Hi Folks,
Since this list has people that are reasonably likely to come up with crowdfunding projects, I thought I'd point at this sorry state of affairs, caused by Paypal:
http://neo900.org/news/paypal-trouble-delays-project
(the link to http://garethhayes.net/paypal-warning/ is hardly encouraging either)
Cheers, Phil.
On Sun, Dec 06, 2015 at 07:53:51PM +0100, Phil Hands wrote:
Hi Folks,
Since this list has people that are reasonably likely to come up with crowdfunding projects, I thought I'd point at this sorry state of affairs, caused by Paypal:
It advertises an IPv6 address - but does not serve web pages over IPv6 - use IPv4.
On Sunday 6. December 2015 19.53.51 Philip Hands wrote:
Hi Folks,
Since this list has people that are reasonably likely to come up with crowdfunding projects, I thought I'd point at this sorry state of affairs, caused by Paypal:
http://neo900.org/news/paypal-trouble-delays-project
(the link to http://garethhayes.net/paypal-warning/ is hardly encouraging either)
I have been somewhat aware of this situation - the Neo900 one, not the Australian one - and I can only say that it is most unfortunate.
PayPal has a poor-enough reputation that I refuse to use their service at all: I've seen people struggle with getting an account enabled to be able to pay people fairly urgently, seeing them go round and round in the stupid card- sampling verification loop to no avail; it used to be possible to pay random merchants by card via PayPal, but now they appear to want you to create an account to do so, and even with an account in the bag, a simple transaction becomes something that Kafka wrote up. I've even read reports of jurisdiction- surfing (moving Swiss accounts to Singapore, if I remember correctly), and it wouldn't surprise me if their European residence is in the most leniently- regulated venue that can still offer services to people in the EU.
The last time I was confronted with the option to pay by PayPal, I had a nice chat with the merchant (Fritzing Fab) and we agreed on a bank transfer instead, to everybody's satisfaction. Merchants/vendors feel that they need to offer convenient ways of paying for things. Sadly, there are people for whom PayPal has caused no problems who see fit on insisting on using the service for payment. As Werner writes...
"However, after many supporters asked for a means to pay by credit card, due to wire transfers being difficult and expensive for them, we looked for a way to accommodate these wishes."
Now, it may be the case that some people would otherwise have to use archaic banking systems that don't offer decently-priced transfers to Europe (or within Europe if we're thinking of UK banks). However, convenience may have been king for some people for whom PayPal is easiest but where other options would still have been easy. I would encourage people to reconsider their preference for PayPal even if it causes them slightly more inconvenience and slightly more cost, because the result (as we see here) is neither more convenient nor less costly.
Not that anyone really needs to be told this (or maybe thinks that they need to be told this), but anyway.
Paul
On Sun, Dec 06, 2015 at 09:29:13PM +0100, Paul Boddie wrote:
PayPal has a poor-enough reputation that I refuse to use their service at all: I've seen people struggle with getting an account enabled to be able to pay people fairly urgently, seeing them go round and round in the stupid card- sampling verification loop to no avail; it used to be possible to pay random merchants by card via PayPal, but now they appear to want you to create an account to do so, and even with an account in the bag, a simple transaction
I had a big fight with them a few years ago. I bought something (theatre tickets IIRC, no other payment option) via paypal, ticked the box saying that I did NOT want an account; then received an email welcoming me to said account ... long phone calls to Eire and Luxembourg finally got it closed and they then banned me from ever making any other payment via them - although I did make one a year later - and they did not open an account on that occasion.
On Sunday 6. December 2015 21.40.45 Alain Williams wrote:
On Sun, Dec 06, 2015 at 09:29:13PM +0100, Paul Boddie wrote:
PayPal has a poor-enough reputation that I refuse to use their service at all: I've seen people struggle with getting an account enabled to be able to pay people fairly urgently, seeing them go round and round in the stupid card- sampling verification loop to no avail; it used to be possible to pay random merchants by card via PayPal, but now they appear to want you to create an account to do so, and even with an account in the bag, a simple transaction
I had a big fight with them a few years ago. I bought something (theatre tickets IIRC, no other payment option) via paypal, ticked the box saying that I did NOT want an account; then received an email welcoming me to said account ... long phone calls to Eire and Luxembourg finally got it closed and they then banned me from ever making any other payment via them
- although I did make one a year later - and they did not open an account
on that occasion.
That reminds me of their one-time corporate bedfellows, eBay, and the matter of me closing my account with them after some data spill or other. After having been assured that my account was closed, I would still get "Welcome Paul!" on the site, and still they insisted that the account really was closed.
Now it could be possible that they stash salutations in cookies that then activate when people go to the site, although I was quite sure I deleted all my eBay cookies, but I rather suspect that they just keep all the data and pretend that they're not trying to collect every last detail and associate it with my identity (also via a bunch of cookies issued by random tracking and advertising sites operating on their behalf).
And I only had an account with them in the first place because a merchant from whom I wanted to buy something seemingly had to do business via eBay and presumably through no other channel. It's all a bit like "friends don't make friends use Facebook" but with buying and selling things and involving real money.
Paul
arm-netbook@lists.phcomp.co.uk
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Alain Williams -
Paul Boddie -
Philip Hands