PayPal Community

Glad you received your refund. But as you pointed out it was from your credit card company, which makes paypals claims of purchase protection even more of a joke. I feel as if the whole "purchase protection" itself is a scam to get people to use paypal's service. And YES i did read the policy before I ordered, but never imagined that anyone in their right mind would consider a small plastic truck as being NOT "significantly different from described" from a lifelike 18" robotic shark! which by the way is an item that there is only one of and it is owned by the inventor, and has never been reproduced. The seller stole a youtube clip and used it as their advertising, with no intention of EVER making good on the item since the item technically does not exist. THAT IS FRAUD plain and simple. I sent all of this information to paypal in my dispute, but was still told i would have to return the item to the address the seller provided (written in Chinese of course) even though the return address on the box was from California. And once the seller received the item i would get my money back. Now had i been gullible enough to do this and pay the $60+ to send my $38. item back, I still would not have gotten my money back because after getting the chinese address translated it turns out it is a nonexistant place.  so the tracking would show it as being undeliverable and the seller could then turn around and claim he never received it, claiming that I sent it to the wrong address. After reading through paypal's community forum I see that this type of scam is rampant and that paypal does nothing to govern it. Other than their update saying that a buyer doesnt have to return the item. What it DOES NOT say is that  it doesnt mean you will win the dispute or get your money back. It is still at paypal's sole discretion. Part of what originally drew me to use paypals service was it promise of "purchase protection" and online security when paying for purchases . Granted I have only ever in 15 years opened a dispute twice (both times I was denied my refund after being scammed by Chinese sellers) I guess Ive been luckier than some on here. Paypal makes a big deal of 24/7 customer service and purchase protection. But it seems that the only customers who are being serviced are fraudulent sellers. But since paypal doesn't make any money(fees for using it's service) off of us , the loyal trusting buyers, I guess they are not too concerned if we quit using their service. I have a feeling though that these sellers must pay some sort of fee for using Paypals other services. Paypal is a business after all not a charity, so Paypal is making money somewhere. This could be the real reason behind their blatant disregard for their buyers/customers concerns. It makes one wonder who REALLY owns Paypal??..... ... View more

Had a very similar experience to yours, the seller said i had to return it to an address written in Chinese, (even though the return address on the box was from Ontario California!) and  that once translated turned out to be a false address. had I been stupid and gullible enough to send the item back to that address, it would have been tracked to there and then sent back to China postal being undeliverable and I still wouldn't have gotten my money back since the seller could then claim he never received the item back. And paypal is as we now all know, absolutely no help.  They send you the same cover letter for every dispute and the same general form letter, they don't have any actual people you can talk to and even if they did, Im sure they would just be reading from a script. They make all these claims of taking care of their customers with 24/7 customer service and purchase protection, etc. Yeah right! They favor towards the fraudulent sellers and deny legitimate  refunds. The only customers they are taking care of are Chinese fraudsters. I feel like the whole promise of "purchase protection" itself is a scam by paypal to get buyers to use their service. And the "return shipping on us" IF paypal decides to agree to it, is only a small percentage of what you actually paid for shipping and it can take up to 60 days AFTER you sent the item back and paid out of pocket for shipping to get even that reimbursed. Judging by all the posts in paypals community forum, the Chinese bait and switch scam is so common and paypal just ignores it and continues to favor these fraudsters and side with them. Makes you wonder who REALLY owns paypal... ... View more

also what good is paypals claim of "purchase protection" if all they do is give you the run around and then deny your refund? Kind of feel like even THAT  is a scam just to get people to use paypal for payment especially since Paypal makes the "purchase protection" and "shipping return on us" sound so enticing to unsuspecting buyers. In the fine print it says that it is at paypals sole discretion to grant or deny a refund. Makes you wonder who REALLY owns paypal... ... View more

I too had a similar experience though mine wasn't a lamp it was a "lifelike baby shark" robotic shark. I received a 6 inch plastic shark like you'd get at the dollar store. I contacted the seller who also offered to give me 10% back. So I opened a dispute with paypal and included pictures of the original ad showing a moving 18" shark and the picture of what I received., including the invoice and the packing envelope. The seller then offered to refund me if I returned it to China (at an appx cost of $60.00 from the USPS) even though the return address on the package was actually in Ontario California! I asked why I couldn't return it to THAT  address since that is who sent it  to me.  Paypal responded the seller was based in China so that's where I had to send it back to.  Long story short Paypal  DENIED my claim by saying what I had received was "not significantly different " from what was advertised (REALLY??) so I now own a $38.00 cheap plastic shark. It does indeed seem like PayPal indeed favors the scammers, judging by the sheer number of similar complaints that are posted here.  which kind of makes sense as Paypal is not getting money from US per say (no fees etc) but Im sure they're  getting money from bogus companies using Paypals other services ... View more

thanks for the advise on how to detect scamming web sites. It is kind of funny though that I could not find a phone number listed for Paypal either! ... View more

thank you for the info. Doesn't help much NOW, since I already got scammed. But my question is if my item was originally sent from a valid US address in California (the return address on the original shipping label that was on the item i received) I don't understand why it cannot be returned to that address, why it must be returned to China. It may have originally come from China, but someone in the US received it and sent it to me via the US postal service.  ... View more