PayPal - Credit card chargeback successful, but now I owe THEM money?

adam.mt

Just my 2p worth, take or leave!

So, the transaction was outside of ebay, correct?

You paid using PayPal - was it marked as a gift*?

If yes to both then PayPal aren't liable in any way, hence why they are requesting their money back! The credit card chargeback you did has penalised PayPal rather than the seller. I would think they are unlikely to pursue you, but if it worries you then that's really the fault of doing a chargeback. PayPal do say when you sign up that you agree to never go that route. The correct route was to go through PayPal's dispute process and failing that take the seller to the Small Claims Court.

Since PayPal is just the money agent in this case section 75 wouldn't apply; ie. they aren't jointly responsible (all they've done is pass on the money). If the transaction was outside of ebay, before the change in the rules, then they can't reclaim their losses against the seller - hence, why they hold you responsible!

As for PayPal advising you that "You may wish to contact your bank in order to determine if there is protection on your purchases with your bank" then sure that complicates matters. Do you have proof of that statement? That would be my line of enquiry with PayPal if I was to pursue this.

[* This may be a factor. If it was marked as a gift then you don't have a leg to stand on at all. Your only chance is if the payment was clearly marked as a payment for goods/services, and even then it's weak]

unidentified

Edit fifth post

adam.mt

unidentified wrote: »

That is utterly disgusting. Why can they not reclaim their losses? All they have to do is limit the seller's account and demand that the seller pay up surely?

It's my understanding that prior to the change in agreement (June) PayPal just acted as the money agent. Therefore they have no responsibility over buyers or sellers of goods. Thus, for them to take money from someone's account without their authority would be considered theft.

Your argument was with the supplier of the goods and not PayPal. Hence, doing the chargeback means you owe them money.

On a practical level it's also possible the seller has long emptied his PayPal account of any funds and thus there's nothing to take.

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As an analogy (may be not perfect, but I think it conveys the point) if I asked you to buy a £20 food hamper for me, you go and get it and hand it over. I say unfortunately I don't have any money on me will you accept a cheque. You agree and we're both happy.

When I get the hamper back I'm not happy with the quality of the food so I cancel the cheque. Would you be happy with that?

You complain to me and my response is here's the hamper, take it back for a refund. Would you now be happy?

I don't think you would since it's not really your problem, you did what you were asked, it should really be up to me to take the goods back and sort it with the place it was bought from. Does that help make it clearer?

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In summary, I doubt PayPal will pursue you for the money but legally they do have a right to do so. Thus, it that worries you then pay them back and take up the claim directly with the seller.

Personally, I'd leave it as is at the moment. But if you do want to do something then before refunding the money first take up the issue of them telling you "You may wish to contact your bank in order to determine if there is protection on your purchases with your bank" and yet complaining once you've done that.

Actually, thinking about it that statement is a little ambiguous since it doesn't actually say 'make a chargeback'. Some credit card providers (and bank accounts) operate their own guarantees for Internet purchases and it may be that they were referring to. Hence, not telling you to make a chargeback at all. As I've said, write to PayPal with copies of the emails and the statement clearly highlighted. Don't question who's responsible for refunding your money at all, just ask 'why are they complaining that you've only done what they advised' and see what their response is.

Hope that makes sense and is of help?

unidentified

Edit sixth post

adam.mt

unidentified wrote: »

This makes sense, but I also have no funds either. Even if the seller has no funds, surely the best route of approach is do the same to the seller as they do to me. For all I know, PayPal could be attempting to claim the amount back from both parties!

But you do have funds since your credit card company refunded you! And by you asking your credit card company to pursue that route you broke your service contract with PayPal. Since PayPal are not liable for the service (or lack) of a client they aren't financially liable for you getting the goods (or not) you thought you would. It's quite simple. As far as PayPal are concerned you are in the wrong and not the seller of the goods!

It does make it quite clear, but I also feel on this note that PayPal are a little two-faced on the matter. Because this was all tied to the previous User Agreement, PayPal did not support SNAD claims outside eBay.

Now come Jun 1st, 2010 they suddenly do as their User Agreement changes. Now, this New/Updated User Agreement was available for viewing long before that date and it was clear that this policy was changing, yet PayPal very rigidly stuck to their guns and did not allow me to pursue my SNAD within the PayPal system.

I don't know all the finer details of why or how this change has come about, but I had a lot of discussion about why they didn't allow SNAD claims outside PayPal at the time, yet only a couple of weeks later - the very road that they would not allow me to take was opened up for everyone else to use - not only that but we were already aware it was coming because they had informed all users of a New User Agreement, it's not as if they had a change of heart.

May be, but it's kind of irrelevant. The only thing that matters are the service contract in place when you did the deal. Not what's in place at a latter time!

This does comfort me But I still wonder at what point do they actually decide to bother pursuing it?

I would think when it's financially viable to do so, ie. the costs pursuing the matter are worth the effort involved. That would be down to PayPal's internal policies.


I'm sorry but from how I see it as an independent party getting that chargeback was wrong and I can see why PayPal are unhappy. That said, I'd advise you get in touch with them and see what they actually meant with that contentious statement - if you get them to confirm they recommended you go the route of a chargeback then all is right again, you did as they recommended, and you can push them to reset the status of your PayPal account and declare a zero balance.

Otherwise, ignore it and move on.

unidentified

Edit seventh post

unidentified

Edit eight post

adam.mt

re: negative balance, no idea.

I agree PayPal's communication hasn't been clear.

Before the rule change however I thought they made it pretty clear there's no coverage for deals outside of ebay thus I think it was wrong for you to assume you were somehow covered. There's certainly a fair amount of warnings on the ebay and PayPal sites to say not to deal outside of ebay since you won't be covered. (I know that's the point of the ebay classified adverts, but does it not also come with that warning?).

You should have pursued this matter directly with the seller who was the party at fault.

Good luck.

adam.mt

Just reading the PayPal user agreement, section 13.11 seems to say that a credit card chargeback is allowed!
(although taken from the current agreement, June 1st, I've found some evidence the wording of this section wasn't changed recently)

https://cms.paypal.com/uk/cgi-bin/marketingweb?cmd=_render-content&content_ID=ua/BuyerProtection_full&locale.x=en_GB

Thus, if you're still worried then you should escalate the issue with PayPal to find out exactly what the situation is. To be honest the whole issue seems to be one to do with PayPal's policies rather than legal rights. Thus, try harder to get a proper explanation from them. You may find you're not actually liable for anything. Only when you've got a proper explanation of the situation will anybody here be able to help. (Following PP's policies and T&Cs is like a maze so I can see why you're annoyed!).

jezzebell

we had exactly the same thing happen to us. Paypal told us, after numerous phone calls, that the bank would refund us to our bank account and paypal would also refund us and once we had the refund from paypal that this was the money they actually wanted back.

Unfortunately 20+months on we never did receive a refund from paypal and they closed the account but nothing more was said!