E-bay And Paypal Scott Thompson, Andrea Paypal is holding my money and I need cardiac surgery. San jose, California

Paypal typically will only hold a payment for 21 days assuming there is not an issue with the type of item being sold. The only way to get the funds released quicker, is to provide proof of shipment, and/or have the buyer post a positive feedback. Sometimes if you communicate with the buyer, you can convince them to post a positive feedback before you ship, and paypal will release the hold in a day or a few days tops. This of course puts the buyer at risk, but if they trust you enough,the risk falls on them and not paypal at that point. A dispute can still be lodged by the buyer, but it makes it way more difficult if a positive feedback was left in advance.

You stated they want to hold your funds for 180 days? This is generally only done if you are closing the account, or if they are closing your account due to a violation of terms. So which is it?

Once again, the reason is so if any transactions have been conducted and there is a dispute, that the funds will be there to be used for refund purposes.

Ebay has been a fantastic source for a small home business to even exist. Do you have any idea what it takes to open a retail location...or to advertise and promote? Ebay allows this to be done very inexpensively, and anyone can do it. The fact that paypal policies are geared more to protect buyers, is a good thing in the long run. As if buyers have confidence, that will continue to use ebay, and the sellers can prosper unfettered.

Once you have proved yourself trustworthy by a sufficient history of positive transactions and no disputes or complaints...the paypal funds are INSTANT. That can be a life saver. There have been times when I was in a bind..so I look through my stuff, throw something on ebay cheap..and in hours my paypal account has funds ready to use. I think it is the best thing since sliced bread.

Granted there are millions of transactions going on at any given time...heck the stats from 2006 state ebay handles 212 million registered users and traffic averaging 1 billion page views per day. Thats the task faced by the web architects at eBay, who fine tune a personalized database-driven e-commerce site that manages $1,590 in transactions per second. With all that traffic and volume, around 5% of sellers have an issue with paypal holds. I would say overall they have done the right thing, but like anything else there are going to be some that have been on the lousy end of a policy. But the policy in the long run, is what can prevent scammers from flourishing, which hurts everyone if allowed to continue.

If you don't wish to use ebay and paypal, perhaps you can suggest a better safer way for anyone to open a business that is feasible and affordable and has very low risk if done with integrity, and requires very little if any, financial investment.

You will get your funds released, they are not stealing or ripping you off, they are abiding by the policies as stated in their terms to prevent fraud and scams. An unfortunate byproduct of the fact the scammers are out there, and always looking for ways to beat a system.

Trust me, I understand your frustration. If you are unaware of certain policies it can cause financial problems. However, the reason they do this is to protect buyers, they are not doing this to collect interest. That is just something people assume because they are angry and not understanding the true reason. It is a false conclusion.

You state you have a 100% feedback rating and they have no reason to freeze your account. If they truly have no reason, then I would agree you have a case. Typically the reason is you have not completed enough transactions to prove yourself as a safe seller. Copied from paypals website...Nothing is hidden or hard to understand. It is easy to read and easy to find. I simply googled "paypal holding funds"..but there are easy to find links on the website so you can understand the terms if you CHOOSE to use paypal.

Why does PayPal hold payments?

Payment holds ensure that sellers have sufficient funds in their account if, for example, a customer files a dispute. This allows PayPal to provide a fast and secure payment service to you and your customers while keeping our prices competitive.

We know this is a change in the way we do business with you and we hope you understand that, if your payment is held, you haven't done anything wrong. In deciding whether to hold payments, we review many factors including transaction activity, business type, and customer disputes.

When do payment holds apply?

Payment holds may be applied to some or all transactions in your account. Here are some common reasons for holding payments:

• You have limited history or selling activity with eBay and PayPal
• You have an eBay feedback score of less than 100 or received fewer than 20 Detailed Seller Ratings in the last 12 months, and do not have a record of good performance
• If you have low Detailed Seller Ratings or other indication of below standard performance on eBay
• You have a high rate of customer disputes, claims or chargebacks
• You're selling in a high risk category or industry such as, but not limited to, tickets, travel, gift certificates, computers, consumer electronics, or cell phones
• Your payment activity is inconsistent. For example, you have a spike in selling activity or you started selling in a new category without an established history in that category
• The account information you have provided is incomplete or inaccurate

So in all fairness to paypal, you may be leaving some information out of the report. I have had no problem with them and have conducted hundreds of transactions and been a member since 2001. They have not held a single payment other then my first few transactions. I was furious also, but now that I understand the reason, I see why it is necessary. Unfortunately due to the scammers out there, honest ethical sellers have to earn trust, it is not assumed for anyone, anymore.

You also stated...and I quote" Ebay makes you use PayPal to buy anything on their site" .

This is simply untrue sorry to say. Ebay does NOT require you to use paypal. Some sellers may only accept paypal, but ebay places NO restrictions on how to pay, that is completely up to the seller how they choose to accept payment. Paypal is generally recommended due to the way it can protect the buyers and the rating system and verifications..but there is absolutely no ebay policy that "makes"  anyone use paypal.

I couldn't agree with you more!

Folks need to READ the complete paypal agreement, as well as the Ebay agreement before they conduct any business through Ebay and paypal.

Good luck to you.