Hacker News Reader

Comment by npc | Hacker News Reader

I'm sure everybody knows by now, but this is certainly not the first time paypal has done this kind of thing:

http://www.somethingawful.com/d/news/paypal-fiasco-summary.p... (slightly nsfw)

That's a story of how a payment processor froze an account that had a sudden, incredible jump in processing volume, just like any payment processor in the world would have done. When he contacted PayPal they, understandably, wanted some evidence that the money was going to be used for the stated purpose, because if it's not PayPal could be on the hook for $30k in chargebacks and a few thousand more in fees. Instead of doing some work to provide convincing evidence, he asks a CSR to donate all his account money to Red Cross which she can't do, then gives up immediately and directs them to refund all the payments.

I don't see anything about this story that makes PayPal look bad. Not objectively at least. Subjectively, we'd like the fundraiser to have worked out, but it's the processor on the hook if the fundraiser is a scam...

I know they are partially being tounge in cheeck, but Something Awful's Privacy Policy implies they should not be trusted with money:

We may share data with the following third parties: WHOEVER WE FEEL LIKE. IF A RANDOM BUM OFF THE STREET WANDERS IN HERE, WE'LL PROBABLY GIVE HIM YOUR IP ADDRESS IN EXCHANGE FOR A HAND JOB. These third parties will use the information as follows: EMOTIONAL BLACKMAIL.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com