Complaint Review: PayPal Inc. - San Jose California

As a private company they are within their rights to terminate your account for violating their policies. Plus, they probably, with valid reason, see you as too high a credit risk if you had to resort to those "cash advance" charges.

Your only grounds to go after them might be for illegal restraint of trade under whatever state or federal laws covering such, because they essentially, for all intent and purpose, maintain a monopoly over their particular service on sites like Ebay, who owns them. So while it would be reasonable to maybe fine you for such violations, outright cutting you off is tantamount to declaring you may no longer make a living via mail order. Such determinations ought to at least entail some kind of due process.

But a fight like that will cost you big legally for lawyers. Even a lawyer friend will only be able to go so far with them pro bono. If they view a submission to you on this as a fundamental risk to their business model, they will fight you tooth and nail.

Your only real world, practical choice is to fall on your sword and beg them to forgive you, or do business without their service.

Believe me I'm trying to work something out with them.  It has been a fruitless endeavor so far, but maybe one of the key folks there will have a heart and reverse the permanent decision.
- This appears to be a much toned down post.  I may be wrong, but my guess is that you talked to a lawyer who basically told you that you had no hope of prevailing.  Either that or Ebay did get the letter you sent to their legal department, and they matched it with another letter that "got your attention".

I would even go so far as to say that if you talked to a lawyer once you told them the reason you were banned they told you that if you pursued it you may actually run into more "issues".

Oh and just a side note I did as you said and looked at your ebay profile.  You have a 100% feedback rating as you said.  But even though you are a member since 2003 and you claim that this is your "livelyhood" you have a rating of only 213.  This seems odd because that is not a lot of transactions over 8-9 years, in fact that works out to about 2 Transactions a month.  If you take out the ones where you were a buyer(138), you are selling about 1 item a month on average.  Perhaps you do more business on StubHub.  The point is how much are you really relying on them for your "business".

So good luck in your "endeavor", but in the end if the only thing that happens to you is that you get banned from Paypal consider yourself very lucky.

Believe me I'm trying to work something out with them.  It has been a fruitless endeavor so far, but maybe one of the key folks there will have a heart and reverse the permanent decision.

While 'cash advancing' yourself a couple bucks a few times will probably not get the local DA knocking at your door with a criminal complaint, it is a big no-no with banks, credit card companies, and paypal.  To try to cover yourself by claiming what you did is not 'illegal' is rather spotty.

if you needed money you could have gone to a bank for a loan, or done a credit card cash advance.  This is a legitimate and above board practice although it often involves higher interest rates and other costs.  You decided you didn't want to pay those costs, so you set up bogus 'purchases' where you sent paypal money from your credit card as a legitimate 'sale' to yourself.  Can you see where this would be a big problem for paypal?  Instead of getting only a small amount from a credit card company thru cash advance a person could max out a credit card paying himself, and then skip on both paypal and the credit card, leaving them to untangle the mess.  And that is only one possible scenario.  You can make up lots of others including stolen/forged cards, check kiting, you name it.  Do it on a large enough scale and you just might have the DA come knocking.

I have seen paypal hold payments, suspend accounts for various lengths of time etc... but to find them completely terminating an account, that is rare (at least in my experience).  They must have found a pattern of these cash advances that set off their alarm bells.

Im sorry to see that your actions have ruined your business.  A 100% feedback rating on Ebay is not easy to maintain.  If you have been with paypal since 2003 you know that once upon a time paypal did have several competitors, including one sponsored by Ebay itself.  Paypal beat them all into the dirt.  Waiting on someone else to rise up against paypal now is not a solution.  It would seem to me that you would do better trying to work out something with them.  I doubt screaming about reinstatement or hiring a lawyer will get it done.

Good luck.

Hey there "coast".  One day you'll be eating your words.  There could come a time when the EBay / Paypal monopoly machine spirals even further out of control and they are FORCED to re-structure.  Remember Enron?  Anything is possible.

I NEVER engaged in any fraudulent or illegal activity.  I simply cash advanced some money to myself on a few occasions FROM MY OWN credit cards.  After they told me that this is not congruent with Paypal's allowable uses, I agreed that I would not engage in this practice ever again, but yet they still insisted on keeping my account permanently shut down.  Check out my track record on EBay.  It is absolutely flawless.  I have a 100% feedback rating:  chrsg83

Trust me Mr. Hot Shot Orange County (Irvine, CA).  I'll be able to find representation if Paypal doesn't budge.  I'm pretty well connected.  Take one look at my LinkedIn account, and this will be evident pretty quickly.

"I am demanding to have access to their service ASAP, otherwise I will be pursuing a lawsuit against the company"

A business has the right to refuse service to anyone for any reason. Welcome to America.

"I am in the process of choosing a lawyer so that I can sue Paypal and take them to court."

You won't find representation. Good luck with that.

Now why would the big evil Paypal terminate your accounts? 

Did they just throw a dart at a list of names and you were the lucky one they decided to pick on?  No..probably not.  So let's guess that you have several complaints and/or "charge-backs" against your accounts and they feel that you are too much of a risk to allow you to continue

I have emphasized to them that I would NOT pose any sort of risk to them were I to be given a second chance, but their company does NOT appear to believe in second chances. 
- So let's see they ban you from Paypal and you want them to take your word that you will not pose any risk to them?  Why would a company that banned you trust anything you say. 

By the way why would you need a SECOND chance?

This entire report has you coming off like some 4 year old who throws a tantrum in the store because they are told they can't have some toy.

Now this may be a shock for you but Paypal is NOT a right they are a business. Where as a business they can decide whether or not they will allow you to use their services.  Any lawyer you try and find who is the least bit legitimate will tell you the same thing..that is after they stop laughing.

If by chance you find some lawyer who takes your case, if they take a single penny you need to immediately report them to the Bar association in your State.