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Paypal Blackmailing Customers
http://byap.backyardmagazines.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=14823		 Page 1 of 5
Author:  earthbound [ Jan 5th, '13, 09:45 ]
Post subject:  Paypal Blackmailing Customers
This morning I woke to find an email from paypal:

Quote:
Dear Joel Malcolm,

As part of our security measures, we regularly screen activity in the
PayPal system. During a recent screening, we noticed an issue regarding
your account.

PayPal's Compliance Department has reviewed your account and identified
activity that may be in violation of United States regulations administered
by the Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control
(OFAC).

PayPal is committed to complying with and meeting its regulatory
obligations. One obligation is to ensure that our customers, merchants, and
partners are also in compliance with applicable laws and regulations,
including those set forth by OFAC, in their use of PayPal.

To ensure that activity and transactions comply with current regulations,
PayPal is requesting that you remove the following countries from your
checkout:

Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Myanmar, Sudan and Syria.

Please email ofacappeal@paypal.com when this is complete.

We thank you for your prompt attention to this matter. We apologize for any
inconvenience.

Kind regards,
PayPal Compliance Department


So now our paypal account is effectively frozen, we can't do anything, business grinds to a halt. We can't take any more payments through our websites, we can't take any money out of our paypal account until we fall into line with US regulatory policy.

Basically they are blackmailing us, not only blackmailing us but stealing. We have thousands of dollars in our paypal account and they won't give it to us until we "comply" and ban anyone from those countries buying through our website. We can't even close our account and take the money out refusing to ever do business with them again.

This is extremely crap and as much as paypal has been a simple way to do business online in the past , and as much as I don't need further website problems, I'm off to find another way to complete our transactions online.

No Paypal, I don't give a damn what your foreign policies are and who you do and don't like, your not going to force your ideologies down my throat through blackmailing me. And what about the poor people in these countries? So some poor farmer in Cuba can't even download our free IBCofAquaponics if they admit to what country they live in... :dontknow: Yeah that's really useful..

Shame on you paypal... :upset: :upset: :upset:
Author:  gazza [ Jan 5th, '13, 10:05 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
Rotten b@$^@&ds!!! I only used paypal once, ordering some ladybug stickers for my daughters room from a US outfit called tinytotsnteens. I waited for 5 weeks before discovering the seller, Andrea Poole never sent the decals, and had no intention of replying to my emails after receiving the money. I contacted paypal and was told too much time had elapsed for them to take any action, and I would just have to shoulder the loss.

:dontknow: I'm not sure how I could have known in advance that the product would never arrive, thus being able to report the problem before my time ran out so I said F paypal, never again!
Author:  Journeyman [ Jan 5th, '13, 10:08 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
What have poor old Cuba and Myanmar been up to? Been a long time since the missile crisis and I haven't seen much in the way of US/Myanmar confrontation going on.

But hey, you can still let Hezbollah buy... :lol: And that al Qaeda group running Libya these days.

I had a bank account registered with Paypal, made a purchase and got advised to use a credit card. I didn't want to so Paypal kindly took the money within the hour from my account and waited almost a week to pay the vendor and told me it was to ensure the transaction. Never mind that the account was a debit-only account.

Advising you that they will not allow trade with restricted countries is one thing; preemptively freezing your access is piracy practices.
Author:  RupertofOZ [ Jan 5th, '13, 10:10 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
Comply with them long enough to get your monies transferred...

Or ask them to release any monies... or prove that any they with hold are transactions from the countries blacklisted...
Author:  Sleepe [ Jan 5th, '13, 10:15 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
OFAC states

As part of its enforcement efforts, OFAC publishes a list of individuals and companies owned or controlled by, or acting for or on behalf of, targeted countries. It also lists individuals, groups, and entities, such as terrorists and narcotics traffickers designated under programs that are not country-specific. Collectively, such individuals and companies are called "Specially Designated Nationals" or "SDNs." Their assets are blocked and U.S. persons are generally prohibited from dealing with them. Click here for more information on Treasury's Sanctions Programs.

I have bolded the interesting bit, complain to OFAC (treasury Dept) and tell them Paypal is blackmailing a non septic. :)
Author:  Journeyman [ Jan 5th, '13, 10:17 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
Thinking about this... why is Paypal complying with US Departments? How come they aren't quoting a UN mandate of some kind? When will people on eBay be getting similar notices? (eBay owns Paypal)
Author:  earthbound [ Jan 5th, '13, 10:25 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
I've written to paypal explaining that I'm not a citizen of the US and now I'm waiting to see what happens... Meanwhile I have stopped those countries from being allowed to buy on our sites so that I can get my money out asap.

Then I'll find an alternative, get rid of payapal, then enable those countries again on the site...

Many of the countries listed have populations suffering under bad conditions, evil dictators, and or corrupt governments, paypal want's to make it harder for these citizens???

Perhaps if I was a gun manufacturer I could understand....
Author:  RupertofOZ [ Jan 5th, '13, 10:27 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
Whether or not PayPal has some assumed right to prevent Australians from trading with certain countries... they have NO right to freeze/steal your funds....
Author:  earthbound [ Jan 5th, '13, 10:31 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
Tell me about it...... This is the second time they have done it... The first time was because we put a "donate" button on the IBC site. Took over a week to free things up then, but at least we could still make sales, just couldn't take money out..

This is blatantly blackmail... They steal our money if we don't comply.
Author:  ccBear [ Jan 5th, '13, 10:47 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
Just check that the next mob you deal with does not do the same thing.
Author:  gazza [ Jan 5th, '13, 11:03 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
Might be time to get on to a current affairs program...
Author:  werdna [ Jan 5th, '13, 12:46 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
If its against regulations, why doesnt the payal system automatically restrict those countries?

So annoying that some stupid government policy makes innocent people suffer.
What a scam

Quote:
The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits
Author:  Journeyman [ Jan 5th, '13, 13:09 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
Because then nobody would notice how good a little corporate boy Paypal is being. This way people get to notice how obedient little Peepee is being.
Author:  Charlie [ Jan 5th, '13, 17:11 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
Sorry to hear EB, hope you get it sorted.

Makes you wonder what the bigger picture is on this one. :think: Who makes this call? Is it government and what are there reasoning? We will never know...
Author:  Sleepe [ Jan 5th, '13, 18:37 ]
Post subject:  Re: Paypal Blackmailing Customers
"Whether or not PayPal has some assumed right to prevent Australians from trading with certain countries... "

Rupe, Paypal has no rights to prevent trade of foreign (and in this case read Australians) companies or individuals trading with certain countries, they would be in violation of international law. They may if the company (paypal) is a US registered company refuse certain transactions on the grounds that they are assisting in trade with certain countries. I can look into a bit more but is it worth it? Cuba http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012 ... go-us.html
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