My Mego Cautionary Paypal Tale

[Hedji]

So, I've been doing business with a well-respected member of this message, board... slowly acquiring minty loose WGSH figures over the past several months. We've had a great buyer/seller relationship, and I'm happy to say we still do. But let me caution everyone, be careful with adding a note on Paypal specifying what you are paying for. I always do that, for my own records, and for the seller. Well, my payment yesterday was flagged and is now held up under investigation due to "government regulations". My payment is now pending for up to 3 days.

Here's the note they sent me:

We’ve placed a temporary pending status on this transaction.

View the details of this transaction

To comply with government regulations, PayPal is required to review certain transactions. The payment you sent is currently being reviewed and we will complete this process within 72 hours. This review only involves this transaction and does not affect the use of your PayPal account.
For more information, see Government regulations and policies.

Sincerely,
PayPal

Why hold my money for 72 hours, you ask? I believe it is because of the NAME of the figure I specified. Let's just say she's named after an Egyptian Goddess and enjoyed a Saturday Morning Live Action show like Shazam.

So be careful, because a transaction for an innocently named toy has now caused my payment to be in limbo while I'm under the microscope.

Ugh.

[Gorn Captain]

If it's because of the name, Paypal has reached a new level of stupidity.
Egyptian mythology has been around for 5,000 years.

But you know, in Downton Abbey they killed off the character of the dog for the same reason...

[palitoy]

CIA has Joanna Cameron on 24 hour surveillance.

[drquest]

Haha.... That's awesome.... Heck just cancel that one, and send another payment.

[Hedji]

I really can't cancel it. They've removed the money, so it's out of my account. It's just... being held.

[PNGwynne]

Per Trump, you can only ship her out of the country.

[enyawd72]

OMG that is horrible.

Just send them a picture of you in your Batsuit and tell them it's okay, because you're Batman.

They'll just think you're a harmless nutjob. Which we all are basically anyway.

[Hedji]

Per Trump, you can only ship her out of the country.

LOL!!!

[Hedji]

OMG that is horrible.

Just send them a picture of you in your Batsuit and tell them it's okay, because you're Batman.

They'll just think you're a harmless nutjob. Which we all are basically anyway.

Man, I can only imagine what they'd think of any of us with our dollies.

[daz71]

they once closed my account for selling a dvd saying it went against their regulations it was the biker flick angels from hell.

[Duncan]

Re: your current situation: I have some familiarity with US Anti money-laundering laws & rules (and none of this stuff is a secret). Basically, financial institutions have various alarms set to trip on certain names/words/places/etc. Your note set off an automatic alarm - no big deal. Stuff is frozen until a human being can review the situation and resolve it. They'll prob verify that neither of you are on bad guy lists and maybe look at transactions in your history. Maybe they'll ask you why that word is on your transaction. Should be easy enough to explain. As far as cancelling the transaction & redoing it (if that were even possible) - that's another red flag. It's like running from a cop. Best thing is just to be patient and relax (again, not like there's a choice).

[Hedji]

Thanks for the info and tip. I REALLY appreciate your calming advice, Duncan.

[Hedji]

Hooray!! My payment was cleared! Whew! Let's hope future radical lunatics avoid naming themselves Shazam or Mxyzptlk.

[daz71]

i nearly had a custom picture frame made by a shop called isis.

[bleit1701]

I ordered Isis sandals from CTVT and got the same message on my payment.