PayPal
Deceptive Personal Accounts are set up in order to force customers into Premier Accounts

PayPal claims that customers don't have to pay anything for transactions as long as they are within a certain limit. "Personal Accounts are free".

If someone who sells his personal stuff on ebay checks "PayPal" he automatically agrees to upgrade his "Personal Account" to a "Premier Account". This is not explained when he checks the "paypal" box but it is hidden in the PayPal user agreement.

Even PayPals employees don't know that. When I asked why their system would allow a bidder to use his credit card even if my "personal account" would not accept credit cards, the lady told me: just put a note into your ebay listing that you don't accept credit cards.

Thats what I did but some ebay user still used his credit card to pay. I received a message from PayPal with two options "accept payment" and "deny payment". The "accept payment" option would automatically "upgrade" my personal account to a "Premier Account" with the corresponding ripoff-fees. The other option, "deny payment" was shaded and disabled. Below there was a message that I was not allowed to deny the payment since this was for an ebay auction.

When asking a paypal supervisor she told me that I had to accept the payment (and had to "upgrade") according to a hidden detail in their legal agreement (that is obviously not even known by their employees). This agreement states that it is forbidden to put a note into an ebay listing that only PayPal payments without a credit card (e-check or paypal balance) are allowed.

PayPal's "personal accounts" are only a way to trick people into their ripoff "Premier accounts". Paypal does not make this clear and even their employees are not able to explain that to customers.

Company: PayPal
Country: USA

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