, I lost so much money and they don't even care, they force you and me to pay to resalve your account but won't do anything , they are not solving problem bettween buyer and seller ,they screw the deal and let the problem rase, I don't understand why goverment won't stop them, if you are seller and sold item and and you recieved the money from buyer if they find buyer is frauds they will force you to pay back the money to them so they don't care even their own paypal policy ,they think you have find item from garbage. if you are buyer and recieve fake item ,like yellow metal instead of gold ,you have to file disput return item register with tracking you may get the money back or not even you get your money, you paid for shipping ,custom and duty fee, and you won't recieve these cost, total headahe, the goverment has to kick them out of business,one thing remember they access to your bank or credit company so they have the power to do anything they want, at the end if you can sell garbage and good garbage seller ,they want you and protect you ,

[maryif]

3.5 Million Dollar Settlement paypal Pay Pal - see if you're entitled
http://www.steelesettlement.com/faq.php3#Q1

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[haspevik]

Hi
I have also problems with PayPal as they have frozen my account with $10.000.00 in it. Even them can not explain why because when I had complains from my customers and offers to pay them back, even though they received puchased order, to get my account back, they still limit my account for 180 days!
I never use my customers money to pay for purchases I sell before they have confirmed receivment and signed for it. Most of my customers has recived, and signed, for orders that I have paid for, and still my account and my money is hold back. I would also like to find a lawyer that is willing to take a case against PayPal, not to gain money but to once and for all make the follow the baking laws as anyone else.