G is for Graham Crackers

Image via Pollystyle

Those bastards at Saveur are always pushing my buttons, and pushing my cooking ability.  This time the posted about Graham Crackers that look amazing.  So amazing that I actually bought some despite the fact that PayPal is their payment processor and I Hate (with a capital H) PayPal.  I really bought them so I would have something to compare against when I try to make these, I feel like you have to have a flavor firmly fixed in your mind to help you when you create something delightful.

How is eBay the only show in town?

Tell your friends, and family don't use these clowns.

Found this one on Gizmodo.com and cannot say that I am surprised. The last several times that I have tried to find anything on that catch all of garbage I was overwhelmed with how few actual products where being sold, most of what is being sold is either freely available from the manufactures site, or "services"/"information" related to making money or getting rich quickly.

From the article that Giz linked the author assumed that the person that purchased the laptop was high, but I think this comment nailed it:

"Maybe not the same in this case but something similar happened to me recently. I put $800 worth of hardware up for sale on eBay and someone bid $5000. They then insisted that they had put the money in my PayPal account, even emailed me receipts etc but PayPal showed nothing. They kept insisting that I ship the stuff they said they bought. In the end it turned out to be a scam with a stolen account. Ever since that I've had a ton of email insisting that payment has been sent for all sorts of stuff I never put up for sale. In the end I closed my eBay account.

Posted by: Graham Heyes"

eBay is definitely circling the toilet, but I will had it to PayPal's support staff. It took less time for them to answer the phone and route my call to the correct department, and even resolve my issue than it did to write this post.

It isn't slowing down the number of phishing scams, or other issues that PayPal has, but at least when you call someone answered the phone (even if you really had to look for that support number.)

Tags: eBay Customer Service PayPal Convictus

Miracle of Miracles PayPal was working today

I figured it had been a while since I tried to logon to PayPal to check my balance, and with no small amount of trepidation typed my credentials .... lo and behold, successful logon on the first go. Not too exciting though, what with the $.01 balance, but none the less maybe the worst of PayPals terrible service is behind me. In the months since I wrote these posts, I have vowed to not buy anything from eBay, and not pay anything using PayPal. Sad really, because as much as I want to help out Kiva.org, as long as the only option is PayPal, no dice. Around the same time I was looking at my PayPal Balance, I also thought to look and my only real funding option for that account, My Adsense account, and I had to wonder why Google would continue to support a rival company, on that has blocked their vaguely similar product Google Checkout. I am very curious to know why (other than for money) eBay doesn't want people to pay for auctions with Google Checkout?

My conclusion is that they know all to well the precarious nature of their business model, and the importance of not giving anybody a foothold in to their business model, looking no farther than PayPal for a reason why. eBay purchased PayPal in 2002, and I am very sure that they have not forgotten the 1.5 billion dollar lesson of how small ideas on the internet can quickly become 800 lb gorillas to be bought out or dealt with. I am guessing that because of the money they laid out for a company that they initially ignored eBay won't ever be caught napping again. Look at how they have a 25% stake in free, vaguely similar competitor Craigslist.org.

I suppose my point is why can't I use my Adsense dollars with Google Checkout, or at the very least as credit to buy Advertising with Google.com? My guess is that Google is finding themselves spread thin like a certain other search/portal giant. Careful Google, we have seen what happens when companies spread themselves out too far.

Tags: Google PayPal Google Checkout Yahoo Peanut Butter Convictus

PayPal induced my mouse rage

Once again PayPal was on the fritz. I tried to finish a purchase and this time I was just getting page timeout errors. I believe the specific error was 409, so there is a possibility my internet service provider was the problem. I was not having timeout errors anywhere else, and Speakeasy is really a great ISP so I doubt it. Any how, since the main page wouldn't even come up I was not able to finish my transaction.

Why do we put up with this? eBay has a strict monopoly on who they allow to be affiliates. Take the portable reputation that is free Rapleaf and what happened to them.

To be perfectly honest, I wouldn't even use my papal account but for that it gets accepted nearly everywhere. The same cannot be said for Google Checkout.

Tags: Convictus PayPal

PayPal is broken - the after math

Based on my analytics traffic I am not the only one to receive the "Message 3004" error. I find this especially interesting as I am (at time of post) ranked 10th in the results on Google.com and one of the results that ranks higher than mine actually has a link to the answer. Unfortunately for me, that page would not have loaded when I was experiencing my trouble.

For those who cannot follow that link the summary is below (emphasis mine):

"Account Basics - Logging In - Error Messages

What is Error 3004?

Error 3004 is associated with the slow loading of some web pages on the PayPal website as we periodically upgrade our system to provide members with the best online transaction features available. Some customers may be unable to access the website or complete transactions for short periods of time.

We apologize for any inconvenience. Thank you for your patience."

This is a similar message to the one that I got from my support email to Paypal. Unfortunately it does not well describe my the trouble that I was experiencing. I tried to logon from numerous locations, different computers, and different isp's. I tried on my home DSL connection, on my works DS3 connection and even on a 115kbs cellular data card. The common thread was me, not slow loading pages (though the page did load slowly). Given the low volume of issues that I have found with this (my blog post being so highly ranked being my evidence) it seems to me that some users that are low volume purchasers are being put into some kind of purgatory, and this may be related to the server upgrades it may not be. I have average about 5 Paypal transactions a year. Because of Payperpost.com, I have received funds more than I have sent funds this year.

Paypal really needs to revise their information campaign, and that stinker of a hard to find 800 number needs to be fixed. 1-866-571-3012 (Monday - Saturday 5:00 AM to 9:00 PM, Sunday 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM PT)

On the whole, in a land of few (read about 6) online payment options other than credit card it is sad how PayPal has been allowed to languish. No one seems to want in, or more to the point the eBay/Paypal exclusive partnership makes it hard for any other online payment options to gain credibility.

Tags: Paypal Customer Service Convictus

PayPal is broken -- Update

So,

I cannot determine if my emails to eBay that were forwarded to Paypal helped, or if my unanswered emails to Paypal did it. But I got the following email from Paypal, and magically I can now log in.

"Dear Josh

Notification of Limited Account Access
We are contacting you to remind you that on 14 November our Account Review Team identified some unusual activity in your account. Therefore as a preventive measure we have temporary limited your access to sensitive features.

To update, please

Click Here "

I have a suspicion that this is related to my trying to logon about 30 times in a 10 minute period, with all different manner of password. Either way I was never able to get a hold of customer service for anything other than an automated email.

Good thing too, I was able to pay for my item (that I hope to see soon) and will probably start looking to not rely on Paypal.

Google needs to hurry the hell up with their Gbuy service, and make it to the start offering services similar to Paypal so I can take those adsense payments somewhere other than with the Jokers working at Paypal.


Tags: Paypal Customer Service Convictus

PayPal is broken

-----Update----
Right so I apparently only have 20 seconds of your attention so I will be brief, below is the first part of my account of some trouble I was having with PayPal. I assume that because you are here you are too.

Paypal support. If you call during business hours they do answer the phone.

1-866-571-3012 (Monday - Saturday 5:00 AM to 9:00 PM, Sunday 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM PT)

These pages are the continuation of the story if you care, otherwise I hope your troubles are resolved quickly.

Part 2
Part 3



So at some point in the last few weeks I started to getting the following whenever I try to access my Paypal.com account.

We are unable to complete your request at this time. Please click Retry or try again later. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Message 3004

Super. Normally this account only holds some low dollar amount, often $30 or less; so I wouldn't care too much. Unfortunately right now I do care...I won an item on eBay and I want to be able to pay for it. I thought that perhaps this was an unscheduled outage they do happen still, even to big companies. I went to my well of information for this sort of thing, and not a whisper of this on slashdot.

Right. I cannot possible be the only one having this problem, so I went to my wifes computer to check. Same result. I cleared the cache and cookies in Firefox and tried again; and again nothing. By this point I am a little annoyed, but it was late so I went to bed.

I tried again from work, and was still greeted with the friendly and informative message 3004. At this point I began to wonder if eBay hated Firefox, I couldn't imagine as there would likely be a riot. Not withstanding I tried with IE6; hello message 3004 (here to fore referred to as "bob")

I called my wife to see if I was the only one on the planet that was having this problem, and guess what she saw bob as well.

OK. Well at least it isn't only me, I was starting to think that bob was my imaginary friend. My brother gets a slightly different 3005 error, but still no go for me, my wife and my brother living in one house all cannot logon to the damn paypal site.

So the practical me decided to email paypal:

"Hello,

I am unable to logon to my Paypal account. My username is the same as the email address that I sending from. Below is the link info from my browser.

I am also attaching a screenshot. I don't know what to do, I have an auction that I have won but cannot pay for. Please advise. I am running windows xp home with latest patches (ie# included) I get this behavior on every pc in my house.

Please advise.


https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_ebay-checkout&sc_track=...."

Hyperlink severely truncated and a little edited, but anonymity is ok even this day in age.

Anyhow I got a response that was very predictable:

"Dear Convictus,


Thank you for contacting PayPal Customer Service.

In an effort to assist you as quickly and efficiently as possible, please direct all customer service inquires through our website. Click on the hyperlink below to go to the PayPal website. After entering your email address and password, you can submit your inquiry via our Customer Service Contact form. If you indicate the type of question you have with as much detail as you can, we will be able to provide you with the best customer service possible.

If your email program is unable to open hyperlinks, please copy and paste this URL into the address bar of your browser.

https://www.paypal.com/wf/f=default

If you are contacting PayPal because you are unable to log in to your account, please use the contact form below.

https://www.paypal.com/ewf/f=default

Thank you for choosing PayPal!"

Not amusing, please login to your account to report an issue with your logon trouble, have a nice day.

Well. Semi-thwarted, but undeterred I replied to them with additional information and specifically requested additional assistance from a human not a form generated brain dead response.

Thinking that it would be best to pursue additional avenues I decided to to try hitting up eBay for some assistancia as well.

"From:
To: eBay Customer Support
Subject: GS=C23002 Paying with PayPal [#US 30086T ?01 ]

Form Message %22301% 031200
D_ID111220062233D_ID/W_ID88018927W_ID/S_ID000S_ID
Subject: GS=C23002 Paying with PayPal [#US 30086T ?01 ]

User Feedback: 45
User State: ?01

Browser Info: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1)
Gecko/20061010 Firefox/2.0

Buying and Finding > Paying for your item > Paying with PayPal

Message: 330044829567

every time I try to pay for my item I receive the following error.

We are unable to complete your request at this time. Please click Retry or try again later. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Message 3004


I am not sure what to do. Please help me complete the payment for my item"

Nice sweet and to the point, and the response:

"Dear Convictus,

Thank you for writing eBay in regard to your PayPal account.

To help you as quickly and efficiently as possible, I've forwarded your email directly to a PayPal representative. We do this to ensure the security of your PayPal account information.

When you have PayPal inquiries, you'll get answers faster if you contact PayPal Customer Service directly. To reach PayPal Customer Service, log into your account and send a secure email through the following Web page:

https://www.paypal.com/ewf/f=default

It is my pleasure to assist you. Thank you for choosing eBay.

Sincerely,
Steffan G.

eBay Customer Support"

Predictable, and again directing me to login to report my logon troubles. Sweet guys, but at least both companies tow the company line. What do you bet that paypal boys wrote the FAQ on dealing with paypal questions for the eBay people? Anyhow form generated cookie cutter crap was starting to wear thin so I thought a more direct route would assist in getting people to respond.

"Yeah for auto generated responses.

I already have tried support requests directly with paypal. They are returning me form generated emails telling me to logon to the site to work on account related issues(funny that my account issue is that I cannot logon to my account). Any way I contacted you in a vain hope that human beings still lived somewhere in this world that will read the email. Read the case, and see that I need to be helped in an "non-automated fashion"

Thanks though.

When I browse to the page that you directed me to I get the same Abort message 3004. I cannot access paypal. I am not joking when I say that any form of web support is not helping. I need a person to read this and realize that the systems that are in place are broken and not helping.

I cannot access paypal in any way shape or from using any browser. All I get from paypal is the message I relayed to you in my email.

I have cleared cache and cookies. I have tried running updates. I have tried it through secure web proxies in hope that is was an IP based denial.

I would appreciate help that involves a human."

Anyhow, this is the end of rant and I will update as I get more info, but I am not impressed with the lack of human touch. 3 emails in and not even a glimmer of hope to resolve my logon issues.

Tags: Paypal Customer Service Convictus