Wednesday, April 07, 2004
Paying For Goods Via PayPal
I have tons and tons of stories to share but sometimes it takes someone else writing about a similar experience to trigger the memory for me. This is the case, yet again, wth my story about some books I ordered from a website and paid for them via PayPal.
Normally, if I can pay any other way, I will pay via my “credit card”, (debit check card with credit card logo), because I have a record of the transaction and usually a bank will go after fraud before your story is completely out of your mouth and you’ve hung up the phone with them.
In this instance, however, I had only the option of paying by PayPal. Perhaps this should have been a warning flag for me. It is now for sure.
Anyway, about a year ago. I ordered approximately 4 books from a website and promptly paid for them using their PayPal button. The webiste stated that books usually were deliverd within 1-2 weeks from the order. So I waited. And waited and waited and waited.
In the meantime, I had decided to really take a good long look at all the rules, terms and conditions that PayPal operates under and discovered a nice little fact I had not known before. Armed with this information, I knew that after 30 days, I was screwed. I had 30 days to dispute anything and I think that some people out there are very dishonest and hope that PayPal users don’t read the rules.
So, about two weeks into it, not having received even CONFIRMATION that my order was received, I emailed the site owner a letter.
No response.
One week later I emailed another, slightly less kind letter...but in NO way rude..and informed him that if I did not have a confirmation by the END OF THAT DAY, I would be discussing this with PayPal.
Well, LO and behold! Guess who responds? I got a confirmation and a nasty bitchy message. He claimed that because PayPal took my money and transfered it into his account, that meant I had confirmation. No. No it does not. That does not confirm one fucking thing except that he knew how to take money out of his PayPal account. It did not give me an itemized list of what I ordered, go over the costs and estimated shipping date. Like I’m fucking stupid and have never ordered anything off the internet before. Idiot. If I had not received my books within 30 days and wanted to dispute this, there was absolutely no hard evidence for me to give to PayPal regarding my purchase. The website owner could very easily say it was a gift as people use PayPal for that all the time. I knew he was full of shit and I knew that he hoped I didn’t know that.
Whatever. Just send me my books prick.
By the end of the week I had my books. And accompanying those books was the nastiest fucking letter I have EVER received from any person trying to make money off of others. He informed me that he would be spreading my name to all sites of this genre and getting me banned everywhere. He made small threats throughout the letter, (not on my life), and just basically went on and on and on.
So I copied it and sent it to PayPal. Fucking idiot.
And how stupid is he? He’s gonna ban me? Please. You can’t ban me from the fucking internet assmunch. And let’s just say he was successful with one or two sites...what’s to stop me from having a friend order future books or other items for me off of those websites?
HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA!
What comes around goes around.....and when it comes back to you, it comes back three times as hard. I hope that fucker remembers that considering this genre of websites LIVES by that policy.
May his shriveled and obviously UNused prick fall right the hell off.
Anyway, I got my goods and I reported him and this time, the consumer won. But let this stand as a lesson to anyone who orders things over the internet. Often times it is legit, safe and you get what you ordered in a timely fashion. However, it is imperative that you read the “fine print” on any service you use and any website you order from. If I had not read PayPal’s t&c, I would have extended patience and been ripped off for it. There would not have been a damn thing I could have done. As someone said in comments the other day:
“Forewarned is forearmed.”
[inspired by Jane]
