Normally, launching an EECB (also known as an Executive Email Carpet Bomb) works like a charm for many companies to at least have your story heard by someone other than a supervisor unwilling to help, but PayPal has grown so greedy that in our experience, even executives at their customer relations department treat you so terribly in hopes that you ‘just go away’. If you still want to launch an eecb, click this link and all 18 executive email addresses will be pre-filled using your mail client. Get right to the point and state that you intend on suing them.
Many honest companies (hi Amazon and Google) rely on their valuable customers to keep them alive and in business. PayPal doesn't. We’ve been contacted by over 300 folks in the last month and in only 2 cases have PayPal decided to protect them. Many complaints were regarding disputes over frozen accounts due to phishing scams as well as cases where sellers were not protected despite the “Seller Protection Policy” in place. (why this site was started in the first place)
What to do first:Find out how to file a small claims case in your state’s court. If you don’t know where to go, we’ve simplified it for you. Just choose your state in the dropdown menu below and you will be taken right to your state’s small claims court website.
Most of the time, filing needs to be done at the court and can cost between $10 and $25.00. Many courts now allow you to file online - http://turbocourt.com/ is a great place to start the process for 21 states and saves you the hassle of having to drive or walk down to your court house.
If you don’t have the money to file a claim, write to us and we will try to help you out financially, if we can, using referral checks for Google Checkout signups below.
We want to help. We want to cost PayPal as much as possible and we dont care about making any money. We just want to keep this site alive, help consumers and prove to PayPal that we want and deserve a feeling of safety when using their service.
When PayPal hears that you are suing them when court papers are delivered, they will begin to fire all their guns at you and intimidate you with a generic, templated letter filled with legal hodgepodge. None of what they say in this letter will usually hold up in court and we have done all the dirty work for you to call them out, free for you to download and easily fill in with your information to mail to them. This usually leaves them with only two options: pay someone (usually a fancy lawyer) to fly to your local court to represent them (which is what we want because this can cost them anywhere from $900 up to $5,000 per hour) or just realize that ending this dispute with you will cost less so they settle out of court.
Once they realize you mean business, they will change direction and try to weasel out of paying a lawyer to go to court by endlessly mentioning their 'Forum Selection Clause' (to you and the court) that you apparently agreed to when you signed up. This is invalid and unenforceable in many states. They will send you a hefty booklet with nice yellow highlights outlining their user agreement as well as nicely tabbed documents outlining past cases they've won. Oh, and they also threaten, yet again, to seek damages from the costs of legal representation. More bullshit (and most small claims courts prohibit this kind of action as it deters plaintiffs from suing companies, which negates the whole judicial process).
They WILL cite their "Forum Selection Clause" when they have no other avenue to go down. Be prepared with this:
A 2005 ruling in New York’s Appellate Term 1st Dept court decision in Scarcella vs AOL 811 N.Y.S.2d 858 2005 and Strujan_vs_AOL 819 N.Y.S.2d 213 2006 (following the opinion of Scarcella), found that any forum selection clause is ‘unenforceable’ in NY. Many states have now followed this NY ruling and prohibits forum selection for most small claim court cases.
Here's why:
The court noted that forum selection clauses in consumer agreements are onerous because they render it unfeasible to pursue a small but legitimate consumer claim. Here, the plaintiff would have had to travel to Virginia and to retain counsel to pursue a claim that would likely amount to less than the expenses incurred in pursuing the claim. The defendant did not show that Virginia courts would also allow the plaintiff to pursue his claim with the same policy benefits the Small Claims Court offered. Thus, the judge invalidated the forum selection clause on the grounds that it conflicted with the public policy of the Small Claims Court.
The reasoning is that the New York Civil Court Act was created to allow small actions to be pursued without burdening the litigant. Paypal's forum selection clause is against the "public policy" established under the Civil Court Act, and thus, those cases held that the forum selection clause was unenforceable. More about the case can be found here and downloaded as evidence.
Below, HTSP will break down what is stated in their letter and why what they say is completely invalid, unenforceable and written for the sole sake of intimidation. Please download, fill out and print the templated letter we've written in response to their joke of a letter from their legal department in response to your small claims dispute. Its that easy. They hate this letter. We hate them.
In most cases, PayPal would be absolutely stupid to show up and spend that amount of money to send someone to small claims court. The best part about PayPal not showing up is that in almost all cases, the judge rules in favor of the plaintiff.
If they DO show up, DO NOT BE INTIMIDATED. In the many cases we've seen, judges have been fed up with PayPal (especially 3 in NYC Small Claims - try to file there if you're close), and dismiss most of the lenghty, wordy and unenforceable arguments they begin to spew in front of the judge, especially when it pertains to the forum selection clause (but again, you're prepared with Scarcella vs Aol case if needed).
Keep in mind, you've already won. You’ve just cost them money - in our case that we won, they sent a top NY lawyer costing them 5k/hr, which is exactly what we all want. And most likely, you'll win.
We don’t want donations, we just want to stay self sufficient running this site and also financially support others who reach out if they can’t afford the court filing fees. Oh, one other thing... to cost PayPal as much in fees as possible. What we recommend is a two step process.
- 1. Sign up with Google Checkout
- 2. Close your PayPal account and send this site to your friends so we can stay up & running.
