PayPal Review

I've been dealing with paypal for a few years now, mostly for buying and selling on ebay. Most of the time its easy to use and there isn't any problem but when it comes to a dispute from a buyer, the seller always loses. I've went through this a couple of times where a buyer doesn't want something I've sold them and even though there is no refund on the item and I prove to paypal that the buyer is lying or wrong, I still lose and the buyer wins.

The first time it happened, I was selling a nintendo ds lite for a family member. After I'd sold the item the price of them went down drastically. The buyer wanted their money back and said the item didn't work. When I received it back and before paypal refunded their money, I sent pictures to paypal showing that the item did work and the buyer was lying. It didn't do any good, they didn't care.

Recently I sold a blackberry phone that I had won. When I won it, it was valued at $600. I sold it for $400. I mistakenly put on the listing that it was unlocked, not knowing a lot about technology. I figured since it was brand new and not locked into any service contracts that it must be unlocked. When the guy got it, he wrote and told me it was locked. I found a site that would unlock it for $20 and offered to refund the money so he could get it unlocked. I didn't hear anything back from him for over two weeks. By then the price of blackberries were being offered for $99.99 each on tv. When I heard back he wanted a refund. At first I refused and then decided to give him a refund minus restocking fees and depreciation fees since the price had come down so much. This was all being done through paypal so I knew I would lose anyway so thought maybe I could at least make up for some of my loss this way since I wouldn't be able to sell it for as much. While Im waiting for a response from him, paypal decides he's won the case and Ive lost! The buyer only had one more day to respond to my offer at that point and then he couldn't have pursued it any longer so paypal intercepted and made me lose.

I really believe paypal should have stayed out of it at least until I'd gotten a response to my offer. During their 'investigation', they never once asked me for my side of it. I believe they automatically call the buyer the winner and the seller the loser and don't actually investigate anything. Each time I've written to them, a different person responds to my email saying they know how frustrating it is.  No, actually they have no idea how frustrating it is! I sold the blackberry, the buyer didn't respond after his initial contact saying it wasn't unlocked so I assumed everything was okay and went ahead and spent about half the money. Then the buyer filed this dispute and paypal froze the rest of the money and anymore that comes in under my name for surveys and stuff that I do online. They have been saying that I owe them everytime I go to their site and they've been causing me a large amount of stress. Im low income and disabled. I did make a mistake in the listing but tried to take responsibility and fix it. The price of blackberries have really come down now (the reason the buyer wanted his money back in the first place so he could go buy a cheap one). The buyers claim that it was 'significantly different' then listed was a total lie.

I now have the blackberry back. It doesn't seem to work as well as it did when I sent it. I have to repeatedly push the buttons to get it to work. It shows some wear so apparently he used it to some extent. The paper that they use to cover these and keep them like new has been worn off. I also keep getting a message on it saying that it needs to be activated by a certain date. It didn't say that before. I assuming he signed up or did something with a company or it wouldn't be saying this. I don't know enough about cellphone technology to know exactly what this means but Im sure its not good and im sure paypal wouldn't care.

I don't want to use paypal at all anymore and don't even want to sell on ebay anymore since they are connected. I've sold things on ebay before where the buyer said they didn't want to pay using paypal and I never understood it. Unfortunately, I now understand it too well! I want a service I can use to buy and sell on ebay but one that doesn't get involved. One where you can make and accept payments so that you're information is kept private, but that isn't involved in making any decisions regarding the buying or selling. If anyone knows of anyplace like this online, please let me know. Thank you.