The Steel Guitar Forum

Forum members who have experienced this problem, what is the MOST DIRECT way using Paypal's site to clear up a double charge? (I don't want to try phoning from China. Been there and done that with Paypal)

Paypal took money out of both my bank account and from my credit card for a pedal steel purchase. I had only ever instructed them to use the bank account. Fortunately, my sister-in-lw who takes care of our bills when we are out of the USA, noticed the error.

When I bought the guitar Dec 6th, Paypal froze my account and cancelled the transactions since they "suspected"suspicious activity". That took days to resolve. Finally, when my account was restored, they said the funds had been paid.

What they did not tell me was the the funds were paid twice and taken out of both my bank and from my credit card.

If anyone has had this problem, can you tell me what is the most direct way is to use the site to get this settled? When I used the site to get the account restored, it was a real labyrinth and consumed a lot of time. I'm hoping one of you can help me quicken the process.

What I am banking on, is that the funds are sent from Paypal to my bank at the end of December, but Paypal has not mentioned that.
Thanks, steve t

Email them ASAP and get the ball rolling. Ultimately a call may be necessary, but PayPals customer service has always been exemplary....

My experiences of course....

And if they won't straighten it out, dispute the charge with your credit card company. There may be limits on how much time you have to do this though.

I agree with Jim. You may want to put your credit card company "on notice" as soon as possible.

At least you didn't swipe your credit card at a Target store. Best of luck to you. Hope it's resolved quickly.

Steve...had a similar thing happen last week. They froze my account for the same reason... so I called them and they were very nice and we straightened it out quickly. Sure you don't want to call??

Guys, thanks for the input. I did call Paypal and though the man said They did use my checking account and then a day later my credit card to pay the seller twice, they said I should get in touch with the seller to resolve it. I did contact the seller and ask him if he was paid twice ( I doubt it). Am waiting to hear back. If not resolved, Paypal said I could file a dispute with them.

What I don't understand is that it was Paypal's mistake yet they do not seem to acknowledge that. When they froze my account (same as Pete Conklin's) due to "suspicious activity", and then after reopening it is when they double paid. (Dec 5th and then Dec 6th). The Paypal man, whom I called, said Paypal did not catch it. Those were his exact words.

I did call the credit card company as well and have gotten the ball rolling with them.

Again, thanks for the the comments and please keep them coming. Still hopeful this will be soon resolved. stevet

Good News for Steve T is that I just checked my Paypal Balance for the first time since I received his original payment, and Sure enough I am unexpectedly wealthy!! Don't worry about ol' steve, He will get this taken care of with a simple refund!!!! Glad This worked out easily!

Great news!

steve takacs wrote: the man said They did use my checking account and then a day later my credit card to pay the seller twice, they said I should get in touch with the seller to resolve it.

why should you have to do anything, steve? they're the one's who screwed up...they should take care of it!

why should you have to do anything, steve? they're the one's who screwed up...they should take care of it!

They are not always the most cooperative people.

oh well...moot point anyway since jeff says he's gonna take care of it. good.
my point was just that it wasn't yor fault or jeff's.
it was paypal's.

spending the holidays in china with all your little santa's helper chicks?

So Steve. Does this mean you will send me a plane ticket to Beijing?

I hate PayPal, but so far they were always quick to respond to any messages I sent, I try to use them as little as possible...same with the eBay

Db

Chris and Damir, you are preaching to the converted. I also feel Paypal made the mistake but wanted me to get in touch with Jeff to correct it. They said, on the phone, they could see the double charge THEY MADE but it would be up to me to contact Jeff. If Jeff did not agree that he had been paid twice, I was free to "dispute" the charge. Again, fortunately for me, Jeff is an honest young man and the problem will be resolved, in spite of Paypal's inaction.

Damir, like you, I use EBAY as little as possible now, opting for The Forum as first choice. If I continue to use Paypal, it will only be for small purchases only.

Jeff and I are now trying to figure out the best way to get the funds to me. I personally would rather have Jeff send a personal check by Overnight Mail to my relatives in ND rather than try to resolve it via Paypal. I need to find out what he is most comfortable with. The other possibility is for Jeff to deposit the funds into Paypal and for me to request a refund.

I know many of you have had good luck with Paypal but I am wary of using them anymore. Yes, it is convenient to use them, but it's been my experience, they take no responsibility for that problems they create.

Again thanks to all of you who responded helped direct me through this.

Chris, the Chinese helper chicks are helping Santa, so I won't be seeing them. Richard, if you have been a good boy, a ticket will probably be forthcoming. If not, perhpas next year.

Steve T.
If I am correct, I believe that since the funds are still in my paypal account I can just send money to a "family member or friend" and there will be no charge and It wouldn't even have to be considered a refund to PP. It would just be me sending you money.

Jeff that might work but my fear is that Paypal would claim it is a sale and not just money sent to a friend and charge me 3.2% of the total because the amount you'd send is over over $2200.

Would you perhaps contact Paypal and ask if your solution would work without either you or I paying a 3.2% fee? If they say yes, I have no qualms about having the refund sent that way.

Perhaps a Forum member who has had experience with large amount of money sent to family and friends can chime in. thx, stevet

Like others here,I'm of the opinion that Paypal ain't my pal. That said, it can be useful.
I've paid for expensive stuff using pay pal as a gift, taken from my bank account. There were no charges for this service. I tried to do this a couple of weeks ago and they added their usurious charge. Not sure if it was me or them but it would seem as with most things that the good goes away.

Jeff, if there are 2 credits to your account then the simple way to take care of it would be to hit the "refund" button on one of them. This includes a full refund of the paypal fee. If you avoided the fee by claiming that it was a gift there is still no fee for refunds.

I recently went around with them for several hours. I wanted to use Bill Me Later due to a promotional deal on financing. I already had a Paypal credit account linked to my long standing account. Even though Bill Me Later is owned by Paypal, they could not associate it with my current account, or replace the existing credit association with it. Their solution was that I open a second account using another email...no problem, took about 15 minutes to do. The problem occurred when the first transaction I tried to do on the "new" account was a $1000 purchase. They turned it down, even though I had another account with them for many years which many thousands of dollars had been processed through with no issues.

Anyway, I spent about half a Saturday morning on the phone with a (very helpful) person at Paypal to get the transaction through. Luckily the seller was understanding and waited for me to get all this sorted out. I do understand, and appreciate that these restrictions are in place to protect their customers as well as themselves from fraud, but at some point there just has to be a way for common sense to prevail.

Good luck with that, if you reach a successful resolution please share how you did it, I have been burned a couple of times, and PayPal has never been responsive to my efforts to recover my losses.

Steve, I would do as Bob suggested, just get a refund for one of the transactions. It would happen very quickly and the full amount would be refunded with no fee taken out.
Jerry

Steve... I believe PayPal's policy is to not refund YOUR money, but to send me a plane ticket to Beijing and spending money. See you soon.

Jeff, Please check your email. I'm going to go with what Bob and Jerry mention aboutusing the Refund option on Paypal. If done correctly it should save us both time.

BE CAREFUL THOUGH; please ask Paypal to deposit the funds into my Paypal account and NOT credited to my credit card or it will take up to 30 days for me to get the funds returned according to Paypal.

Bob and Jerry, thanks for making me feel a little more comfortable using the Refund option. I must admit, I like Howard, Dave & and probably others, are gun-shy about using Paypal
Everybody's suggestion have been extremely helpful.
Thanks, stevet

The only issue I ever had with them was...After buying a book from a registered user...they paid him for it, then they froze HIS Account...The seller confirmed that they had been paid, but refused to send it, and PAYPAL refused to send my money back....I was totally P'd OFF...It was only 20.00...but its the principal...