Thanks for posting your story. I chose the title of this post carefully a couple of years ago when I myself tried to find out who or what regulated Paypal (after hearing my brother’s story of fraudulent ‘buyer dispute’) and couldn’t find a single useful piece of information on the subject. I realised that posting with titles like ‘who regulates paypal’ and ‘how to complain about paypal in the uk’ would be certain to bring some unhappy paypal customers here.

And, as you can see, it has.

I can’t quite get my head around what I keep hearing: the way that paypal throws people out with such incredible lack of justification and such explicit and hi-visibility rudeness. It’s like they’re not even trying to do customer service or resolve things. And that sets me wondering… it really does. What’s going on here? What’s really going on?

If I wasn’t so busy I’d try to get some investigative journalist / watchdog types to look at these posts.
Whatever it is, it doesn’t feel right to me.

I have been registered with ebay buying and selling using paypal for over 10 years, but have never had such problems apart from the odd customer dispute now and again, but since last year both ebay and paypal have increased their fees to extortionate amounts and made all sellers lives a living hell!!

First problem i had was back in sept 11 when Ebay randomly decided to close my ebay account permanently without any warning or anything saying how i had become such a huge risk and threat to the ebay community?! They send you such threatening messages making you sound like a terrorist or something. Worst part is they dont even give any actual specific reason – coz you have become such a high risk – that god knows what you might do should you find out!! Craziness…

Then I created a new paypal account for my new ebay account in nov11…. all was fine, my ebay account was going well and I had made about £4k in sales in 1 month which i was really pleased at, and I had 100% feedback, posted all my items recorded delivery next day so no delays, perfect transactions you could say, not even a single dispute had been opened by any customer, then lo and behold early december I get an email from paypal saying my paypal account has been limited until i provide proof of ID, copy of invoices from suppliers and proof of address, all of which I satisfactorily provided within a couple of days… then 2 days later I get all these messages saying my account has been permanently frozen and im am yet again a huge threat and risk and i have carried out illegal activity or something and thats why my account has been frozen – i was soo shocked i cudnt believe it, and rang paypal but they were helpful as ever… and refused to give any details what so ever as to why my account has been frozen, the only thing they could say was that a Paypal Psychic expert has made his grand predictions for the year and his magic ball is telling him that… somewhere sometime in the near future they Could be problems with my account…. and I Could be involved in something illegal… All still only a Mere Posibilitity that all this MIGHT happen….!! Can u bloody believe it?! Then the bloody fool has the cheek to say “Im sorry but Paypal has decided not to do business with you, we do not appreciate or require your business?” AARGHHH i dont knw how i didnt smash my phone on the floor i was soo angry and fuming!!

My Ebay account wasnt closed however i did get a message everytime i logged in saying there is a problem with your paypal account please resolve these issues in your paypal account, and hasnt let me list anything new until these are resolved, but obviously they arent going to be resolved as paypal has decided the closure is permanent…. Now im left with £700 odd ebay fees which were meant to be paid automatically from that account, but as that is closed i now have to fork out a spare £700 from sumwhere to pay those fees!!

Therefore paypal need to be Stoppped before they destroy any more lives!!!

All the cases that people have reported here over the last couple of months are equally serious (i.e. they are utterly unacceptable) but yours is the largest sum of money anyone has reported being frozen by PayPal. Obviously, in your situation, this could be a show-stopper for your business when times are tight enough as it is.

What the f**k makes PayPal think it’s ok to freeze your account because you’re having some difficulties? Imagine if High St. banks did that? Half the adults in the UK would be starving within a week and we’d have a full scale revolution on our hands.

90 days has passed still no responce in giving me my money back I have reported them to the FSA , and to the financial obudsman who can act after 8 weeks if I still get no responce.

I have written to then on several occasions and had no responce. I have just managed to speak to a man called Conner in Limitations dept, who was very condesending about the issue and has asked them to review our balance to see if they will give us any funds back.

The reason our account was frozen was not due to fraud or charge backs, it was because we contacted them and told them that were we as a company in a CVA which is a voluntary state that a company can place itself in when you cannot pay alll your bills on time, we are still trading and have now managed to make profit for the last three months and we are paying our suppliers back on a monthly basis.

All I can say about Pay Pal is that they do not understand customer service, they are not to be trusted, one of the most frustrating businesses I have ever had to deal with.

My advice to Pay pal users is do not leave any funds in your account, do not reley on them as a sole source of payment. if you have any issues with them go to the FSA who regulate them.

But best advice of all is do not deal with the F*~~#~$g W8#~*kers in the first place.