This relates to a problem I had with PayPal on
6 August 2009.
* grO0gle reads a paypal.com web page:
<grO0gle> eBay Payment Received (Unique Transaction ID #6BS39fdsafs976912N)
<grO0gle> What does that mean to you?
<grO0gle> I've just had a bloody idiot from PayPal on the phone who tells me
that that doesn't mean I have the money.
<Darius> did he say why their web page lies to you?
<grO0gle> He said "it's not lying".
<Darius> yet there is no money!
<Darius> payments without money seem a little like paintings without paint
<grO0gle> Right. The buyer cancelled the transfer.
<Darius> sounds like fraud on their part
<Stralytic> paypal (and ebay) is evil... they're completely
unregulated... there's nothing to guarantee you will ever get you
money out of them
<Darius> there are plenty of fraud laws on the books Stralytic
<Darius> although you may get stuck in the middle :(
<Stralytic> paypal is not a bank, they don't have to play by the same rules
that banks do
<Darius> I wasn't saying they were
<Stralytic> eg, you buy something or sell something via visa or mastercard,
then you have certain rights
<Darius> well, in so much as VISA give you certain protection
<Darius> it's not mandated by law
<Darius> well some of it is
<peter> There's also contract law.
<grO0gle> Just got off the phone with this bloke's supervisor.
<grO0gle> She's just as stupid.
<grO0gle> ACCC tomorrow morning.
<Darius> heh
<grO0gle> No real harm done; I did check my balance before sending off the
item.
<grO0gle> But it's *impossible* to make them understand that the issue is the
misleading text, not that the transaction has been cancelled.
<Darius> as in the fact you don't know when the transaction has been
irevocably committed?
<grO0gle> Wait for tomorrow's diary. I'll put in a sanitized version of the
web page.
<grO0gle> In the middle there's a little thing saying "Status: Cancelled".
<grO0gle> And that's the only difference from a real, completed payment.
<Darius> grO0gle: ugh
<grO0gle> What do you see when you go to
https://www.paypal.com/au/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_contact-phone ?
<grO0gle> You'll need to log in.
<grO0gle> I get my phone number, a PIN valid for one hour (good idea) and my
email address.
<grO0gle> And then a number to call.
<grO0gle> Is that what you people see?
<Darius> lesse..
<Darius> yeah a 1800 number from 6am-10pm EST
<grO0gle> And the other info, specific to you?
* grO0gle prods Darius.
<Darius> phone number
<Darius> email address
<grO0gle> PIN?
<Darius> and CC number
<Darius> yeah PIN
<grO0gle> OK, fine.
<grO0gle> CC number at the bottom, right?
<grO0gle> I have bank account there.
<Darius> I don't see the actual numb er
<Andys> so someone tried to scam you by cancelling a payment when they thought
you wouldn't notice?
<Darius> it just says they have it
<Darius> could be a konq bug tho
<grO0gle> No, you're expected to know it.
<grO0gle> That's actually quite clever how they do that.
<grO0gle> The banks could learn something from them.
<grO0gle> No?
<Darius> home time
<grO0gle> The banks seem to have a lot of difficuly learning security.
