There was no fraud detection, no flags, no payments to me ever. None.
Paypal demanded, out of the blue copies of drivers licenses, passports, bank statements etc that they have no right to, claiming they needed them to comply with law. Suspicious much? Well I sure was and am. They have only ever been an online click-clack machine for my credit card and nothing else. Ever.
I have the _right_ to refuse to do business with them if they unilaterally change their rules. I have done so.
There /can/ be /zero/ fraud possible by closing the account because I don't trust them and going elsewhere to get my credit card processed.
From their point of view it would be a negative metric. Better to not have declining account numbers you have to report so just block them.
They are just crooks from top to bottom. It's their default response. They are arrogant, obnoxious and deserve to be prosecuted and should be.
What I want them to do is repect my wishes not to be associated with them in any way and not to have an identity theft vector avaialble with people and an organisation I have justifiably decided don't trust when I have told them that is what I now want.
So f%#k them and anyone sticking up for the crooks they are.
I stopped reading your rant here because it's clear you are not familiar with financial regulations.
I think the issue is with shifting expectations with no clear way to terminate a business relationship. Not sure how being "familiar with financial regulations" would change that.
For what it's worth, harry8's post inspired me to close my Paypal account while I still can. Done.
Enlighten me if my knowledge has gone amiss.
Now remove the "cpu on a network" being involved and see if you can think it through. You've never been murdered so there's no need for laws and regs. Equivalent with no cpu on a network. Obviously murder is pretty extreme and selected on that basis to underline the principle.
>> Paypal demanded, out of the blue copies of drivers licenses, passports, bank statements etc that they have no right to, claiming they needed them to comply with law.
Is a statement of fact. Make your accusation plainly about it if you choose to do so or maybe apologise for insinuating it?
So clearly these "financial regulations" you speak of don't actually exist, or at least PayPal has just -- lucky for me -- conveniently forgot to comply with them for my account.
Also consider that there are two things at issue here: account ownership, and account operation.
PayPal seems to not believe that the grandparent is even the owner of the account. If they did, then they'd allow him to close the account. That seems distinct from allowing someone to operate the account, that is, perform financial transactions. Which, sure, depending on the kind of transactions or kind of account, that might require further verification. (But assuming the GP is telling the full story of how he uses the account, PayPal certainly does not legally need further documentation.)
So it's a little weird PayPal has taken the stance they've taken. If all they cared about was complying with "financial regulations", then they should have no problem with the account owner asking them to close the account. But clearly they are doing something shady, because presumably knowing the account password, or at least demonstrating having control of the email address and/or phone number (or other contact method) associated with the account, should be enough to satisfy PayPal in order to close the account. The fact that it isn't is a red flag that should make us question PayPal's motives here.
At any rate, the fact remains that using a PayPal account solely to pay for stuff online should not invoke any "financial regulations" requiring the account owner to upload ID photos or other documentation. If that were the case, every intermediary in payment processing -- like Stripe, Venmo, Square Cash, or even Google Pay (all entities I use but have never given identity documentation to) -- would be required to collect this information.
The account (email) that created the PayPal account is requesting it to be deleted, that should be sufficient. If both accounts have been insecurely breached, that's really the user's fault. PayPal could even mark the account as pending deletion after 30 days if we're really worried about this.
You shouldn't be able to stand around and blackmail the user for even more personal information to sell or "accidentally leak" to advertisers under the guise of "security."
- The person asking to close the account isn't the same person the account belongs to, and the person who created the account is on a vacation or something
- There is some nefarious activity in progress and closing the account would hamper dealing with it
...and after this they can close the account without demanding the ID.
At the same time PayPal is almost aways side with buyer no matter where account was open.
> What else do you want them to do? There's a bagillion compromised PayPal accounts actively scamming people
... actually check using humans and not "algorithm told me it's a fraud, therefore it's a fraud" ?
I had dumbassery like that trigger (not on pp) just because I didn't use account for few months then used it once...
What else do you want them to do? There's a bagillion compromised PayPal accounts actively scamming people. It's why PayPal G&S is the gold standard for buying stuff from people online. Like I get that closing the account seems like a safe action but letting someone who isn't the account owner do anything with the account is bad move.