PayPal has "permanently limited" my account

Why you may ask? Was I selling stolen Netflix accounts? Modchips by the kilo? Maybe some hot XBox One dev goods? Nope.

Why was it locked? I sold a fellow member a GameCube DVD-ROM to replace the one he damaged. An ordinary, bog standard, GameCube DVD-ROM. The e-mail specifically pointed to the "http://assemblergames.com" which I've had in some form or another in many, MANY transaction notes over the years. Nothing in the description said anything that is a known PayPal no-no best I can tell.

I will seriously take them to small claims court if calling customer service gets me nowhere. My BLAW professor mentioned it costs about $50 to file in the state of California so it's worth a shot. Time to read

 

You to Pay Pal

 

I think customer support or someone higher-up within CS may actually rectify this. Speaking to someone who the company actually cares about will get you somewhere I hope. Someone pulled a dummy move and hopefully you both don't have to extend unnecessary energy on something that shouldn't have been an issue in the first place.

 

We have recently reviewed your PayPal account activity, and determined that
you are in violation of PayPal's Acceptable Use Policy regarding your sales
/ offers on http://assemblergames.com.

Please refer to:
- Transaction blahblah

As a result, your account has been permanently limited and this cannot be
appealed.

-------------------

Direct quotation. The specific transaction was just the GameCube DVD-ROM but I'm thinking they're trying to do guilty by association.

 

You will be able to get this fixed as my account had something similar happen to it over allegedly pirate software. I was able to prove my innocence and have my account restored. This did take pretty much a month mind you.

When you say you sold a Game Cube DVD ROM, was it a demo disc, a real did drive or a DVD-R? Try to prove to PayPal you didn't break any law by giving them hard evidence such as links, pictures and descriptions from the buyer of your goods.

 

Maybe the DVD-ROM had some drugs hidden inside it. PayPal are onto you!

I can't see how a DVD-ROM is violation, if you mention it was OEM can't understand where their logic is.

 

Wait, what do you mean "GameCube DVD-ROM"? Do you mean a game, or a disc drive?

 

I think I've been given a strike for selling mod/upgrade related electronics before. But it was never from cross-checking against the forums, and it was always from the payment comments. So I simply asked people who paid for items to just use generic terms that would likely sound too technical to most reviewers (ie. CD-ROM Controller, SD Card Reader, etc).

 

DVD-ROM. As in disc drive. I think they may be assuming it was a burnt disc now that you say that. The transaction was done in private via PM but the user damaged their GameCube's DVD-ROM PCB and I shipped them an entire DVD-ROM (laser, PCB, shell, etc) to replace it.

Customer service told me to e-mail the department that locked it. The fact they simply say "this cannot be appealed" is likely grounds to sue them for breaking the arbitration agreement. Surprised it hasn't happened already.

 

ROM means Read Only Memory, so it normally refers to pressed discs. Maybe eBay though you meant DVD-R, but that'd be stupid on their part ; not necessarily surprising though.
A DVD-ROM unit would be a more precise name, that could hopefully avoid misinterpretation. DVD reader is a fugly and improper term, but there should be no ambiguity.

Keep us update on the process, I hope everything turns out well for you and that others can use this thread as a resource is such situation happen to them.

 

Update:

They replied back and said they referenced the wrong transaction and pointed me to one in June. This sounds like a fishing expedition to me. The transaction they referenced a second time reads "Sega Saturn chip" for $32.xx which I have reason to believe was a replacement BIOS chip that does not in any way allow a user to bypass copy protections. IIRC it was OEM BIOS chips not even the replacements made with modified code. Some people just aren't interested in doing region free.

Sent this back to PayPal, shall see what happens now. I smell a fishing expedition on their part.

 

"Sega Saturn Chip" could be anything. That could be one one the processors, a ram chip, bios chip. Anything at all. "chip" isnt a definition of anything in their banned items.

I think someone was over zealous in the ban hammer and has no clue about electronics

 

I agree. Especially if they have no idea what kind of information was on the chip. For all they know it could have been blank.

 

Agreed, which is what is frustrating to me. They replied again saying the action cannot be appealed and my account remains limited as well as to contact them again if I need anything specifically. I'm just going to continue to state my case and take pictures of the item in question as well as discuss legal options with my BLAW professor. Funny enough we have to write a short paper on a fake case that has something similar going on in terms of the contract itself for class.

I think both are unconscionable as per the fact both agreements (fake and PayPal's) are adhesive contracts, meaning giant guy forcing you to sign or not use services offered and you're a tiny guy who simply has to accept it. In 2002 PayPal was sued and ruled against by a judge who ruled with that same argument. I also, effectively, cannot use my eBay account as a lot of people are too impatient to wait for money orders and I'm not interested in losing a MO in the mail. Nobody accepts Apple Pay, Google Wallet, or Samsung Pay yet.

 

Could it be possible it was just a auto-banning system by keywords?

When accepting Payment, best thing to do is tell the person not to leave a note.

Also, take this to Judge Judy if nothing else happens. It will air a year later in Australia.

 

If I was in your shoes I'd consider bringing up the case where a judge ruled against them once before for the same thing they're doing to you now and explain how this could be applied in your case if paypal refuses to unlock your account, if they still refuse you might have to take it to court.

 

When they say "permanently limited" I presume you can remove your funds otherwise if they are preventing you from your money that is technically theft on the basis they are intentionally permanently depriving you of something you own without an intention to return it (which is the definition of theft). Mentioning in case you want to look it up and add to your lawsuit.

 

Worse comes to worse could do money orders.

 

Funny how their better argument as why they can't do anything is that it's called a "permanent" limitation. That's a bit unilateral..

 

Also, you see many ROM discs, copy software, pirated gadgets that are rip-offs of real stuff, flashcards and similar on ebay every day - if they want to be bitchy about a legitimate account, why don't they get rid of the real piracy items which are blatent?