Online graphic designer gets account permanently limited

[RemoteWorker]

Hello global nomads and people that are forced against their will to work from home or not work at all! Due to the exorbitant cost of living in NYC, I've decided to travel the world and work remotely from time to time. Then the world shut down and now I'm forced to work online all the time. I have clients all over the world including Europe, Russia, China, Australia, Indonesia and other countries. Recently I did an online design and marketing project for two clients and everything was fine for a long while, then spontaneously those two clients were flagged as the reasons why I'm not permanently limited using the following very vague and quite lame explanation:

"A recent review of your account activity identified products/services on your website [note: I do not have a website] violate PayPal's Acceptable Use Policy. Specifically,  are associated with pvaaccountss.com  and are not permitted on our platform. Therefore, your account has been permanently limited. [note: I've never had any dealings with that website nor have ever heard of them]

Please remove all references to PayPal from your website/s and or auction/s. [note: I have no idea what their talking. I don't have a website nor do auctions. I simply do the work and the client sends me money directly to my PayPal]. This includes not only removing PayPal as a payment option, but also the PayPal logo and PayPal shopping cart.

Please refer to:

- Transaction 79xxxxx4J from 09/04/2020 for the amount of $35.00 USD

- Transaction 1LPxxx0D from 09/04/2020 for the amount of $80.00 USD

Currently there is no money on your PayPal account balance.

Note that should any chargebacks result in your account balance falling below zero, then you will also need to settle the amount owed to PayPal to avoid further action.

Customers who are permanently limited for violating the Acceptable Use Policy are not permitted to use PayPal services and are not permitted to open new or additional PayPal accounts.

You can find the complete PayPal Acceptable Use Policy by clicking Legal at the bottom of any PayPal page.

Sincerely [note: not likely being they use bots to replace humans in order to increase their bottom line and pay only minimum wage to their employees],

PayPal"

Now, I've decided to look on their AUP and don't see anything that explains anything about this. And it says...

Prohibited Activities

You may not use the PayPal service for activities that:

violate any law, statute, ordinance or regulation.
relate to transactions involving (a) narcotics, steroids, certain controlled substances or other products that present a risk to consumer safety, (b) drug paraphernalia, (c) cigarettes, (d) items that encourage, promote, facilitate or instruct others to engage in illegal activity, (e) stolen goods including digital and virtual goods, (f) the promotion of hate, violence, racial or other forms of intolerance that is discriminatory or the financial exploitation of a crime, (g) items that are considered obscene, (h) items that infringe or violate any copyright, trademark, right of publicity or privacy or any other proprietary right under the laws of any jurisdiction, (i) certain sexually oriented materials or services, (j) ammunition, firearms, or certain firearm parts or accessories, or (k) certain weapons or knives regulated under applicable law.
relate to transactions that (a) show the personal information of third parties in violation of applicable law, (b) support pyramid or ponzi schemes, matrix programs, other "get rich quick" schemes or certain multi-level marketing programs, (c) are associated with purchases of annuities or lottery contracts, lay-away systems, off-shore banking or transactions to finance or refinance debts funded by a credit card, (d) are for the sale of certain items before the seller has control or possession of the item, (e) are by payment processors to collect payments on behalf of merchants, (f) are associated with the sale of traveler's checks or money orders, (h)involve currency exchanges or check cashing businesses, (i) involve certain credit repair, debt settlement services, credit transactions or insurance activities, or (k) involve offering or receiving payments for the purpose of bribery or corruption.
involve the sales of products or services identified by government agencies to have a high likelihood of being fraudulent.

Activities Requiring Approval

PayPal requires pre-approval to accept payments for certain services as detailed in the chart below.

Service Requiring Pre-Approval Contact Information
Airlines and scheduled or non-scheduled charters/jets/air taxi operators; collecting donations as a charity or non-profit organization; dealing in jewels, precious metals and stones; acting as a money transmitter or selling stored value cards; selling stocks, bonds, securities, options, futures (forex) or an investment interest in any entity or property; or providing escrow services.

Please send contact information, business website URL and a brief business summary to compliance at paypal.com

Providing file sharing services or access to newsgroups; or selling alcoholic beverages, non-cigarette tobacco products, e-cigarettes or prescription drugs/devices.

Please send contact information, business website URL and brief business summary to aup at paypal.com

Activities involving gambling, gaming and/or any other activity with an entry fee and a prize, including, but not limited to casino games, sports betting, horse or greyhound racing, fantasy sports, lottery tickets, other ventures that facilitate gambling, games of skill (whether or not legally defined as gambling) and sweepstakes, if the operator and customers are located exclusively in jurisdictions where such activities are permitted by law.

Please send contact information, business website URL and brief business summary to aup at paypal.com

1 thru 4. The the best of my knowledge, digital creative services like graphic design and video editing do not violate any laws nor violate any of the PayPal terms.

2. Digital creative services are not services that require pre-approval.

So, if you're like me that's **bleep** by the global shutdown and forced to do the best they can on their own because their government doesn't give a flying squirrel about them, can you enlighten me as to what I did incorrectly that earned the ire of the PayPal gods?

Thanks and have a glorious global shutdown! [can you sense my cynicism?]

[sharpiemarker]

@RemoteWorker 

Those two clients of yours are somehow associated with that 'website' or used that website's products though, which is a website that sells social media and email accounts that are pre-phone number verified (PVA) which can be used to do who-knows-what with. How can those accounts be pre-phone number verified? It's sketchy. Each person who signs up for a social media account or email account in general, verify their own phone number and information, none of it can't be 'pre-verified' so you know its something shady. And these social media/email accounts are free to register, too. Why should it be sold if there isn't something valuable in having these account pre-phone number verified. It's sketchy.

So "other products that present a risk to consumer safety" would be the bit that applies. This is not hard to understand.

"Please remove all references to PayPal from your website/s and or auction/s. [note: I have no idea what their talking. I don't have a website nor do auctions. I simply do the work and the client sends me money directly to my PayPal]."

This is just in case you do have references to PayPal on your website/auctions. It doesn't apply if you don't.

But hey, perhaps PayPal had a misunderstanding but know they are highly sensitive to this stuff and they want no part of anything they know to be risky/shifty. I'm shocked they actually went as far as they did to tell what the problem was. Contact PayPal and explain the situation and see what they say. They have a right to not do business with anyone.