OK, PayPal does NOT suck... here's why...

OK Guys,

Recently, I've read a couple threads; (old and new); that have painted PayPal as being unscrupulous and/or bad for business.

I've been with them primarily for the past 10yrs with all of ONE problem with 'my' account and I've done nothing but IM related stuff. Yet, as a part of business maintenance, one should always do due diligence with all of their business partners on a regular basis.

So, I just got off the phone with them and figured I'd report back my experience. There was some useful information given that I figured I'd share with my fellow Warriors.

OK, so I called the number on the back of my debit card; had an initial "grrr" moment when the automated system wouldn't recognize my keypad signal, (that may have had something to do with it being VOIP -- not sure), but when I decided to use my voice the system understood me.

They asked for verification of my SSN; which in my case of having a business account would be my EIN, (take note here.. NEVER [as much as possible] do business with your SSN). I did that and since this is a unique number, the system was immediately able to pull up my account.

The automated system then gives you a series of (limited) choices; which was another "grrrr" moment, but this is the same with most all automated telephony systems. So, from my experience with them; (which is once you get to the "main menu" section 9x out of 10, pressing 0 [that's zero] will flag the automated system to transfer you to a live rep); I pressed 0 and was politely given the "one moment while I transfer you" message.

The rep was nice. BJ was his name; yeah right. But, this is understandable; them not giving out real names... so no "grrr" moment.

I told BJ, "Yeah, I'm under the impression that I have the option of being assigned an account rep. I'd like to exercise this option, please."

BJ: (clearing his throat nervously cautious) "Well, there is certain criteria that is involved with having a personal account representative assigned to you. Right now, your account is flagged for my department."

me: "hmm.. So, what is that criteria?"

BJ: (again clearing his throat nervously) "Well, you'd need to be doing a volume of about $100K per month in order to have this feature enabled."

I guess he was anticipating me being offended or something. I kinna knew this would be the deal, but just wanted the info straight from the horse's mouth.

BJ: (continuing) ".. why do you ask?"

me: (explaining) "Well, I'm about to have a fluctuation in the amount of transactions I'm doing; which will change over time; due to a business venture I'm about to be involved in."

I was purposely ambiguous to see his reaction and naturally I could hear the caution level raise in his voice, (again - take note here.. NEVER be ambiguous about what you're doing IF you don't want to make them paranoid).

So, in order to calm BJ down, I then gave more detailed information. He calmed down.

me: ".. so with that I just wanted to make sure everything was on the up and up with you guys."

(communication skill here I was taught... notice how I DID NOT say, ".. up and up with you guys so you don't think I'm doing anything wrong"... once you plant that negative vibe in someone's head, its associated with you by YOUR association. From that point, no matter WHAT you do that negative vibe will be associated with you in the back of their mind. If you negate it from YOUR speech and allow them to come to such a conclusion on their own, they'll justify it as paranoia more reliably and quickly based on your actions, from that point forward).

So, I then asked BJ to tell me what I could do to make sure my business ran smoothly. Here's where some 'very' useful information was divulged.

BJ: "Well, there's no actual set amount that would trigger our risk department to look into your account. Its kind of a case by case basis. Its called explosive growth and this is what will raise a flag. This may cause them to want to contact you for more information and they'd basically ask you about what you just explained to me, here today. So, what I can do is put a notation on your account..."

OK... IMPORTANT IMPORTANT IMPORTANT, here...
You have to take into account that these reps are trained on a regular basis on WHAT TO SAY. Based on the "time of day" that you call, you'll get a different "caliber" of rep.

I purposely called at 1pm PST because, from my corporate experience, this is the best time to call. This is when everyone has already finished the morning rush; they've gone out and more than likely had lunch; maybe even a shot to get them through the rest of the day; and the more laid back and "nice" people (who work jobs like phone reps) are the ones that take on this shift. So, your chances of having a positive (and highly informative) experience is exponentially compounded.

I then asked BJ if there was anything else that he could tell me; as I'm trying to be proactive and blah blah make myself look more positive and legit calm them down make them look the other way "oh he's cool" line of talking...

He asked me if I wanted to have him ask his Supervisor if there was anything he was missing. Again, this is internal code; see, all these calls are already monitored and recorded from the time you say "hello". The Supervisors are right there on the floor in eye shot of the reps and a hand motion about 5mins. ago already had the Supervisor paying attention to BJ's current call. My account was already up on the Supervisor's screen and he was going through it.

So, of course I said "SURE, please do."

If I had fallen into the trap of either trying to prove nice and appreciative about BJ giving me the information and it being enough 'cause I don't wanna offend BJ... OR said something like "oh, there's no need. You've given me enough information"... then that Supervisor would have placed his/her own notation on my account ... some internal jargon about "keep an eye on this dude".

Call me paranoid if you want; but I worked in high end call centers like this before and you might be surprised about the level of psychological analysis that's done based on how people respond to certain things.

And as I anticipated, BJ was pleased that I chose to have him talk to his Supervisor. And as I anticipated, they were going through my account history to further profile me and my risk level; they had me on hold for more than 5min.

OK, so this is getting rather long ... bottom line is, BJ came back with no new information, (because it wasn't about trying to get new information -- it was about profiling me and my account)... and told me that a notation had been put on my account and..

.. to make sure my phone numbers were up to date; as we basically call ALL phone numbers listed on the account if we need to contact you.

And there you have it. PayPal is highly professional and doing exactly what they should be doing, IMHO. With the level of volume they do each day; I would WANT them to be hard a**es when it came to who they did business with. I WANT them to be "overly security conscious"; because I don't want any 'outside' ninny influencing my business heartbeat -- my money.

Full disclosure and age old tried and proven business practices are the keys here, people. Follow that model in your business and you'll have NO problems with the likes of the PayPals out there; I know I never have.

Edit
Just found this link on the PayPal site; should prove extremely useful...
https://cms.paypal.com/us/cgi-bin/?c...UA_admin_setup

Hope this helps...
Peace, Love & Prosperity
tecHead