Why sending money to family is pending this time?

[dekes1]

I frequently send money to family using Paypal instant transfer.  My account is verified and has no limits and has both a linked checking account and a backup credit card.

So far this week, I've sent $60 and $200 and the funds were instantly available to the family member.  But today I sent $300 and the payment was processed as an "eCheck" and shows pending for the next 6 days (which does not help this person at the moment). 

Why did this transaction go into pending and none of the others did?  Why did it call this payment an "eCheck"? 

[kernowlass · Accepted solution]

@dekes1

Transfers from bank accounts are never instant, that is why when you send funds paypal credit that person for you and paypal take the wait for the funds to transfer to pay them back again.

But they use risk factors on deciding if they want to do this especially for friends / family payments. As you have already sent 2 this week and this time a 3rd of an even higher amount I guess they decided to 'slow' it down and make you take the wait for the funds to transfer from your bank account instead of them as there was a level of risk to the transaction.

[splurben]

This answer is not helpful. A helpful answer would explain how I can be sure that when sending funds to my brother who's traveling in Australia, I need to know if it's going to take five days because I may have to try to find another way to send it. I've also had this be completely random, i.e. one day I send $3,000 and it goes through instantly. A month later I try to send $200 and it has to wait five days for an 'eCheck'. Then a week later, once again I can send $1,000 and it goes through instantly. Paypal need to indicate on the penultimate click that there will be a HOLD OF X NUMBER OF DAYS IF YOU CONTINUE WITH THIS TRANSACTION, instead of taking your money and then dangling it in LIMBO for a week while your friend or relative is in desperate situations in some outback Australia hostel.