PayPal reviews

Overall an awful company to deal with. They are not on your side, they are on the side of the money. Whenever they will loose a substantial amount of profit, they will make it so they don't and push that loss onto the seller or buyer regardless of the facts. I have been scammed so many times via Paypal without care on there part, i stopped using them forever. Credit cards are always more secure then any service like paypal.

My experience with Paypal has been OK. They have limited offers for their users outside the US and that makes it difficult for me at times to use it. They do follow through with complaints and try to help which is what makes them ok for me.

Absolutely horrible!! They limit my account asking for documentation when I received a payment for $200. What gives? Lately Paypal has been the worst processor, the only issue has been. Buyers have been ingrained with using them. That makes the more devious and an absolute failure for business.

pay pal was great before E BAY has purchased it !!! even the previous owner is furious and threaten them many times to cancel the contract and buy it back for their bad practices toward all !
now it is a monopoly and a dictatorship just like their site ! if you can avoid it please do ?otherwise watch out for your money ? E Bay will take it at will and nothing there you can do .

PayPal is the absolute worst online payment business I've ever had to deal with. I had multiple charges from companies I never bought from, was scammed out of $450 and sent them every single text message and email with MORE THAN ENOUGH PROOF. Did PayPal customer service do anything to help, at all? NOPE. I would never recommend PayPal to a friend, family member or complete stranger. Worst experience I've had in a very very very long time

I use Paypal for payment on many, many projects. I have found their customer service to be friendly and eager to help. For tax and record keeping purposes the PayPal model is excellent. In terms of protecting you from fraud, I have nothing but the highest praise to offer.

Do not use PayPal. You are not protected as much as they claim. I made a $2k purchase for some custom fireplace doors. Never got the doors and did everything is the PayPal policy to file claim. PayPal doesn't make claims on custom made product even if the seller doesn't ship merchandise. PayPal is a scam. good luck getting a live person on the phone, you get looped in automation and the only way to get a live person is to not select from the automation prompt. PayPal put a negative mark on seller account. whoo hooo, that didn't help me get my money back

I was totally unsure of the safety of using PayPal when I started several years ago ... Wow was I wrong to be concerned. This is probably the safest way and certainly the most convenient way to pay for purchases.

hate this company for always putting holds on my account. they say its' for safety issues but they just make me call in to have them manually review my account and release the funds. It's a very big hassle having to deal with them.

As with every business, especially a massive one like paypal, there are going to be people who aren't satisfied and of course some mistakes will be made with some customers.

I personally haven't had any problems with them and find their services quite convenient at times. There are some niggly issues with the interface, much too basic for some of my needs, and the features that are available would seem very hard to implement for beginners as they are hidden away and not really straight forward or well explained. But for the simple stuff, reliability and security, it gets top marks from me.

Paypal is very good if you sell your own products, it's a ready-made platform which is easy enough to install without technical knowledge.

In my experience, Paypal is not suited for a large volume of transactions: it becomes very risky, and Paypal has the habit of blocking accounts at the slightest complaint, justified or not. Keep in mind that Paypal is based in Luxemburg, and they are allowed to freeze your assets for several months according to local legislation.

Have used paypal for two years to make the payment, they provide a very good service. I personally did not have any trouble with this site yet.

When you transfer funds from a bank account to paypal it says it takes 5-7 days but always takes seven and sometimes longer. Its pure greed that it takes this long because they suck up as much interest with YOUR money as they can. Will avoid paypal an even co's associated with them from now on.

I run a small online business, and as of today, we do NOT accept pay pal payments. Our service is a monthly service, which means you end up being billed multiple months as long as you are using it. Well, apparently if you sign up with paypal, for my site you can just cancel payments via pay pal and keep using the site. Awful.

I use paypal as an easy why to send money to friends and family. I do find it annoying that there is a fee to pay companies. Overall, I think it is safe and reliable.

This is true story about true people. And big WARN to all of my colleague from hospitality industry to ban using PayPal services if you have ever done it before.

It is also about how "democrats" screwed up regular people.

My company is a private accommodation provider in Bali. Rarely but we have to accept payments on PayPal as guests prefer to use their credit cards to pay for holidays.

Just this Friday I issued PayPal invoice to my customer from Crimea. She authorised her credit card follow PayPal rules and she paid by invoice about US$ 6,700. 100% legal and authorised transactions from 100% authorised PayPal account using their bloody pin codes you need to find on your bank statement. It's not that easy to pay more than US$ 500 on PayPal and you need to spent hours of your time and still pay their ridiculous payment commission of 4,4% plus 3,9% exchange commission.

She had no other option to pay for accommodation because nowadays banks in Crimea can not send any payments to overseas that exceed US$ 1,000. Sanctions? Against whom, wealthy oligarchs? Western "democracies" $#*!ed nice regular people who want to go for holiday or do some purchases from overseas. I don't know if business can pay by their contracts. But my client's bank refused her payment to our 100% legal Indonesian company despite she provided invoice from us.

Finally. After client paid I received notification from PayPal about transaction is under review and it takes about 24 hours to review transaction and "make decision". Less than 24 hours later I received another email from PayPal saying that PayPal is "alerting you to potentially problematic transactions" and "We've completed our review of the transaction below and found the payment may not be authorized by the PayPal account holder or may be the result of suspicious activity. As a result, we’ve cancelled this transaction".

Without asking a question. Without asking for prove of payment (we managed to get Billing Authorisation Form, and client's copy of passport and credit card). Without taking care about what they do.

Without asking us or client whether this payment is true or not.

PayPal just cancelled US$ 6,700 payment without giving a $#*! about it might be important or urgent payment. In fact, it is urgent as her holiday commence this Wednesday.

Guess what's next? It takes UP TO 30 DAYS to see refund on customer's credit card statement.

So, client accumulated money for holiday of 6 people in Bali. Spent hours of her time authorising her credit card. PAID full amount using authorised credit card. And now she has NO MONEY and she can not be provided with an accommodation.

Well, she booked 3 villas from us for 3 consecutive weeks. 1 villa belongs to our company and we happy to place her in our villa without payment while she is waiting until she can use her money again. But the others 2 villas are someone's villas and we can not place her and her family with kids into another 2 villas without payment.

It is absurd and ridiculous situation. And PayPal doesn't give a $#*! what they do. They answered to my concern with very standard email saying they "protect" while nobody asked their f..ng protection.

Be careful!

P.S. Much more stories about terrible attitude of PayPal can be found everywhere in Internet and there is even "PayPal Sucks" community on Facebook. With a lot of confirm cases how PayPal $#*! their clientele.

Take care!

I have had good luck with PayPal in the past, but keep in mind that they do not offer any buyer protection if the production you are buying is a digital product or "intangible" item as they say. If you are using PayPal funds to purchase a product that is delivered electronically, and the seller does not deliver, then PayPal will not offer you any assistance.

I have been trying to change my name and my email address and they are making it SO DIFFICULT!!! First of all, it takes at least 5 minutes to get thru their automated phone system as they keep referring you back to the website to do whatever it is that you want to do. But if you can't get in, then you get to spend HOURS and HOURS on the phone with them! It's awful. Their customer service is lacking and I'm on hold for the 4th time as I leisurly write this review. It's a time-saver if you never need to change your information.... but just trying to update your name or your account information and be prepared to have you call dropped multiple times, having to deal with their EXTREMELY IRRITATING customer service. Actually... I am rethinking my 2 stars, here. Depending on how much longer I have to deal with this, I may be coming back and downgrading it to 1 star. Their "customer service" is bad....

have used pay-pal for a long time and always satisfied with them thank you very much pay-pal for your good service

Paypal is a site I have used often for several years. The BEST thing about Paypal is that it protects its buyers. I just had an issue with Facebook charging my account for advertising that I did not do. My guess is some old ad from months and months ago was still somehow active but I did not know about it. Within a couple of days of alerting Paypal of the issue, it was resolved.
As a seller using Paypal sometimes it takes too long for money to get transferred to my bank account and that is frustrating when someone is waiting for confirmation of purchase. The other issue is the fees that Paypal charges. Some buyers don't believe there are fees and are objective to paying them. I wish the fees would be charged up front to the buyer rather than passed down to the seller, after all PayPal is for their convenience. I just opened a business account so I do like that we will now be able to take credit cards or offer buyers the buy now pay later option.
Overall, Paypal is a safe website to use. They take care of their buyers, which is a big reason why I have continued to use them and why people are comfortable using them for large purchases or out of state purchases.

This is ok. And great for fast payment. But one time the money used to long of a time to get back to my account. Both my bank and Paypal could not tell me where my money was and when I would get it back. It took 4 days before I got my money.

Amazing!? I get a $700 dollar payment from one of my clients and my account is limited? What gives? The morons at Paypal limited my account permanently for one payment and they never want to do business with me again. I can't fathom the thought of these big businesses relying on Paypal for all their transactions, it's just absurd.

Only way is to open a new one, but apparently you need to have some info in order to get back on without them noticing: http://auctionessistance.com/paypal-limitations-reasons/

One point is this: don't rely on Paypal for all your transactions. Read all these reviews and search horror stories and you will see what I mean.

My experience of PayPal is excellent from the efficient and knowledgable staff who are genuine and not false with scripts to read from like some telephone reps. They protect the customer in disputes where the seller has operated in certain unacceptable ways which do not adhere to trading standards. PayPal can control these situations by holding the customers money under the appropriate conditions and can enforce a full refund from the seller within a time scale if the seller has failed to meet selling requirements.

I used to maintain a small balance in my account, but no longer. When I went to use it recently, I found that it had been frozen by Paypal management. Upon inquiry, it turns out my adult son was involved in a billing dispute with someone or other. Since we share the same initials and address, they froze MY account as well as his. When this was explained to a Paypal agent, it was no interest....my account would remain frozen until my son resolved his dispute. Unethical, piratical and arbitrary. Paypal is managed by swine, IMO.

An unexpected experience. I made a purchase on ebay and used paypal to make the payment. After a month of not receiving the item I contacted Ebay, then Paypal. Paypal refunded my money and advised they were sorry for the bad transaction between me and the seller and they would pursue him to get their money back. The process was simple. They asked that I write an email to the seller asking about the product I purchased and if there was not a satisfactory response I would be refunded. The seller never responded. Paypal earned my trust and I would recommend the service to others.

Paypal is what I use for whatever payments I'm doing (or accepting) on the internet. they are supported in League (which I play a ton), and I accept payments when selling from my records-collection on Discogs.com - I warmly suggest this site to anyone who wants to buy/sell on the internet - it's perfectly safe! :)

The call center staff was rude both times we called. We've had our account frozen for buying on ebay. It's too much hassle, they still have our funds. Stick with Amazon for a much better experience.

PayPal is awesome. Got my money back from horrid sammydress via their conflict resolution centre in a very short time frame. It's a wonderful service especially when dealing with unscrupulous people. Thanks a million PayPal!

I don't rely on this site fully for online transactions but I use it a lot for neopets.com and any random sites I come across that use it. I've never had a problem and have used them for years....approximately 7-8 if I were to venture a guess.

I have done a lot of things with PayPal before they came to Russia. For now I'm disappointed with this website as I have lost possibility to work with it. For me after they registered in Russia officially it's useless.

paypal.com Good to use them for online purchase only and having been a long time sincere user of this site for several years due to the many who have bought from me an use them, the thing that is annoying here is there is only buyer protection but none for the top rated seller) they should change there policy for certain trusted members like myself or at least give some buissnes sellers some seller protection who have lost out to undesirable buyers.

First they decided put me through a "random security check" which was fine, I only had to change my password, email and security questions. But the real stinger was the fact they had removed ALL of my cards linked to the account.
This means I then had too relink all my cards before I could make ANY purchases online.
This process took more than 3 weeks to finish, as paypal neglected to take the money out of the accounts so i could reenter the codes to link them back to the account.
Literal trash.

Absolutely awful.... PURE CRAP!!! Buyer and Seller Beware!!! You are much better going with a site like payza or one of the other processors

Bad! They froze my account and have my balance because I bought a shower curtain on ebay. Do not trust Paypal

Some of the worst Customer Support services out there. They never protect the seller, and the seller is the one paying the taxes to them.

A friend that does services had her acount licked until further investigation by paypal. Someone cancelled the credit card transaction after services were rendered and it may be her word against his . Having a business license is helpful but she does erotic services from her homes. You can't get a license for being a sugar -baby.

(Updated.)

PayPal is convenient but problematic.

1. PayPal goes to great lengths to avoid paying the tiny bank charges it incurs when you use your credit card. I guess it figures a penny saved is a penny earned. You have to be exceedingly diligent to avoid being shifted to a different funds source (like your bank account).

2. PayPal will not tell you the address or phone number of any merchant that might want to conceal that information. This of course facilitates shady or even fraudulent actions on the part of those merchants, since it discourages or prevents complaints and lawsuits. (For example, the Better Business Bureau will not process a complaint without a mailing address.)

3. PayPal touts its "PayPal Purchase Protection." What you won't read in PayPal's glowing words is that PayPal will apply it only for "tangible" purchases -- meaning purchases that are sent to a physical address. So problems with purchases of any kind of services, including links to downloadable software or special Web pages, or promises of support, are of no interest to PayPal. PayPal may tell you to pursue the question with your credit card provider, which, since the creditor is PayPal and not the merchant, is a dead end. Even worse, should a merchant's fraudulent actions come to light, you can expect PayPal to continue processing payments as for any other merchant.

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PayPal does have toll-free phone support. That support has markedly improved in recent years, but it's still far from perfect.

2nd time in month account locked poor custmer servoce. An all they got to say is waite 72 houers after being on phone a houer. Got to talk to a computer for 5 min just to talk to a real persen . Meanwile all I can tell ppl is I can't pay them even thow I have the $ had account for years no problem an now my account has issues

I have had (U.S.-based) eBay and PayPal accounts since like forever. I had the PayPal account for the sole purpose of buying on eBay and the PayPal account was linked to my Citibank account. They could just take the money directly from my bank account. Big mistake. Never give anyone access to your bank account, much less PayPal.

Once in a long while I would buy something on eBay and pay using PayPal. No problems.

So a couple months ago, one afternoon I went on an eBay buying spree and bought eight items totaling about $100 and paid using PayPal.

So PayPal takes the money from my Citibank account and then freezes my PayPal account refusing to pay the sellers or to return the money to my Citibank account.

They say I need to provide proof of ID and proof of residence at the registered address. Because, you know, such a buying spree and such huge amounts of money are clearly suspicious. Specially from an account that is only like 13 years old.

I sent several emails which got canned responses which had nothing to do with the subject. Time went by and sellers started to complain and probably thought I was making $#*! up to excuse my not paying.

On eBay the status of the payments showed as "cancelled" so it looked like *I* had cancelled the payment, not PayPal.

I opened a thread in the eBay forums explaining the case and I got a few sympathetic responses but after a few days the thread was disappeared without trace or explanation. At least it was there long enough for the sellers to see it and realize I was not making it all up.

I asked a friend to open an eBay account and pay for the items while I sorted out the case with PayPal. Which she did.

Six items were paid and received with the sellers being helpful and understanding. The sellers of two items say they never received the payment even though PayPal shows them as paid. These two transactions are still being disputed by my friend. What a mess and what a waste of time.

I called Citibank and told them I considered PayPal’s charges as fraudulent because they have my permission to charge my account in order to make payments on my behalf but not to just take money and keep it. Citibank said so sorry, if you don't absolutely trust them then don't give them permission to access your account because once they have taken the money it's gone forever. (Moral of the story: never give anyone direct access to your bank account, even if you think they are honest.)

So I call PayPal on the phone to see how to solve the issue. They need a utility bill to verify the address. Except that it is an address in America where I do not now live. At the time I opened the account it was good but I am now in Europe and now it is my girlfriend's address. Apparently there is no way to resolve the issue because I cannot change the address to a foreign address and I cannot change the name on the account to my girlfriend's name.

After almost two hours on the phone being transferred from one department to another what they are telling me is that I cannot get my money back unless I show them a utility bill I cannot provide because it is my girlfriend who lives there and utilities are in her name. So they just imposed a new rule without warning. A new rule which effectively blocks my money in their possession.

They explain this is not their choice but that the Federal Government requires this as a counter-terrorism measure. It requires this to give me back my money but they had no problem taking it from my bank account. No warning, nothing. They took my money and then blocked it. They could have blocked the PayPal account before taking the money but no. How convenient for them.

I said, look, I bought a bunch of trinkets on eBay worth about $12 average to be shipped from sellers in the USA to an address in the USA and paid from money in a USA bank account to bank accounts in the USA. Could you explain exactly how this could be used to finance terrorism?

They don't know and they don't care, they just follow Federal rules (which, apparently, allow them to take my money under false pretenses, no problem there).

So, being a practical kind of man, I thought what might be the way to get my money back. And I know it is child's play to get creative with a graphics program and manufacture what may apparently look like a utility bill with someone's name on it. Not that I would do such a thing which probably breaks all sorts of anti-terrorism laws and would subject the perpetrator to drone bombings and/or water-boarding. You know things have gotten out of hand when honest people have to lie just to get around the impossible bureaucracy. Kafka would be proud.

In any case, I was finally able to retrieve my money back into my bank account. Of course, the hours I spent trying to resolve this and the problems cause with the sellers and the aggravation are worth much more than the money I recovered.

Needless to say I immediately closed the PayPal account and warned my bank not to accept any further charges from PayPal. $#*! them.

So this is pitting PayPal for their retarded response in this case but also the retarded bureaucracy. Bureaucracy is a cancer which will consume the society it is meant to help.

My friend just had his paypal account blocked ("permanently limited") because he sells software for parents to monitor and manage their kid's (and employers for their employees) internet and phone usage - apparently this is a prohibited in terms of paypal's acceptable use. They cited this as illegal activity - any other views out there as to how ridiculous this is. That didn;t bother me as much as the "this decision cannot be appealed" notice attached to the original. Nevermind the fact that parental and employee monitoring systems are perfectly legal. I'd be interested to hear from someone who'd actually take the opposing view that paypal is completley justified - bearing in mind that his paypal account is unusable (even to send money) and funds may only be withdrawn 180 days from now.

This is the best of the best international electronic payment system! The best protection and the best customer service!

I've been using Paypal for a long time now. Not because it's good, but because it's more convenient to make purchases and that every merchant uses it. If you ever purchase an item on Paypal from sites such as eBay and the seller offers returns, never claim the item is fake even if it is cause you will need to pay someone to verify it is fake or get some sort of proof somewhere. Instead, just say you want to return the item to the seller, and then leave negative feedback. I've lost over $500 because I couldn't get proof buying a Hermes belt on eBay.

After someone scammed me from Etsy, PayPal refused to help me and only ever sent me cookie cutter e-mail responses. I don't think I ever once talked to a human. Don't use PayPal if you don't care about the amount of money that's in the transaction. I had to go through my bank to make PayPal give me my money back. They don't care about their customers.

I had only one dealing with Pay Pal. I received $100.00 from a customer through them and when i went to retrieve it it was not there. I notified Pay Pal and they never got back to me.

As a Buyer: Paypal is pretty good with the buyer protection.... I needed it after I paid a guy and never received the item, and after countless emails and no replies, Paypal refunded me the money...
As a Seller: I've never had a problem with Paypal as a seller... although I've never really been screwed as a seller either.. Paypal is a great form of payment, especially if you have the Paypal card...
Update: I was just screwed by a buyer on Ebay last month.. A guy to which i sold an Xbox live gift card to, asked me to email him the code over eBay... That was a mistake... Guy disputed the charge saying I "hacked his Paypal account"... I contacted Paypal and Ebay and they did nothing.. Like don't they have record of this stuff?? meanwhile the guy has multiple feedbacks from sellers, who by the way all "gave" him XBox cards, saying "don't sell to him" and BEWARE".... That was a crappy experience..

Here's another social virus to steal all your money.
It belongs to the Bilderberg Group and it is a project with nazi origins (they hope to control the whole planet a day, just by controling your money).
If you know it, you will avoid it.

PayPal.com has always provided our company with good customer service. Any problems we have previously had have been solved. A simple phone call to PayPal and you will get a CSR really quickly who will help you with your frustrations.

I have been using PayPal for nearly a decade now. During that time I have sent money, received money, requested money, sent invoices, created subscription and buy now buttons as well as used other features. I find the site/services easy to use. I most often use PayPal to pay for items online, send friends or family money if they need it fast, track payments (work and online sales related), send invoices, and manage disputes. There are two things that I didn't like: (1.) if there's an issue with your account they can and will freeze it holding all of your money until the issue is resolved (while this has not happened to me I've seen it happen and that's scary) ----> (2.) They required me to provide my social security number in order to withdraw more than $500/month of my own money; I felt that was rather ridiculous considering they make money on everything. But given the sheer amount of people that use their service and that they have to cover their own asses I figure it was inevitable. Overall I'm satisfied with what I can do and how the site/services run.

Bought a dress from a company I didn't know is based in China, the company has a UK and US telephone number on the website. The sizing of the dress delivered was small and the company suggest I amend the dress locally and will be offered a 15% refund if I am happy with the option or return the dress back to China but I will be responsible for the postage cost. Need to say this wasn't mention in the return policy on the website. Thanks to PayPal, my money was recovered and credited back to my account. Fantastic case resolution from PayPal.