Bad PayPal Done Good No Not Really!

[Peter Hartwig]

So think about this. The perfect scam.

It's a known scam method and has been used here against individual sellers a couple times. One of the most famous being , Helton-Balls to the Walls
https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/balls_tothe_walls-heath-helton-is-a-scammer.1539933/
I believe those individuals that used G&S did get their money back under the warranty, but unfortunately many took F&F.
Maybe the terms for merchants are different, but it seems to me that part of what we pay for is the approval of the transaction. Once they give that they(PP ) should be responsible and it should be PP that haggles with the credit card company not the individual IMO.

 

[JJHollowman]

This guy lives with his Mommy.. That's hilarious and exactly what I'd expect from somebody who put you through this crap.

 

[jp9mm]

Just curious if you tried calling the customer when the dispute first came in?
I've had to deal with these before but a couple times the customer's response was something like ' oh sorry i forgot what that was'
They call the bank to correct and it's a lot quicker process.

 

[Horsewright]

I honestly don't use PayPal a lot ... even off the forum ... and maybe 15 times on the forum ... and for the most part it's a great service ... but to think that at anytime you may decide to sell that one very expensive knife you have ... and this situation comes up ...

you would think PayPal would have at the very least a working relationship with the credit card companies and should keep records of info so they could at least give you the needed information to contact the bank needed ... and I think they should assist in the initial contact ...

especially when they have a loyal customer such as Dave or Josh that have thousands of transactions with them ...

so I understand the frustration ... and to be fair Dave orginally gave PP a glowing GOOD feedback ... and only after the fiasco of a son who is ok with stealing from his own mother by using her card without even asking it appears ...

and to me this is key where the switch to a bit negative feedback comes in ...

PayPal should never have processed the transaction if the address and name on the card did not match the account info ...

so yes PP is 99% good ... but maybe lax in some areas ... and most buyers and sellers are legit and transactions go smooth ... but just one or two negative experiences can leave a bad taste in your mouth ...

I use PayPal with established members and those I see are contributing members not only in the exchange ... but I have missed a few deals because I wanted a USPS money order or to pay by money order ... to be safe.

And I still need one of your knives Horsewright ... I'm hoping this fall or winter I will have things settled in to order one finally.

now I wrote a book I'll apologize for being so long winded ... and just say I'm glad it worked out and that most people still are basically good folks ... so this is rare.

I was wondering if some had read the whole deal, guess not. Anytime buddy, I make knives all the time. Got 35 on the bench right now I'm getting ready to start handles on but they're all sold. Got another 60 odd in a box under the work bench back from heat treat and another 45 or so ready to go to heat treat tomorrow. keeps me out of the bars.

 

[Horsewright]

Just curious if you tried calling the customer when the dispute first came in?
I've had to deal with these before but a couple times the customer's response was something like ' oh sorry i forgot what that was'
They call the bank to correct and it's a lot quicker process.

Ya know twenty twenty hindsight and you are absolutely right. That was our initial thought to do too. However after cussing and discussing it at some length we decided just to use the rebuttal system that PP had in place. My concern was not giving the customer any further ammo so to speak. Where he could not even say hey the merchant is harassing me now. I thought it better not to muddy the waters and not make that call. We even talked about how to make the call so that it could not be perceived as harassing. But our thoughts were if he'll lie about authorizing the purchase he'd sure lie about the call. Knowing what we know now about the lack of investigation that goes into these deals, I'd make the call. What could it hurt?

 

[Lodd]

I loved reading this story. It's great to get to see 'under the hood' so to speak.

I think it was a small miracle how this worked out, too.

I don't want to sour things up, but if you look at the amount of time you spent figuring all this stuff out, didn't you lose out on the deal instead? (Well, I guess you got something out of it that money can't buy, so a lot of respect for that).

If I were an entrepreneur (hint: I'm not) I would seriously consider just adding 3% to my cost/price to mitigate these kinds of risks. That way I don't have to chase things like this. Think about it: if G&S adds 3% as a sort of 'insurance policy', but it's mostly to cover for PayPal and the customer, and has little to do with protecting the seller, why shouldn't you create your own little insurance policy? After all, it's the cost (risk) of doing business.

 

[Horsewright]

I loved reading this story. It's great to get to see 'under the hood' so to speak.

I think it was a small miracle how this worked out, too.

I don't want to sour things up, but if you look at the amount of time you spent figuring all this stuff out, didn't you lose out on the deal instead? (Well, I guess you got something out of it that money can't buy, so a lot of respect for that).

If I were an entrepreneur (hint: I'm not) I would seriously consider just adding 3% to my cost/price to mitigate these kinds of risks. That way I don't have to chase things like this. Think about it: if G&S adds 3% as a sort of 'insurance policy', but it's mostly to cover for PayPal and the customer, and has little to do with protecting the seller, why shouldn't you create your own little insurance policy? After all, it's the cost (risk) of doing business.

Certainly the law of diminishing returns does come into play and I think we were getting there pretty close. The wife and I talked about this some. She figured she had 2-3 hours into this (she handles all the business and office side of our deal). The only time I had was the call to the PD, the officer's return call and the mom's call so maybe thirty minutes. But here is the flip side. We wouldn't have lost just one knife's income but two. I would have had to make and sell a second knife (completely out materials and labor) to replace that money from three months ago that was already spent, just to break even. So I would not have had this second knife to sell and make money off of, it would just be replacing the income from the first. Now I do have the second knife to sell. But like I said we were pretty close to what else does a guy do?

 

[NWPilgrim]

I loved reading this story. It's great to get to see 'under the hood' so to speak.

I think it was a small miracle how this worked out, too.

I don't want to sour things up, but if you look at the amount of time you spent figuring all this stuff out, didn't you lose out on the deal instead? (Well, I guess you got something out of it that money can't buy, so a lot of respect for that).

If I were an entrepreneur (hint: I'm not) I would seriously consider just adding 3% to my cost/price to mitigate these kinds of risks. That way I don't have to chase things like this. Think about it: if G&S adds 3% as a sort of 'insurance policy', but it's mostly to cover for PayPal and the customer, and has little to do with protecting the seller, why shouldn't you create your own little insurance policy? After all, it's the cost (risk) of doing business.

If it happens on a regular basis you pretty much have to, unless you have generous margins where an occasional hit is not significant. Just like retailers have to factor in operational expense for inventory "shrinkage" (employee theft). Sort of like self-insuring against credit card cancelations. Before doing that I would explore low cost/no cost changes to sales procedures/methods, if any. The problem is credit cards/Paypal make online sales so easy, fast and to some degree spontaneous which is to the good for increasing sales. On the other hand, those same methods are easy for the buyer to renege on weeks or months later (I was hacked, unauthorized use, etc.). Discounts for payment by postal mail order? C.O.D used to be used a lot more with mailorder catalogs. Too bad there isn't an electronic equivalent: package is delivered, recipient pays cash to carrier, carrier scans package and deposits cash into account, funds transferred to seller?