Paypal Friends and Family

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I have made way too many ukulele transactions on here. Used friends and family every time. Never had an issue. People on here really are a community. And I have really enjoyed all of the transactions as opportunities to meet great people. 'Friends and Family' seems like a pretty accurate description of the process. Plus, I can't imagine Paypal actually helping you resolve an issue. There are lots of ways these days to exchange money free of charge. Paying the fee seems like a waste of money.

Craigslist and Ebay are a totally different beast. Protect yourself with those transactions. But people are not on UU to rip you off or make money. They are here to share their enthusiasm about playing music.
 
I guess it's a matter of one's business ethics. Have bought and sold many instuments (ukes, guitars & mandolins) using PP and have always gone the "fee paid" route. Bluntly, have not had a transaction with a family member and have never dealt with any buyer/seller in a prior situation where "friend" could now be insinuated in any context.

PP's fees are not exhorbitant and the service PP provides does have value. The PP fee on a $250 transaction is less than the cost of a martini at the local watering hole. I can't see where trying to beat PP out of an inexpensive and reasonable fee for PP's servce is proper.
 
"Friends and Family" is the most common method for payment in all the specialized collecting communities I'm part of -- some of which regularly involve $1k plus transactions. No one I know has ever had an issue--probably due to the fact that these are small communities, well-networked, and any bad players will be blacklisted immediately.

If you can't work something like this out easily, you probably shouldn't be doing business with that person.
 
"Friends and Family" is the most common method for payment in all the specialized collecting communities I'm part of -- some of which regularly involve $1k plus transactions. No one I know has ever had an issue--probably due to the fact that these are small communities, well-networked, and any bad players will be blacklisted immediately.

If you can't work something like this out easily, you probably shouldn't be doing business with that person.

So, are you suggesting that defrauding Paypal is OK, or am I misreading what you wrote?
 
It’s not necessarily frauding them if you are waiving all rights to the service they provide for goods and service transactions is it? I mean that’s why you pay for the fee after all. Why is it free to give family or friends money but when you do a transaction and waive all of the service of protection it is no longer is free? What exactly are you doing differently if you waive all services of protection? Having sold 50k + on eBay and always paying all fees I don’t see why a few transactions between a few acquaintances is such a big deal. If you ask me pretty much everything is fraud depending how you look at it. Being taxed multiple times is fraud but the government makes a pretty good living out of it. I don’t understand how some places are trying to tell you that stuff you sell on eBay or Paypal must be counted as income. So if I buy an instrument and pay taxes and then turn around and sell it I have to pay taxes on it again because it is income? How is it income when you are simply making money from something you already bought with the income you already made? The whole system is fraud mate!
 
It’s not necessarily frauding them if you are waiving all rights to the service they provide for goods and service transactions is it? I mean that’s why you pay for the fee after all. Why is it free to give family or friends money but when you do a transaction and waive all of the service of protection it is no longer is free? What exactly are you doing differently if you waive all services of protection? Having sold 50k + on eBay and always paying all fees I don’t see why a few transactions between a few acquaintances is such a big deal. If you ask me pretty much everything is fraud depending how you look at it. Being taxed multiple times is fraud but the government makes a pretty good living out of it. I don’t understand how some places are trying to tell you that stuff you sell on eBay or Paypal must be counted as income. So if I buy an instrument and pay taxes and then turn around and sell it I have to pay taxes on it again because it is income? How is it income when you are simply making money from something you already bought with the income you already made? The whole system is fraud mate!

Yes it is fraud if the people you are dealing with are NOT family members or friends. You can make it sound OK to do if you like but we both know it is not right.
 
In my case it usually is a “friend” I think the same few ppl and I just keep swapping instruments back and forth ha. But yes; totally see what you are saying.
 
So, are you suggesting that defrauding Paypal is OK, or am I misreading what you wrote?

I don't spend much time worrying about whether I'm in compliance with the TOS agreements of corporations.

Also, it's worth pointing out that there is some risk to sellers when using "Goods and Services." Once that option has been chosen, all of PayPals "buyer protections" kick in. Which... is sometimes exploited by fraudulent buyers. All they have to do is buy an item, then claim it was never received, or was "not as described" -- PayPal's default policy is to refund the money to the buyer first, then investigate later. And the burden of proof generally falls on the seller, not the buyer.

I know several sellers who have been seriously screwed by fraudulent buyers exploiting the protection policy in this way. Understandably, they no longer use the Goods and Services option.
 
Right, forgot what I wanted to say:

IMO, UU forums should not get involved with policing these matters. If someone's an untrustworthy seller, ban them. But it's up to the buyer and seller to come to an agreement on how best to complete financial transactions.
 
Right, forgot what I wanted to say:

IMO, UU forums should not get involved with policing these matters. If someone's an untrustworthy seller, ban them. But it's up to the buyer and seller to come to an agreement on how best to complete financial transactions.

But not, if the agreement reached on how best to complete the financial transaction, defrauds the company being used Surely not?
 
I don't spend much time worrying about whether I'm in compliance with the TOS agreements of corporations.

Also, it's worth pointing out that there is some risk to sellers when using "Goods and Services." Once that option has been chosen, all of PayPals "buyer protections" kick in. Which... is sometimes exploited by fraudulent buyers. All they have to do is buy an item, then claim it was never received, or was "not as described" -- PayPal's default policy is to refund the money to the buyer first, then investigate later. And the burden of proof generally falls on the seller, not the buyer.

I know several sellers who have been seriously screwed by fraudulent buyers exploiting the protection policy in this way. Understandably, they no longer use the Goods and Services option.


I have definitely been screwed numerous times on eBay by the money back guarantee that Paypal always sided with!
 
I am appalled, angry and unbelievably dissapointed at the huge number of people who are happy to defraud Paypal of their fee just to save 30 dollars on a 1000 dollar transaction. Polish the turd as much as you like guys but, it's still a turd. I'm done with this thread, have at it !
 
I will always side with the moderators who keep this site going. Over the years there have been bulletin boards and forums for all sorts of hobbies and activities that just disappear. You wake up one morning and it's gone. There may or may not be a message indicating the site has been shut down. So whatever makes it easier on the them, gets my vote.

It really is about not having the moderators police these things or have to ban/blacklist someone over a bad transaction. Think about that for a minute. Someone is not honest and the first thing to do is contact a mod so they have to investigate what happened. Go through the whole he said, she said. Easy to talk about not policing when the situation can be just dumped on the moderators.

I'm sure over the years there have been all sorts of unpleasant situations that few of us even know about, yet the site keeps rolling along. I have no clue about these things. Personally when it comes to buying, selling, money, and UAS, if it were me, I'd rather just refer the person to PayPal for a dispute and steer clear.

John
 
I believe UU should leave it to the buyers and sellers with a strongly worded disclaimer in use policy. You see, trying to police something like this from UU would make them liable and it's a lot like government, the more you regulate the bigger the government gets and that leads to more policies and rules that will eventually ruin the entire experience.

Just my opinion.

Jim
 
Most other buy/sell forums ask that a donation be made to the forum host when a transaction has been made ie: mandolin café, unofficial martin guitar forum etc.
 
Holy cow. When I posted this, I did not expect there to be so much debate since to me it is black an white. If you use Friends and Family to pay for goods and services, it is against the Paypal user agreement. If you violate Paypal agreement, you can get fined a minimum of $2500 USD per violation since that is what Paypal considers the minimum damage cost to them. Again, this is per violation.

It doesn't matter if you agree with the policy, or if you think this is ethical, or you think its okay to use for friends, or if you didn't bother to read the user agreement. If you use Paypal, you have legally agreed to their terms. Friends and Family can't be used for paying for goods or services, even if you are selling to your legal brother or sister.

Again, whether UU should actively police this or not is up to the moderators. All I was wondering was if there should be some message in the Ukulele Underground Forum Rules to say that friends and family is not allowed for sales of goods or services. Is UU liable for letting this go on? I am not a lawyer so I don't know. But it might be a good idea to put some language letting Paypal or whoever know that UU is not okay with violating Paypal rules.

I mean, we have a rule that says that it is prohibited to sell "any item the trading/selling of which is subject to legal regulation or control, including items such as tortoiseshell, wood, and other things covered by the CITES convention". Should UU be responsible for policing CITES violations? So, why not have a sentence that says, please don't use Friends and Family for sales of ukuleles? Or even something like, if you use paypal, remember that you have agreed to their terms. So why should we have a rules on CITES and not a rule on paypal user agreement?

I may have made a mistake posting this in the forums instead of privately messaging a moderator. But I honestly wanted people to be informed of the rules. There are too many examples of people getting fined when they were honestly selling to an actual friend, because they didn't know the rules. This isn't just for scammers. I did not want people to start accusing people of unethical behavior and people becoming insanely defensive.

So moderators, maybe we should lock or delete this post. I did not mean to cause such a rift in the forums. UU was a happy place, and I am sorry for causing such chaos. I just wanted sellers and buyers and UU to be protected.
 
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I imagine that many have never read user agreements. I know that often you find that these are very long, filled with small print and legal jargon. Not to justify anyone's actions, but sometimes when selling you find that if you want to sell an item for XX, you will be hit with people offering less. I think that some try to make up the loss wherever they can. I know that is one reason why many sell here rather than ebay is to avoid fees, and hopefully deal with more honest interested folks. I don't know for sure, but I have not heard of many bad transactions here and every one that I have had buying or selling has been fine.

Rather than get into policing and making it more cumbersome for the moderators, perhaps they would prefer to just indicate that any transactions are between the buyer and seller, not the responsibility of the UU site and that all parties are expected to follow all appropriate laws, regulations and restrictions regarding their transaction. It falls on the shoulders of the two parties.
 
I imagine that many have never read user agreements. I know that often you find that these are very long, filled with small print and legal jargon. Not to justify anyone's actions, but sometimes when selling you find that if you want to sell an item for XX, you will be hit with people offering less. I think that some try to make up the loss wherever they can. I know that is one reason why many sell here rather than ebay is to avoid fees, and hopefully deal with more honest interested folks. I don't know for sure, but I have not heard of many bad transactions here and every one that I have had buying or selling has been fine.

Rather than get into policing and making it more cumbersome for the moderators, perhaps they would prefer to just indicate that any transactions are between the buyer and seller, not the responsibility of the UU site and that all parties are expected to follow all appropriate laws, regulations and restrictions regarding their transaction. It falls on the shoulders of the two parties.

Absolutely. I agree 100%. While I might think using Friends and Family is against PayPal's rules when purchasing goods (it clearly is based on their agreement), I don't think UU should make this a policy or rule to use the buy and sell forum. My views are just that, MY VIEWS. I have no right to inflict my views or ethical values on anyone else. I interpret the agreement differently than someone else might. I think a good solution is to post a disclaimer from UU standpoint and let the user decide. If they break the law and get caught, let them pay the consequences.

I'll add the ones that are so adamant about this not being allowed because it is unlawful, ask yourself, have you ever driven over the speed limit or did not come to a complete stop at a stop sign??? Remember, this is unlawful as well.

Jim
 
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It really is about not having the moderators police these things or have to ban/blacklist someone over a bad transaction. Think about that for a minute. Someone is not honest and the first thing to do is contact a mod so they have to investigate what happened. Go through the whole he said, she said. Easy to talk about not policing when the situation can be just dumped on the moderators.

I agree with what you say about the selfless work of moderation, etc. But as a moderator of another community, my job is not to adjudicate transactions, but to determine whether there are "dangerous" elements in the community (predators, aggressive folks, bad sellers, etc). If someone, for instance, made a sale and never shipped the item, it would be up to the buyer to try to work it out, and if that fails, post a warning to others. I would not get involved in judging individual cases--or banning anyone--until critical mass of public complaints had been aired.

As for enforcing sales policies of other companies, I simply don't agree. Two parties could complete their transaction with hotdogs (not legal tender, btw) for all I care. Why don't we come up with a policy that all cash sales are also taxable, may violate interstate commerce clauses, etc. And as you note, the end result is usually simply to refer people back to the broker for the transaction and have them work it out. If a buyer entered into a transaction that violates their use policies, they're screwed (and may have their account cancelled). If a seller gets hosed on a dealer, they may decide to pursue other payments options that are less convenient for everyone involved. It's their choice.

Perhaps a middleground--a set of "recommended best practices" to inform both buyers and sellers of the proper way to conduct a transaction. Whether they choose to adhere--or come up with their own agreement--is, of course, up to them.

Don't really have a dog in this fight, at the end of the day. I make my own decisions about how I'm comfortable paying/selling, and that's the end of it as far as I'm concerned.
 
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