Ebay Payment: Is this Scam?
 

I recently sold an item on ebay. The winning bidder has a feedback count of 6 and is in Spain. He keeps sending email telling me to "Claim my payment". I have never seen this form of payment through payapal. There is nothing showing as pending in my paypal account. I do however get a "claim payment" option from the auction listing on ebay. I am then directed to enter my ebay password. I have not done so.

Has anyone seen this before? I think it is a scam. Anyone?

some payment processing are powered through a 3rd party program, but they're supposed to be payable through ebay.

when in doubt...

Dont do it :eek:

This may occur if the person paying is using a credit card and you do not have a "premium" Paypal account. Basic accounts allow only draft from a bank account. If you upgrade, they ding you for 3% on all funds received even if a direct draft. That is why I rarely accept Paypal payments any more. If they just charged for credit cards, I would not have a problem with it.

Call Paypal. They were very helpful when I had an issue.

+2

Sign in your Paypal account manually (www.Paypal.com) and, as always, check to be sure that you end up at the 'https:' secure sign in screen. Check to see if there are any payments pending and claim them from within. Paypal does ugly, stupid rip-off transparent stuff like this all the time - in the hopes that you won't 'claim' your money quickly, they can sit on it and make money using it -. They're ultimatey hoping that you never notice at which point, they can just keep it as 'unclaimed and found.

Danny

Paypal: the modern racketeer, swindler, cheat, sumbuck, neo-no-see, john wayne, chewers.

Obviously ebay has owned paypal for quite a while, but has the service gotten worse (since)?

service has gotten worse,but not much. Ebay is buyer oriented, this means they are somewhat anti-seller. And the big scammers are sellers.

Paypal is a bank, and should be regulated as such. The fact that they are not makes it dangerous to deal with them.

As for the OP, looks like a scam, Paypal would reflect any pending payments. Sounds like a paypal password scavenging scheme. Are you using a link to the auction that the buyer provides?

It is exactly the opposite. It is sellers who pay fees, and are eBay's business. For both eBay and PayPal, a seller can send a brick, and they'll accept the shipping receipt as "proof" that the goods were delivered.

PayPal demands I link a bank account with them to continue to make purchases. My bank won't allow this - they know PayPal can/will freeze your bank account if they suspect any criminal activity. This can take the form of a disgruntled customer, or troll, claiming you did a no-no. I know a guy who sells astronomy equipment this happened to. His million-dollar business was shut down for a year while he fought to get his money back. PayPal kept the interest of course.

So in the words of Eric Cartman, to PayPal - "Well screw you guys!"

What you say is true, but it's far easier for a buyer to rip off a seller. Look at the new feedback rules as an example. Their business grows by the number of buyers, sellers will be there if there are lots of buyers.

I'll pay the paypal fees for any transaction if the seller requests, only because in my experience it is a small price to pay for insurance on a big sale. i got screwed pretty hardcore once and paypal hooked me up. its faster safer adn more convenient for me than money orders. and personal checks....lets not even start on that train. compared to actually wiring money and the scam that western union is, im afraid paypal is the best of them. its only a rip off if you dont know what your getting into, once you agree to it, it was a calculated decision based on the other available options.