Posts by Philip Cohen

The facts on PreyPal ...

eBay: Magento, AliExpress, Skype, Fish, FigCard, GSI Commerce, RedLaser, Where, Milo, Fetch, PayPal, Visa, MasterCard, Google, Schmoogle, whatever …

The fact is the rusting old hulk eBay is presently being kept afloat by the clunky PreyPal so it’s good to see these boys recently squabbling and threats to the clunky PreyPal now coming thick and fast. It’s interesting times for all we eBay “haters” (oops, I mean “watchers”). I just hope that someone has remembered to bring the popcorn.

All anyone needs to know about the clunky PayPal, at:

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=165263

What all buyers should know about the criminal activities of eBay, at:

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=23540

Is that PayPal’s blood in the water, and are those “sharks”—oops, “banks”—I can see still circling?

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

eBay, Magento, AliExpress, Skype, PayPal, Google, Schmoogle, whatever

eBay, Magento, AliExpress, Skype, PayPal, Google, Schmoogle, whatever

The rusting old hulk eBay is presently being kept afloat by PreyPal so it’s good to see these boys recently squabbling and threats to the clunky PreyPal now coming thick and fast. It’s interesting times for all we eBay “haters” (oops, I mean “watchers”). I just hope that someone has remembered to bring the popcorn.

PayPal is mostly registered in various places not as a “bank” but only as a “money transmitter” (like Western Union), and PayPal actually claims that they are not a “payment processor”, and there is a minute degree of truth in that claim because it could, nonsensically, be claimed that they do no more than facilitate the transmission of money by riding on the back of the banks’ existing payments processing systems.

In fact, the only thing creative about PayPal has been their use of users’ email addresses as an identifier for online transactions. PayPal is otherwise no more than a blood-sucking parasite on, and in the main cannot function except via, the banks’ existing payments system (via their banker, GE Money Bank—Ugh!).

PayPal, outside of whatever will ultimately be left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay Marketplace, will undoubtedly eventually be consigned to the history books by all the retail banks/Visa/Mastercard once those players get their “online” act together.

Some people may not like “the banks” but all those participating retail banks at least supply a professionally run payments processing system—unlike PayPal’s—and even PayPal concurs with that assessment: except for intra PayPal “account” transactions, they use the banks’ payments processing system all the time and simply could not exist without it.

Regardless, all the above comments apply equally to all of the other third-party “payments processors” that are emerging out of the woodwork and wanting to have access to your banking account. Unless they a formal arrangement with all the participating retail banks, as do the likes of Visa/MasterCard, then the result is invariably going to be as potentially problematic as presently is PayPal’s clunky operation for its merchants, and many of them can tell you a sorry tale or two.

All anyone needs to know about the clunky PayPal can be found at:

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=165263

Is that PayPal’s blood in the water, and are those “sharks” (oops, “banks”) I can see circling?

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

“… sparking a PayPal investigation …”

eBay, PayPal, Google, Schmoogle, whatever

The rusting old hulk eBay is presently being kept afloat by PreyPal so it’s good to see these boys squabbling and threats to the clunky PreyPal coming thick and fast. It’s interesting times for all we eBay “haters” (oops, I mean “watchers”). I hope that someone has remembered to bring the popcorn.

PayPal is mostly registered in various places only as a “money transmitter” (like Western Union), and PayPal actually claims that they are not a “payment processor”, and there is a minute degree of truth in that claim because it could be, nonsensically, claimed that they do no more than facilitate the transmission of money by riding on the back of the retail banks’ existing payments processing systems.

In fact, the only thing creative about PayPal has been their use of users’ email addresses as an identifier for online transactions. PayPal is otherwise no more than a blood-sucking parasite on, and in the main cannot function except via, the retail banks’ existing payments system (via their banker, GE Money Bank).

PayPal, outside of whatever will ultimately be left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay Marketplace, will undoubtedly eventually be consigned to the history books by all those same banks/Visa/Mastercard once those players get their “online” act together.

Some people may not like “the banks” but all those participating banks at least supply a professionally run payments processing system; even PayPal concurs with that assessment: except for transactions between PayPal “accounts”, they use the banks’ existing payments processing system all the time and simply could not exist without it.

Regardless, all the above comments apply equally to all of the other third-party “payments processors” that are emerging out of the woodwork and wanting to have access to your banking account. Unless they have formal arrangements with all the participating retail banks, as do the likes of Visa/MasterCard, then the result is invariably going to be as potentially problematic as is PayPal’s clunky operation for its merchants, and many of them can tell you a sorry tale or two.

All anyone needs to know about the clunky PayPal can be found at:

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=165263

Is that PayPal’s blood in the water, and are those “sharks” (oops, “banks”) I can see circling?

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

eBay, PayPal, Google, Schmoogle, whatever

The rusting old hulk eBay is presently being kept afloat by PayPal so it’s good to see these boys squabbling and threats to the clunky PayPal coming thick and fast. It’s interesting times for all we eBay “haters” (oops, I mean “watchers”). I hope that someone has remembered to bring the popcorn.

PayPal is mostly registered in various places only as a “money transmitter” (like Western Union), and PayPal actually claims that they are not a “payment processor”, and there is a minute degree of truth in that claim because it could be, nonsensically, claimed that they do no more than facilitate the transmission of money by riding on the back of the retail banks’ existing payments processing systems.

In fact, the only thing creative about PayPal has been their use of users’ email addresses as an identifier for online transactions. PayPal is otherwise no more than a blood-sucking parasite on, and in the main cannot function except via, the retail banks’ existing payments system (via their banker, GE Money Bank).

PayPal, outside of whatever will ultimately be left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay Marketplace, will undoubtedly eventually be consigned to the history books by all those same banks/Visa/Mastercard once those players get their “online” act together.

Some people may not like the “banks” but all those participating banks at least supply a professionally run payments processing system; even PayPal concurs with that assessment: except for transactions between PayPal “accounts”, they use the banks’ existing payments processing system all the time and simply could not exist without it.

Regardless, all the above comments apply equally to all of the other third-party “payments processors” that are emerging out of the woodwork and wanting to have access to your banking account. Unless they have formal arrangements with all the participating retail banks, as do the likes of Visa/MasterCard, then the result is invariably going to be as potentially problematic as is PayPal’s clunky operation for its merchants.

All anyone needs to know about the clunky PayPal:

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=165263

Is that PayPal’s blood in the water, and are those “sharks” (oops, “banks”) I can see circling?

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

Bear in mind that PayPal is mainly registered in various places as only a “money transmitter”, and PayPal actually claims to not be a “payments processor”, and there is a minute degree of truth in that claim because they do no more than ride on the back of the retail banks’ existing payments processing system. The only thing creative about PayPal is their use of the email address as an identifier for online transactions. Regardless, as they are no more than a blood-sucking parasite on the banks’ existing system, PayPal, outside of whatever is ultimately left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay Marketplace, will eventually be consigned to the history books by those same banks/Visa/Mastercard once those players get their act together.

All anyone needs to know about the clunky PayPal:

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=165263

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

GoogleWallet, PreyPal. What's the difference?

One has to wonder what the retail banks been doing for the past 10 years? Sleeping? I have been paying my regular bills via internet banking for I can’t remember how many years now and I have not written, even for an irregular payment, a paper check for at least three years. I’ve banked one paper check in that same time period.

Likewise, where have the participating retail banks’ payments aggregators, Visa/Mastercard, been for the past 10 years? Asleep too? While it has been riding on their backs, they have allowed this parasitic, clunky, PayPal to develop a market for a simpler online payments product that the retail banks and/or Visa/Mastercard could always have been better able to provide in a much more effective, efficient and professional manner.

Please, Banks/Visa/Mastercard, get off your butts and exorcise this PayPal leach that is riding on the back of, and siphoning revenue off, your own payments processing system.

The retail banks have email addresses for all their internet banking customers. How hard then could it be for their payments aggregating partners, Visa/Mastercard, to optionally utilize for online transactions the unique email addresses of payers in place of the relatively unsecure online, twentieth century POS card numbers, for both direct debit and credit purchases? I ask you?

The principal point of the PayPal matter is that the PreyPal operation is no more than a parasite on the retail banks’ existing payments processing system; except for PayPal-to-PayPal “account” transactions, PayPal cannot operate without utilizing the retail banks’ payments processing system. Unlike the credit/debit card aggregators, Visa/Mastercard, PayPal has no formal partnership with all the participating retail banks; PayPal performs all its “direct debiting/crediting” banking transactions via its retail banker, GE Money Bank (ugh!), and all its credit card debiting transactions PayPal does simply as a “credit card merchant”, albeit probably the biggest credit card merchant on the planet. In effect PreyPal buys all the necessary services from GE Money Bank at a “wholesale” price and then charges their individual PayPal users a “retail” price.

Ask yourself, why then should the retail banks, forego this revenue to such a parasitic operator who does no more that aggregate payments, as Visa/Mastercard already do on behalf of all their participating partner retail banks. As has been said many times before, Visa/Mastercard could do for the retail banks the same job for universal online transactions as they already do for “card” transactions—and do it more effectively, efficiently and professionally than the clunky PreyPal. All they have to do is implement the email address identifier. Why should we otherwise deal with PreyPal, a non-prudentially regulated operator who is incapable of professionally managing the risk involved and has effectively no transaction mediation process. …

Be gone! PreyPal; and take John Donahoe with you.

All anyone needs to know about the clunky PayPal:

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=165263

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

What about Donahoe's share?

Even though eBay apparently still owns 30% of Skype, if this Skype deal does go ahead at anywhere near this price it will be interesting to see how eBay’s "Chairman Ho" will spin the matter on his CV—which he will undoubtedly have to update in the not too distant future, if his ongoing dismal performance at eBay is any guide.

My God, who would now employ this cretin? Regrettably, I think that when the time comes we will be surprised how this fool and his Bain Tool Kit will slide into another senior position somewhere. For instance, incomprehensively, Intel has this headless turkey on its Board!

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

Another eBay failure

If this Skype deal does go ahead at anywhere near this price you can bet that eBay’s Chairman Ho won't be mentioning it on his CV, which he will undoubtedly have to update in the not too distant future—I hope.

My God, who would employ this cretin? Regrettably, I think that when the time comes we will be surprised how this fool Donahoe and his Bain Tool Kit will slide into another senior position somewhere. Intel, for instance, has this headless turkey on its Board!

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

What about a dividend for shareholders?

What? More shareholders' money being flushed down the toilet. When are the eBay directors finally going to come to terms with the obvious fact that the eBay's Chief Headless Turkey, John Donahoe, and his fellow incompetents, have absolutely no idea of what they are doing?

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

Another Donahoe Turnaround?

Wow, this is a great deal for someone, but is it a great deal for eBay stockholders? Follow the money, boys; look for the secret commissions for the people who organized this purchase.

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

PayPal: Dead Man Walking

“Bank customers of participating financial institutions will have the option to select a Visa account as the destination for funds when making a personal payment. By simply entering the recipient’s 16-digit Visa account, email address or mobile phone number, consumers can send funds directly from their bank account to a recipient’s Visa account.”—Visa (16 March 2011)

Draft Media Release re PayPal

“It is with great sadness that eBay’s Chief Headless Turkey, John Donahoe, announces the probable demise of eBay’s most ugly daughter, PayPal. Donahoe says that PayPal is expected to be soon stricken by particularly virulent strains of Visa/Mastercard simplified “online” payments processing, and these afflictions will be greatly aggravated by PayPal’s lack of any direct financial institutions support and a great deal of PayPal merchant dissatisfaction, particularly with respect to PayPal’s grossly unfair, “all responsibility avoiding” user agreement, most primitive risk management processes, and grossly unprofessional, buyer-biased and fraud-facilitating (indeed, effectively non existent) transactions mediation—to name just a few of the problems that PayPal “merchant” payees have to endure.

“Donahoe says that after such affliction PayPal’s health may be expected to deteriorate rapidly and, if ultimately not completely incapacitated, will most likely be kept alive only with the aid of the “life support” provided by eBay’s mandating the use of PayPal on what little there will eventually be left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay Marketplaces. There is no cure for this condition and the “eBafia Don” is particularly saddened by the inevitable presumption that it is unlikely that PayPal will be able to continue to underpin the eBay Marketplaces’ deteriorating revenues too far into the future.”

Yes, it’s a send-up but, still, it accurately describes PayPal’s unregulated, most unprofessional, “clunky” operation. Had the developers of the original “bankcard” concept ever behaved the way PayPal behaves, towards its payees in particular, credit/debit cards would never have gotten off the ground, and we would still be paying for all our purchases with bits of paper and little metal discs.

PayPal is not a “bank” and is not prudentially regulated as are the banks. PayPal has been forced down the throats of eBay merchants—much to the distaste of most of them. Without eBay’s mandating the use of PayPal it would still be little known (and conversely, without PayPal, the eBay Marketplace would be going down the toilet at an even faster rate than it presently is) and, regardless, PayPal is the most despised, unprofessional, unscrupulous, wire fraud-facilitating payments processor on the planet.

No thinking person should ever allow PayPal to draw funds directly from a bank account. PayPal should only be given access to funds via a retail bank-branded Visa/Mastercard credit card account: that is the only way to get any protection from PayPal’s fraud-facilitating practices and to get any effective transaction mediation—and then not from PayPal but from your retail bank via their real credit card transaction-mediation process.

All the payments processors that do not have the direct underlying risk-managing and real transaction-mediation support of the retail financial institutions (the “banks”) that are ultimately involved at either end of each transaction—as does have the likes of Visa/Mastercard—suffer all the same material handicaps that PayPal suffers. The “banks” may be disliked by some but they at least supply a “professional” payments processing service.

Undoubtedly, if and when the retail banks decide they want to take the final step (and probably the greater risk and extra work involved) and offer a simpler, “online” payments process, similar to that which PayPal offers, to the many amateur merchants who may otherwise not want (or not qualify for) a bank credit card “merchant” account, and the banks offer that service in their usual professional manner via the likes of Visa/Mastercard, the clunky PayPal will very quickly disappear into the history books—there is nothing surer than the sun will rise in the morning.

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

An "infomercial"

A very disappointing coverage of this matter by the ABC; it was more like you’d expect in a paid “infomercial”.

The fact is, if anyone needs the protection of the ACCC, it is consumers, from the devious activities of this most unscrupulous eBay organization and its ugly daughter PayPal.

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

Goodbye PayPal ...

Draft Media Release re PayPal

“It is with great sadness that eBay’s Chief Headless Turkey, John Queeg-Donahoe, announces the probable eventual demise of eBay’s most ugly daughter, PayPal. Donahoe says that PayPal is likely to be stricken by particularly virulent strains of Visa/Mastercard P2P, and these afflictions are greatly aggravated by PayPal’s insurmountable lack of direct financial institutions support and a great deal of PayPal merchant dissatisfaction, particularly with respect to PayPal’s grossly unfair, “all responsibility avoiding” user agreement, primitive risk management processes, and grossly unprofessional, buyer-biased and fraud-facilitating (indeed, apparently non existent) transactions mediation, to name just a few of the problems that PayPal “merchant” payees have to endure.

“Donahoe says that PayPal’s health may therefore be expected to deteriorate and, if ultimately not completely incapacitated, will most likely be eventually confined to its mandatory offering on what little there will be, by then, left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay marketplaces. There is no cure for this condition and the “eBafia Don” is particularly saddened by the inevitable presumption that it is unlikely that PayPal will be able to continue to underpin eBay’s sagging bottom line too far into the future.”

Yes, it’s a send-up but, still, it accurately describes PayPal’s unregulated, most unprofessional and “clunky” operation. Had the developers of the original “bankcard” concept ever behaved the way PayPal behaves, towards its payees in particular, credit/debit cards would never have gotten off the ground, and we would still be paying for all our purchases with bits of paper and little metal discs.

PayPal is not a “bank”, and is not prudentially regulated as are the banks. PayPal has been forced down the throats of eBay merchants, much to their distaste. Without eBay’s mandating the use of PayPal it would be nothing and, regardless, it still is the most unprofessional, unscrupulous, incompetent, wire fraud-facilitating payments processor on the planet.

No one with even a minimum of brain cells functioning would ever allow PayPal to draw funds directly from their bank account; only from their retail bank-branded Visa/Mastercard credit card account; that is the only way to get any effective transaction mediation—and then not from PayPal but from your retail bank via their credit card transaction-mediation process.

All the payments processors that do not have the direct underlying risk-managing and real transaction-mediation support of the financial institutions (the “banks”) that are ultimately involved at either end of each transaction—as does the likes of Visa/Mastercard—suffer all the same handicaps that PayPal suffers. The “banks” may be disliked by some but they at least supply a “professional” payments processing service.

Undoubtedly, if and when the banks decide they want to take on the greater risk and extra work undoubtedly involved with such payments processing as PayPal offers to the many “unprofessional” merchants, and they offer a like simple, but more professional, online system via Visa/Mastercard, the clunky PayPal will very quickly disappear into the history books.

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

PreyPal in B&M: Simply laughable

“PayPal has hired a new Vice President for Retail and Prepaid Products to help bring PayPal offline and into traditional retail stores.”

Why would any merchant in the “off-line” world want to use PayPal? PayPal is a clunky, unprofessional, transaction-mediation-lacking, buyer-biased, fraud-facilitating, non-bank-supported, poor imitation of a real payments processor.

The fact is that the risk management involved in payments processing can never be effectively satisfied without the support of the financial institutions (banks) at either end of every transaction.

If I was Mastercard or Visa—who have such bank support—I would not be in the least concerned about PayPal encroaching into the off-line world. The merchant that naively offers PayPal deserves all the fraud they will undoubtedly be exposed to.

Conversely, If I was PayPal, I would be terrified of those same bank-supported credit card companies introducing a simpler “online” process based upon the unique email address identifier which all net bank using customers have already supplied their bank.

When the credit card companies do eventually get off their butts and introduce such a simplified system, PayPal, probably along with its ugly mother, eBay, will quickly disappear into the history books.

Enron / eBay / PayPal / Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

eBay the new Westfield?

Seriously, why would any reputable “brand” retailer risk their reputation, and the loss of control of their selling process, by going aboard this sinking eBay ship that has at its helm a group of most disingenuous and unscrupulous, indeed white-collar-criminal, senior executives—other than, of course, to ultimately direct any potential customers to their own website for a cheaper deal?

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking

Yes, you can bet the other 302 people who had funds taken from their PayPal accounts were given the right royal runaround by PayPal before the 303rd person finally broke through PayPal's most unprofessional and disingenuous user agreement and non existent customer service.

Too little, too late, for eBay

"These projects involve data mining, machine learning, classification, natural language algorithms, query analysis, entity extraction, metadata extraction from web pages, UX feature design, A/B testing, metrics development/data analysis, and scable [sic] and performant infrastructure engineering."

Well, if Prevost actually does have any idea of what he is doing, the Chief Headless Turkey at eBay could certainly use him; however, I think it is too late for eBay; if it were not the efforts of its most ugly daughter, PayPal, eBay would be by now extinct.

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

eBay/Intel/HP

So, in addition to driving eBay down the toilet, John Donahoe is advising Intel on how to drive Intel down the toilet, and now Meg Whitman is going to do the same for HP. Brilliant. How is it that these companies succeed in spite of themselves? Don’t they have these people psychologically appraised before that give them the reins?

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

"It's just passed the million mark."

"It's just passed the million mark."

But are any of the bidders serious, or are they all idiots and/or shills?

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

eBay selling brands

Yes, but are any of these fashion "brands" genuine, or are they all knock-offs like almost everything else on eBay?

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

Utterly unscrupulous eBay

At the risk of repeating myself, I would have thought that by now everyone would recognize that unless it produces more income for them or threatens their present income, the eBafia will do absolutely nothing about anything, including all forms of fraud or other illegal activities that they facilitate on other than themselves. Regardless, absolutely nothing will be done about anything unless they are prodded (multiple times) by someone, and even then their reaction is likely to be disingenuous, ineffective, unfair or fraudulent. Has it not ever been so?

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=23540

Ahhhh, PayPal ...

But all the other unscrupulous/criminal activities that you, and your ugly mother, the eBafia, facilitate on we simple peasants are OK?

“Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel”—Samuel Johnson.

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=23540

Ahhhh, PayPal ...

But all the other unscrupulous/criminal activities that you, and the eBafia, facilitate on we simple peasants are OK?

“Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel”—Samuel Johnson.

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

Apple?eBay

I hope Mr Sanche does a better job with Apple's data center than he did with eBay's new data center.

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking

I don't suppopse there any chance that someone will tap "Turkey" Donahoe on the shoulder and take him away from eBay while there is still a chance, albeit remote, of salvaging something from this Donahoe-induced slow-motion train wreck that is presently happening at eBay?

Draft Media Release re PayPal

“It is with great sadness that eBay’s Chief Headless Turkey, John Donahoe, announces the probable demise of eBay’s most ugly daughter, PayPal. Donahoe says that PayPal has been stricken by particularly virulent strains of Visa+CyberSource and Mastercard Open Platform, and these afflictions are greatly aggravated by PayPal’s insurmountable lack of direct financial institutions support and a great deal of PayPal user dissatisfaction, particularly with respect to PayPal’s grossly unfair, “all responsibility avoiding” user agreement, totally primitive risk management processes, and grossly unprofessional, usually buyer-biased, fraud-facilitating (indeed, non existent) transactions mediation, to name just a few of the problems that PayPal merchants have to endure.

“Donahoe says that PayPal’s health may therefore be expected to deteriorate and, if ultimately not completely incapacitated, will most likely be eventually confined to its mandatory offering on what little there will be, by then, left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay marketplaces. There is no cure for this condition, and the “eBafia Don” is particularly saddened by the inevitable presumption that it is unlikely that PayPal, will be able to continue to underpin eBay’s sagging bottom line too far into the future.”

Yes, it’s a send-up but, still, it accurately describes PayPal’s most unprofessional and “clunky” operation. The fact is, had the developers of the original “bankcard” concept ever behaved the way PayPal behaves towards its payees in particular, credit/debit cards may never have gotten off the ground, and we would probably still be paying for all our purchases with bits of paper and little metal discs.

It should also be emphasized that all the payments processors that do not have the direct underlying support of the financial institutions, as do Visa/Mastercard, suffer the same handicaps that PayPal does. The “banks” may be disliked by some but they at least supply a “professional” payments processing service.

A detailed examination of and prognosis for PayPal, (including a link to the “PayPal Horror Tour”) at:

<url>http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=23309</url>

Shill Bidding on eBay: Case Study #4

This latest study provides an indication of eBay’s desperation to mitigate lessening sales activity and very effectively demonstrates eBay’s effective aiding and abetting of criminal shill bidding “wire fraud” activity on unsuspecting buyers:

<url>http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=23540</url>

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

PayPal—ugh!

“… has more respect for … PayPal …” Are they really that naïve?

Draft Media Release re PayPal

“It is with great sadness that eBay’s Chief Headless Turkey, John Donahoe, announces the probable demise of eBay’s most ugly daughter, PayPal. Donahoe says that PayPal has been stricken by particularly virulent strains of Visa+CyberSource and Mastercard Open Platform, and these afflictions are greatly aggravated by PayPal’s insurmountable lack of direct financial institutions support and a great deal of PayPal user dissatisfaction, particularly with respect to PayPal’s grossly unfair, “all responsibility avoiding” user agreement, totally primitive risk management processes, and grossly unprofessional, usually buyer-biased, fraud-facilitating (indeed, non existent) transactions mediation, to name just a few of the problems that PayPal merchants have to endure.

“Donahoe says that PayPal’s health may therefore be expected to deteriorate and, if ultimately not completely incapacitated, will most likely be eventually confined to its mandatory offering on what little there will be, by then, left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay marketplaces. There is no cure for this condition, and the “eBafia Don” is particularly saddened by the inevitable presumption that it is unlikely that PayPal, will be able to continue to underpin eBay’s sagging bottom line too far into the future.”

Yes, it’s a send-up but, still, it accurately describes PayPal’s most unprofessional and “clunky” operation. The fact is, had the developers of the original “bankcard” concept ever behaved the way PayPal behaves towards its payees in particular, credit/debit cards may never have gotten off the ground, and we would probably still be paying for all our purchases with bits of paper and little metal discs.

It should also be emphasized that all the payments processors that do not have the direct underlying support of the financial institutions, as do Visa/Mastercard, suffer the same handicaps that PayPal does. The “banks” may be disliked by some but they at least supply a “professional” payments processing service.

A detailed examination of and prognosis for PayPal, (including a link to the “PayPal Horror Tour”) at:

<url>http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=23309</url>

Shill Bidding on eBay: Case Study #4

This latest study provides an indication of eBay’s desperation to mitigate lessening sales activity and very effectively demonstrates eBay’s effective aiding and abetting of criminal shill bidding “wire fraud” activity on unsuspecting buyers:

<url>http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=23540</url>

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

John Donahoe's Mentor ...

Well, the most terrifying thing is, will all that money actually buy her the office? God help CA if it does.

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking

Has no one yet noticed that the eBay Marketplace whale is high and dry on a beach somewhere, has died, and is starting to stink? And then there is PayPal that, some say, has always stunk:

Draft Media Release re PayPal

“It is with great sadness that eBay’s Chief Headless Turkey, John Donahoe, announces the probable demise of eBay’s most ugly daughter, PayPal. Donahoe says that PayPal is about to be stricken by particularly virulent strains of Visa+CyberSource and Mastercard Open Platform, and these afflictions are aggravated by PayPal’s insurmountable lack of direct financial institutions support and a great deal of PayPal user dissatisfaction, particularly with respect to PayPal’s grossly unfair, “all responsibility avoiding” user agreement, totally primitive risk management processes, and grossly unprofessional, usually buyer-biased, fraud-facilitating (indeed, non existent) transactions mediation, to name just a few of the problems that PayPal merchants have to endure.

“Donahoe says that PayPal’s health may therefore be expected to deteriorate and, if ultimately not completely incapacitated, will most likely be eventually confined to its mandatory offering on what little there will, by then, be left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay marketplaces. There is no cure for this condition, and the “eBafia Don” is particularly saddened by the inevitable presumption that it is unlikely that PayPal, will be able to continue to underpin eBay’s sagging bottom line too far into the future.”

Yes, it’s a send-up but, still, it accurately describes PayPal’s most unprofessional and “clunky” operation. The fact is, had the developers of the original “bankcard” concept ever behaved the way PayPal behaves towards its payees in particular, credit/debit cards may never have gotten off the ground, and we would probably still be paying for all our purchases with bits of paper and little metal discs.

A detailed examination of and prognosis for PayPal, (including a link to the “PayPal Horror Tour”) at:

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=23309

Shill Bidding on eBay: Case Study #4

This latest study is a measure of eBay’s desperation to replace lost revenue and very effectively demonstrates eBay’s effective aiding and abetting of this criminal shill bidding activity, at

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=23540

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

eBay?

"SGI also added eBay as a customer in the quarter, ..."

So, does that mean that eBay is still looking to find someone who can fix their very obviously broken nww Untah data center?

Shill Bidding on eBay: Case Study #4

This latest study is a measure of eBay’s desperation to replace lost revenue and very effectively demonstrates eBay’s effective aiding and abetting of this criminal shill bidding activity at

http://forums.auctionbytes.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=23540

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking.

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking

eBay can probably buy their way out of this little mess, so I see the real problems for PayPal coming from simply a better service from the likes of Visa/Mastercard.

<b>Draft Media Release</b>

“It is with very great sadness that eBay’s Chief Headless Turkey, John Donahoe (aka “Peter Principle”—among many other derogatory terms), announces the probable demise of eBay’s most ugly daughter, Pay-Pal. Pay-Pal is about to be stricken by particularly virulent strains of Visa+CyberSource and Mastercard Open Platform, aggravated by Pay-Pal’s insurmountable lack of direct financial institutions participation and a great deal of Pay-Pal user/merchant dissatisfaction, particularly with respect to Pay-Pal’s grossly unfair, “all responsibility avoiding” UA, totally primitive risk management processes, and grossly unprofessional, buyer-biased, fraud-facilitating, transactions mediation.

“Pay-Pal’s health may therefore be expected to deteriorate and, if ultimately not completely incapacitated, will most likely be eventually confined to its mandatory offering on what little there will be by then left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay marketplaces. There is no cure for this condition, and the “eBafia Don” is particularly saddened by the inevitable presumption that it is unlikely that Pay-Pal will be able to continue to underpin eBay’s sagging bottom line in the future.”

Also, unlike all other payments processors operating in Australia, Pay-Pal has declined to sign up to the payments processors’ “Code of Conduct”. The clear message therefrom is “users beware”!

The fact is, had the original developers of the “bankcard” concept ever behaved the way Pay-Pal behaves, credit/debit cards would never have gotten off the ground, and we would still be paying for all our purchases with pieces of paper and little metal discs.

A detailed examination of and prognosis for Pay-Pal (including a further link to the “Pay-Pal Horror Tour”) at:

http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6504554

eBay/Pay-Pal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking (already brain dead)

Here come de judge, at last, and let there be many more ...

More at:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/wear/10510086.stm

‘Sentencing the 39-year-old, Judge Peter Benson, said: “Had you had previous convictions for dishonesty, the result would have been a custodial sentence.

‘“This sort of conduct strikes at the heart of that trust which is vital if this very, very useful commercial medium is to continue to operate successfully.”

Oh, dear me, shill bidding, who would have thought …

What a shame it is that Judge Benson did not sense the need to look at and comment upon eBay’s clunky auction system mechanism that—eBay well knows—so obviously facilitates and thereby encourages this form of criminal activity.

‘A spokeswoman for eBay welcomed the sentence.

‘Vanessa Canzini, eBay’s head of corporate communications [aka, Dept of Spin], said: “This practice is not only prohibited on eBay as it damages the integrity and fairness of trading on our site, but it is also illegal.”’

Have you no shame Vanessa; we all know that eBay couldn’t care any less about shill bidding fraud—it improves eBay’s FVFs!

We can only hope that one day some competent consumer authority will shine a bright light under this slimy rock.

And, the proof of the pudding can be found at

http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

Visa/Mastercard chew on PayPal

Draft Media Release

“It is with very great sadness that eBay’s Chief Headless Turkey, John Donahoe (aka “Peter Principle”—among many other derogatory terms), announces the probable demise of eBay’s most ugly daughter, PayPal. PayPal is about to be stricken by particularly virulent strains of Visa+CyberSource and Mastercard Open Platform, aggravated by PayPal’s insurmountable lack of direct financial institutions participation and a great deal of PayPal user/merchant dissatisfaction, particularly with respect to PayPal’s grossly unfair, “all responsibility avoiding” UA, totally primitive risk management processes, and grossly unprofessional, buyer-biased, fraud-facilitating, transactions mediation.

“PayPal’s health may therefore be expected to deteriorate and, if ultimately not completely incapacitated, will most likely be eventually confined to its mandatory offering on what little there will be by then left of the Donahoe-devastated eBay marketplaces. There is no cure for this condition, and the “eBafia Don” is particularly saddened by the inevitable presumption that it is unlikely that PayPal will be able to continue to underpin eBay’s sagging bottom line in the future.”

Also, unlike all other payments processors operating in Australia, PayPal has declined to sign up to the payments processors’ “Code of Conduct”. The clear message therefrom is “users beware”!

The fact is, had the original developers of the “bankcard” concept ever behaved the way PayPal behaves, credit/debit cards would never have gotten off the ground, and we would still be paying for all our purchases with pieces of paper and little metal discs.

A detailed examination of and prognosis for PayPal (including a further link to the “PayPal Horror Tour”) at

http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6504554

More nonsense directly from the eBay Dept of Spin

What on earth is eBay dabbling in all this new technology for—these headless turkeys can’t even get their principal marketplace web site to work properly—or maybe it is working as they intend. Does anyone know?

What possible good is RedLaser to eBay. Due to eBay’s constant fee increases, prices on eBay are no longer likely to be the best available. Merchants surely aren’t going to direct buyers to eBay when they can direct them to their own sites, or elsewhere, and avoid eBay’s ever higher and higher profit-sucking fees.

Why then would anyone (even eBay) want to promote a technology that is probably going to direct buyers away from their own principal site? Then, we have to assume that this most unscrupulous organization, eBay that is, won’t fiddle with the algorithm to favor themselves, don’t we? Sounds like another “Skype” purchase to me. Oh, sorry, I forgot, PayPal is going to be eBay’s major growth area in the future. Oh yeah, dream on …

You think that 1989 San Bernardino train disaster and its aftermath was spectacular? In my crystal ball I can see an eBay train wreck approaching; it’s due to arrive in the evening of 21 July; this one’s going to be as horrifically spectacular; but as horrific as it is going to be, you simply won’t be able to look away. Mark your diary so you don’t forget to watch, and have your video camera on the ready (catch the train driver—that’s the one behaving like an excited chimpanzee—waving his arms around in the air)—you may be able to sell the footage to the WSJ. (But, don’t worry, if you do happen to miss this event, there will be a repeat episode on 21 October.)

If nothing else it will be interesting to hear who John Donahoe blames this time for the fiasco (if you can find any mention of it) that has been eBay’s IT operations since April Fools Day; undoubtedly his creative reporting will show that it was all the fault of all those many unwashed, irritating, ignorant, “noisy”, flea-market passengers travelling in third-class—not the criminal fool driving the train, Donahoe himself, of course …

More fun with the ‘eBafia Don’ at:

http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

eBay

Maybe Mr Chandrasekhar should send "Noise" Donahoe at eBay a note. The "eBafia Don" seems to have been having a bit of IT trouble—since April Fools Day, aptly.

You think that 1989 San Bernardino train disaster and its aftermath was spectacular? In my crystal ball I can see an eBay train wreck approaching; it’s due to arrive in the evening of 21 July; this one’s going to be just as horrifically spectacular; but as horrific as it is going to be, you simply won’t be able to look away. Mark your diary so you don’t forget to watch, and have your video camera on the ready (catch the train driver—that’s the one behaving like a lobotomized chimpanzee—waving his arms around in the air)—you may be able to sell the footage to the WSJ. (But, don’t worry, if you do happen to miss this event, there will be a repeat episode on 21 October.)

If nothing else it will be interesting to hear who John Donahoe blames this time for eBay’s current IT fiasco: undoubtedly his creative reporting will show that it was all the fault of all those unwashed, irritating, ignorant, “noisy”, flea-market passengers travelling in third-class—not the criminal fool driving the train, Donahoe himself, of course …

And, even more fun with the ‘eBafia Don’ at:

http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

eBay/PayPal/Donahoe: Dead Men Walking

eBay supports the "Third Way"

Regardless of it's apparent merits, I would always be suspicious of anything that eBay is prepared to support, because they certainly have no concept of looking after anyone but themselves.

And for anyone interested in eBay’s deviousness generally, and in particular eBay’s demonstrable and deliberate criminal facilitation of the rampant shill bidding fraud being perpetrated by many unscrupulous professional sellers on buyers, particularly on nominal-start auctions, an introduction thereto (along with some PayPal horror stories thrown in for good measure) can be found at

auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

eBay New Data Center

Maybe John "Noise" Donahoe should have put in a bid for this ...

And, for anyone interested in eBay’s stupidity and deviousness generally, and in particular eBay’s demonstrable and deliberate criminal facilitation of the rampant shill bidding fraud being perpetrated by many unscrupulous professional sellers on buyers, particularly on nominal-start auctions, an introduction thereto (along with some good PayPal horror stories thrown in for good measure) can be found at

http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

eBay still going backwards ...

What was “good” about these results. They are still going backwards compared to everybody else.

And why is that? See http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

But, wait until you see the results for the second quarter: they are going to be a disaster. Why? See

http://forums.ebay.com/db2/topic/Seller-Central/5-Days-Straight/520194234&start=50

Fraud on eBay? No, I don't believe it

One down, only a couple of hundred thousand to go ...

"eBay welcomed the conviction and said it spends over £6m a year on countering fraud on the site."

And is not that the nub of the problem? eBay is spending (only) £6 million annually to rid the site of “fraud, including buyer protection programs and employees whose sole job is to monitor infringement issues”.

On his way to virtually bringing the eBay marketplace to its knees, one person—the eBafia Don himself, the sociopath John (Peter Principle) Donahoe—was effectively taking home $20 million annually—and still we can’t get rid of him either …

Let’s face it, anything to do with the proactive protection of its consumers from fraud is an expense that the bean-counting toads at eBay have little intention of incurring. Indeed, just the opposite, eBay has chosen to deliberately, and criminally, facilitate the defrauding of its buyers by unscrupulous sellers, by their masking of bidding aliases, from which they profit from higher FVFs.

And, I keep wondering when they are going to pay stockholders a dividend out of all that cash they supposedly have stashed away overseas. Or is this whole business simply a short-term “pump and dump” exercise for the benefit of the options-holding executives?

For those with a longer attention span, an evening’s entertainment of details and facts on eBay’s deliberate facilitating of wire fraud on its consumers world wide and a list of links to a number of PayPal horror stories is contained in my post at:

http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

Donahoe/eBay/PayPal: Dead Men Walking

White collar criminals?

Meg previously presided over what has become the world’s most dysfunctional, unscrupulous, indeed “white collar” criminal, organisation—eBay, that is. With the standard of ethics that she displayed whilst running eBay, the mind boggles at what she could do with the governorship of the state of California.

With Meg as Governor, the “eBafia” (and who knows who else) will undoubtedly be able to carry on facilitating criminal frauds on the whole world with even less risk of some competent authority ever shining a light under this slimy rock.

How did “Dr Death” Donahoe MBA ever get to be CEO of a listed public company? She, who is “rich and tired” but still aspires to be Governor of California, hand picked him; he’s Meg’s protégé! Donahoe is the totally incompetent buffoon who undoubtedly will go down in US corporate history as the idiot who actually did “kill the golden goose”.

A detailed analysis at: http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

Talking about "Rolex" ...

Talking about “Rolex”, take a look at the eBay-touted selling success story, “beckertime” and then note the multitude of habitual, common, never- or rarely-winning bidders that appear on this seller’s 99c-start auctions (but don’t show up as suspicious on the Bid History Details because their own-auctions’ activity is kept well diluted by placing many small no-win bids elsewhere).

Makes it clear that eBay’s introduction of masked bidding aliases was effectively never intended as anything but the deliberate criminal facilitation of ‘wire fraud’ on buyers the world over—just so eBay could get a better FVF.

The details at http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

eBay/PayPal: Dead Men Walking

“Tiffany & Co and eBay Continue to Battle Over Infringement”

http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/markets/industries/media/tiffany--ebay-continue-battle-infringement/

“EBay argued to the court that it has spent as much as $20 million annually to rid the site of fraud, including buyer protection programs and employees whose sole job is to monitor infringement issues.”

And is not that the nub of the problem? eBay is spending (only) $20 million annually to rid the site of “fraud, including buyer protection programs and employees whose sole job is to monitor infringement issues”.

On his way to virtually bringing the eBay marketplace to its knees, one person—the eBafia Don himself—was effectively taking home $20 million annually—and still we can’t get rid of him either …

Let’s face it, anything to do with “customer support” is an expense that the bean-counting toads at eBay have little intention of incurring. And, I keep wondering when they are going to pay stockholders a dividend out of all that cash they supposedly have stashed away overseas. Or is this whole business simply a short-term “pump and dump” exercise for the benefit of the options-holding executives?

For those with a longer attention span, an evening’s entertainment of details and facts on eBay’s deliberate facilitating of wire fraud on its consumers world wide and a list of links to a number of PayPal horror stories is contained in my post at:

http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

eBay/PayPal: Dead Men Walking

Does 'cyber crime' include 'wire fraud'?

Well, that’s interesting: “cyber crime”: does that include “wire fraud”?. And why only foreign countries?

eBay’s registered office is in Switzerland or somewhere. Does this mean that, as the gang of white-collar criminals running eBay are knowingly, and by deliberate design, aiding and abetting wire fraud on consumer the world over, the US President will identify eBay’s country of residence as a “country of cyber concern” and will he then get the FBI, or whoever, to do something about this most unscrupulous white-collar criminal organization (eBay, that is)?

I notice too that neither eBay’s nor PayPal’s names appear in the list of companies that support this bill: a bit of sensitivity there I suspect, and anyway the record of these two is of much talk but little action—unless, of course, they themselves are the victims of the crime.

The full ugly details on eBay at: http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

PayPal is a Bank?

“PayPal was granted a bank license with the Luxembourg bank authority.”

https://www.paypal.com/uk/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=xpt/cps/general/LUXMigrationFAQ-outside

This is all nonsense and it is for PayPal’s benefit, not for the benefit of PayPal’s customers. The statements contained on this web page are typical of those made by eBay and usually mean the exact opposite of what the words say. Luxembourg is one of those tax haven countries that will deal with anyone as long as there is a dollar in it for them; this licence has no effect anywhere else and PayPal is otherwise not a “bank” anywhere else; indeed PayPal does all its actual banking through another gouging organization, Citibank. Notice how all the snakes seem to gather together.

PayPal is an unregulated, unprincipled, systemically dysfunctional, amateur organization (just like its ugly mother, eBay).

PayPal and Bill Me Later are not a bank, are not regulated as banks are and yet offer banking-type services, services that would be more appropriately and more competently carried out under the auspices of the banking community (via their credit card company partners).

The simple fact is that without the bankers’ knowledge of the entities involved in the transactions, PayPal, or any other non-bank provider, will always be handicapped. Non-bank providers will never guarantee anything for the buyer or seller because they simply don’t have the bankers’ knowledge of the entities involved.

The head turkey at eBay, ‘Noise’ Donahoe, has talked of the possibility of offloading PayPal because he is just barely smart enough to know that when the major credit card companies do get off their butts and introduce a like card/terminal-less payments system to complement their credit card system, they will do it properly, and the dysfunctional PayPal will then sink like a stone—other than, possibly, on what is by then left of the Donahoe-shrinking eBay marketplace. Possibly, the banks may let PayPal keep those ‘no hoper’ customers that the banks, who will always better ‘know’ the entities involved, might not likely allow a merchant-type facility.

If Donahoe has any brain at all he will be actively trying to sell PayPal to the banks to complement their credit card system; but I doubt the banks would want to lower their image any further by associating themselves with the likes of PayPal; not even for a peppercorn consideration would the banks touch such an incompetent amateur operation as PayPal, I suspect.

Does anyone then think that ‘all the banks’ are not watching this market segment with interest, and is it possible that PayPal could be having some negative effect on their credit card business? Why then would ‘the banks’ not be considering a like system to complement their existing card systems? The simple fact is that anything that PayPal can do ‘the banks’ can do so much better and, after all, every internet banking user is already set up to receive such a service directly, efficiently and securely, from their bank.

Do we then need to offer the banks and the major credit card companies another such monopoly-type situation? Ideally not. But, having said that, within the credit card system the individual banks do compete with each other on terms, interest rates, etc.

Regardless, it would be nice to have a card/terminal-less system that worked efficiently and effectively—as does the banks’ credit card system. Regrettably (or thankfully, some say), PayPal does not have such a partnership with ‘all the banks’ and so PayPal can never offer that same effectiveness.

My only surprise is that ‘all the banks’, via their credit card partners, have not yet offered their own system. When they do, I suspect that it will be bye, bye, PayPal—you most ugly of daughters. And, more importantly, we will then have a system that works effectively, just like our credit cards do!

In support of the above comment I offer an introduction to the full sad/ugly story of eBay/PayPal at

<url>http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877</url>

eBay/PayPal: Dead Men Walking

Dead Men Walking

PayPal is an unregulated, unprincipled, systemically dysfunctional, amateur organization (just like its ugly mother, eBay).

PayPal and Bill Me Later are not a bank, are not regulated as banks are and yet offer banking-type services, services that would be more appropriately and more competently carried out under the auspices of the banking community (via their credit card company partners).

The simple fact is that without the bankers’ knowledge of the entities involved in the transactions, PayPal, or any other non-bank provider, will always be handicapped. Non-bank providers will never guarantee anything for the buyer or seller because they simply don’t have the bankers’ knowledge of the entities involved.

The head turkey at eBay, ‘Noise’ Donahoe, has talked of the possibility of offloading PayPal because he is just barely smart enough to know that when the major credit card companies do get off their butts and introduce a like card/terminal-less payments system to complement their credit card system, they will do it properly, and the dysfunctional PayPal will then sink like a stone—other than, possibly, on what is by then left of the Donahoe-shrinking eBay marketplace. Possibly, the banks may let PayPal keep those ‘no hoper’ customers that the banks, who will always better ‘know’ the entities involved, might not likely allow a merchant-type facility.

If Donahoe has any brain at all he will be actively trying to sell PayPal to the banks to complement their credit card system; but I doubt the banks would want to lower their image any further by associating themselves with the likes of PayPal; not even for a peppercorn consideration would the banks touch such an incompetent amateur operation as PayPal, I suspect.

Does anyone then think that ‘all the banks’ are not watching this market segment with interest, and is it possible that PayPal could be having some negative effect on their credit card business? Why then would ‘the banks’ not be considering a like system to complement their existing card systems? The simple fact is that anything that PayPal can do ‘the banks’ can do so much better and, after all, every internet banking user is already set up to receive such a service directly, efficiently and securely, from their bank.

Do we then need to offer the banks and the major credit card companies another such monopoly-type situation? Ideally not. But, having said that, within the credit card system the individual banks do compete with each other on terms, interest rates, etc.

Regardless, it would be nice to have a card/terminal-less system that worked efficiently and effectively—as does the banks’ credit card system. Regrettably (or thankfully, some say), PayPal does not have such a partnership with ‘all the banks’ and so PayPal can never offer that same effectiveness.

My only surprise is that ‘all the banks’, via their credit card partners, have not yet offered their own system. When they do, it will be bye, bye, PayPal—you most ugly of daughters. And, more importantly, we will then have a system that works effectively, just like our credit cards do!

In support of the above comment I offer an introduction to the full sad/ugly story of eBay/PayPal at

http://www.auctionbytes.com/forum/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=6502877

@ Someone up above...

@ Someone up above...

There has never been any suggestion that individual banks should offer a PayPal type card/terminal-less service; any such individual service would simply be as dysfunctional as PayPal actually is.

Indeed the PayPal service is supported by only an individual bank, Citi, and that is why PayPal is such a dysfunctional system, because only one bank is involved, the bankers of the entities involved in the transaction are not directly involved (remember, PayPal is not a bank and therefore they still need to work through a bank, in this case, Citi—ugh!).

For the same reason “the banks” (and the many other card providers) don't offer individual credit cards as such; although they “badge” their cards, they will still be of the type Mastercard or Visa, through which organizations all “bank-type” card transactions (even Citi’s) are processed.

The banks may well be gougers themselves, but at least their “universal” card system works (and they do have an effective mediation system), and there is competition between the banks in the marketing of their “badged” cards.

Seriously, can you imagine how long the Mastercard and Visa card systems would have lasted if their systems had been as dysfunctional as PayPal? If the banks’ card system had been as “clunky” as PayPal, charge cards and ultimately EFTPOS would have never got off the ground; charge card use would still be the exclusive domain of Diners Club (who?) and “wealthy” Amex card users, I suspect.

Whether you like the cost, or not, of the banks’ credit card system, you get what you pay for; someone has to pay for the warranty involved in such an effective system. It seems to me that PayPal wants to take a similar fee for the their “clunky” service without any warranty and certainly no effective mediation process.

Again, anything PayPal can do, “the banks”, via their card processing partners Mastercard and Visa, can do much better, and they can do that because all the participating banks better “know” the entities involved in the transaction, as PayPal never can.

eBay/PayPal: Dead Men Walking