Failed eBay/PayPal purchases putting my credit card over the limit.

glengood on 15/06/2017 - 13:50
Last edited 15/06/2017 - 13:50

So last night I attempted to purchase (an admittedly too good to be true) Macbook Pro using the 'CHOPCHOP' code - worst case I'd raise a Paypal dispute or file a CC chargeback through Amex.

I tried 5 times to make the purchase, each time getting an error on Ebay stating the chosen payment method was not available. Eventually gave up and thought meh, was probably fake anyway and went to bed.

Fast forward to this morning, and when trying to make purchase and my amex card was declined for being over the credit limit. When I take a look on Amex there are now four pending charges for ~$1000 from Paypal.

I called Paypal to get them to cancel the transactions. Their response was was to send me an email in their secure email system to confirm that Paypal had denied the transactions due to internal security checks on the Ebay seller, and Amex should release the funds as the transactions are denied and can't proceed at all on Paypal's end.

After calling Amex, they say they can't do anything until either Paypal claim the funds that are pending, or Paypal call them directly to confirm the funds can be released. Understandably Amex won't take a random third party email as authorization to cancel the transactions completely, but Paypal are insistent they won't call Amex directly and will only email me something to forward on.

So now I am left with an overdrawn credit card which will incur overdrawn fees, and be unable to use the card until some arbitrary time limit passes.

Has anyone had experience with a case like this or advice on what I could do to get the pending amounts taken off my Amex card? I find it bizarre how Paypal can claim there is no issue with their system that stops transactions due to security concerns, and then proceeds to place pending amounts on buyers credit card which can't be removed until the next billing cycle.

TL;DR;
My credit card is unusable and over the limit due to Paypal's amazing security features. plz halp or share your tales of Paypal's incompetence.

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Comments

  • tomsco on 15/06/2017 - 14:05
    +1

    I'd be on the phone to PayPal hounding them. As AMEX said, until they have a way of verifying PayPal authorise to release the funds, there is nothing AMEX can do.

    • glengood on 15/06/2017 - 14:19

      Cheers - Currently waiting a callback from a supervisor at Paypal as the last person I spoke to gave the same spiel about them only being able to send an email.

    • galaxiers on 15/06/2017 - 14:32
      -1

      PayPal customer service is awful, I wont waste my time with them, will try with AMEX

  • EFC94 on 15/06/2017 - 14:25
    +2

    Had this happen to me a few weeks ago, all the pending transactions disappeared after 2/3 days. I didn't call anybody or do anything about it, so I wouldn't stress too much :)

    • glengood on 15/06/2017 - 14:26

      Ahh thanks! If it is only 2-3 days that's not so bad - I was under the impression it would be until the next billing cycle

      • ascorbic on 15/06/2017 - 14:37
        +2

        Purchase authorisations have up to 7 days to be settled into the merchant account. If the funds aren't settled by that time (or the merchant cancels the authorisation), the funds are released back into the customer account.

  • pjetson on 15/06/2017 - 14:27
    +5

    It doesn't sound like your card is actually overdrawn, just that there is no balance available. I doubt you're getting charged anything for it.

  • trex on 15/06/2017 - 14:34
    +4

    The pending amounts should disappear on its own after a few days. When you charge a transaction to your credit card, the merchant (ie Paypal) makes a request of your bank, and your bank has only a few seconds to accept or reject the transaction. Once the transaction is accepted by your bank, it appears in the Pending transactions.

    At the end of the business day (or week depending on the merchant's internal process), the merchant submits all of the final transactions to their bank in a batch, and the banks all trade transactions in a batch, and money is sent between banks. This is the process that takes a couple of days, and after this happens, you see the transaction move from your Pending transactions into the regular transactions area.

    Since the 4 charges were not completed due to the error, Paypal would not claim these charges from your bank. After a few days of being unclaimed, the transactions will disappear from Pending transactions.

    • glengood on 15/06/2017 - 15:01

      Thank you, that makes perfect sense. If only the Amex support staff were as informative…

  • [Deactivated] on 15/06/2017 - 15:09
    +1

    Typical ozbargain response.

    Bikies

    • BookerDeWitt on 15/06/2017 - 18:36

      We need Bikies plus flamethrowers for this instance. Should solve the problem.

  • Ozbargainlyf on 17/06/2017 - 00:33

    bikies

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