Update – November 5, 2012: Ask PayPal is a well-kept secret. The people behind it got my account back in order quickly and painlessly once I found out they exist.
I saw this in my PayPal account some time last month:
What is the problem?
Sep 9, 2012: As of April, 2012, new Federal Regulations require Money Service Businesses, such as PayPal, to verify the identity of a customer before we can provide various services or product offerings. As a result, PayPal must ensure we have collected and verified important data such as customer name, address, date of birth, and national tax ID or social security number. Because we were not able to fully confirm your identity based on your current account information, we need to request additional supporting documentation from you.
You will continue to have full access to your PayPal account, but until we are able to confirm your identity, we may be unable to process certain types of customer initiated requests such as adding funds to your PayPal account.
I got the following message in response to submitting a photo ID. It was the only document I felt safe providing with so few details, and they didn’t make it clear how much documentation I needed to provide.
Thank you for responding to our inquiry regarding a request for documentation in order to regain access to your PayPal account.
The name on the documents recieved does not match the name on the account.
At this time, we are unable to lift the limitation as we need to have your legal name listed on your paypal account. To complete a name change please provide the following-*The name on the account does not match with the name on the documents you have provided.In order to remove the limitaton & restore your account to normal, we need your authorization to update your legal name on your PayPal
account to match the name on your Photo ID .Please response to proceed further.
- A recent statement for tha Bank account or Credit card linked to your PayPal account.
Please ensure this document clearly shows your name, address, account no & statement date.
*A copy of your social security card. If you do not have access to this document, you can go to your local Social Security Office and request a letter which will verify your Social Security Number. The Social Security Office will need to stamp, date, and sign the letter for authentication purposes.
We will also accept a current W-2.You can upload scanned documentation or print a fax cover sheet in the Resolution Center. The Resolution Center can be accessed by logging into your PayPal account.
You may also mail the information to:
PayPal, Attention: Compliance
P.O. Box 45950
Omaha, NE 68145
United StatesPlease be sure to include your email address on the coversheet of your fax or letter.
Once we receive and review your documentation, we will notify you via email regarding the status of your account.
Please do not reply to this email. This mailbox is not monitored and you will not receive a response. For assistance, direct all questions to complianceverifications@paypal.com.
We appreciate your patience and understanding regarding this matter.
Sincerely,
Kamalpreet
PayPal Compliance Department
PayPal, an eBay Company
Let me extract a bit of this, because it’s important:
Please do not reply to this email. This mailbox is not monitored and you will not receive a response. For assistance, direct all questions to complianceverifications@paypal.com.
I directed a question seeking clarification at that email address. They keep sending me this same template message every time I ask for clarification. A template message with more than a few typos. I’ve gone through the same loop of requesting details and getting this message back ten times. I can’t trust them with my personal information after all this.
A little back story is in order so you don’t think I’m a scammer trying to commit fraud via PayPal: I signed up as “Michael R” when I was a teenager and had a thing about giving my full name on the Internet. Now they’re asking for a lot of private and personal information to verify that “Michael R” is in fact “Michael Robinson,” vaguely citing some new law.
I tried a name change, and got the same message. I can’t change my name on the account, and I can’t verify my identity until I change my name. It’s a no-win situation since I can’t get in touch with a real person.
I had a similar problem with Amazon Payments, but they eventually cut the loop off and looked at what I was saying, so it’s all resolved now. I can trust them more than PayPal because I know I can get in touch with people who know what they’re doing.
I’m only keeping the PayPal account open because WordAds sends payments through PayPal. And PayPal, for the time being, is letting me receive money and transfer it to my bank account.
In fact, the only thing it’s forbidding is adding funds from my bank account. But given this lack of communication, how can I know if that’s going to change?
And I’m certainly not the only one who has problems with PayPal. I heard more than a few horror stories before this happened, and you can use different search queries on Google to find more. There’s no shortage.
PayPal seems to work for you until you really need them to listen. And they don’t. And it’s not a matter of a big business that’s just too burdened with users to help them.
I’ve gotten help from notable behemoths like Google and Amazon when I needed customer support. Sometimes it took a while, but I got in contact with a human quickly and was able to work through the problem. These emails from PayPal have had three different signatures on them, and it’s the same message every time. They’re obviously made-up names randomly selected.
Stop doing business with PayPal. It’s a worthless company. If you send money through PayPal, ask the people you pay with PayPal to sign up for another payment provider, like Amazon Payments or WePay. If you receive money through PayPal, encourage sellers to support more options.
