Recently someone of Digital Point Forums was selling the code for a video blog. I thought I’d give it a shot. I sent him the money via Paypal and he sent me a link to download the code.
Unfortunately, the code was incomplete and didn’t work at all. I sent him several emails asking him to fix the code. At his request, I even set him up with an FTP username-password so he could copy the code over himself. Apparently I’m not bright enough to unzip a file and upload it to my own server!
He never uploaded any code and he stopped responding to my emails.
Anyway, after more than a week I got tired and contacted Paypal. I opened a dispute and they sent the seller an email which he ignored. After 2 days I escalated the dispute to a claim.
But Paypal denied the claim! Here’s their canned response:
You have chosen to escalate your dispute to a PayPal claim. By ending communication with the seller, you are asking PayPal to investigate the case and decide the outcome. As part of our investigation, PayPal reviewed any communication you may have had in the Resolution Center.
Our investigation into your claim is complete. As stated in our User Agreement, the claims process only applies to the shipment of goods. It does not apply to complaints about the attributes or quality of goods received. Therefore, we are unable to reverse this transaction or issue a refund.
———————————–
Transaction Details
———————————–Transaction Date: Feb 14, 2008
Transaction Amount: -$11.00 USD
Your Transaction ID: XXXXXXXXXXXXX
Seller’s Transaction ID: XXXXXXXXXXXXX
Case Number: XXXXXXXXXXXXX
Seller’s Name: syed sinofer
Seller’s Email: [email protected]
Luckily it wasn’t a large amount, but it still left me pretty pissed. I suspect that the seller had bought a piece of software that generates a video blog and was just zipping up the resultant code and illegally reselling it. By its inaction, Paypal is condoning these fraudulent sales. Basically you can sell anyone complete crap and Paypal won’t do a damn thing! So long as you actually send the buyer something, you’re safe to continue scamming people!
Until today I was under the impression that Paypal would protect me against fraudulent sellers. Doesn’t seem like this is the case.