[Music]
hey guys it's celestia and today we're
going to be talking about a very serious
issue facing the art community which was
brought to my attention by a twitter
user by the name of luck foxo33 i've
been working on this video since they
first messaged me and i appreciate all
of your patience this month as i
postponed it three separate times and
put other content on the back burner
i'll be back to my regular upload
schedule again after this but i wanted
to make sure that i did as much research
as possible given the nature of this
topic and that meant reaching out to
multiple sources for interviews and
waiting for their responses i'm still
not sure i'm gonna be able to do the
issue justice in my coverage of it but i
can at least say that i have absolutely
done my best to that in mind let's just
get right into it because there is a lot
to get into
for artists that accept commissions
paypal has been all but a necessity for
a long time as it is the most versatile
and widely used online payment system in
the world and subsequently what most
artists use to get paid for their work
it's available in most countries is
easily integrated into most ecommerce
platforms and even independent websites
and it's a household name that people
trust people know paypal almost everyone
has an account and when it comes to
paying for commissions buyers tend to
feel safe and reassured with paypal as
the method because their buyer
protection policies put their minds at
ease for the artists themselves there
have always been issues paypal has not
made it easy for digital goods to be
sold with their service and many artists
faced a number of issues as a result in
the past digital goods referred to by
paypal as intangible goods were not
covered by paypal's seller protection
program which meant that artists selling
digital commissions could very easily be
scammed by buyers taking advantage of
that system and issuing chargebacks
because they didn't receive their item
because paypal wouldn't protect the
seller in this case the artist would
then be forced to have that commission
refunded without their permission as of
march 2022 they now have an updated
section to kind of fix this problem they
amended the original stipulation that
protected goods had to be physical and
shippable to now also protect goods that
meet the intangible goods additional
requirements which are deliberately
vague and effectively come down to you
have to prove to paypal that you
delivered what you sold and even then
it's up to paypal's discretion as to
whether or not they want to deem it
eligible and protect your rights on a
case-by-case basis which is hardly
reassuring and if that wasn't dubious
enough moving on to the next section of
their seller protection program terms
really digs in how shady they are and
how little this update actually protects
artists because under the list of
ineligible items and transactions they
include anything paypal determines in
its sole discretion is prohibited by
this user agreement or paypal's
acceptable use policy even if the
transaction is initially marked as
eligible or partially eligible on the
transaction details page so basically
whether or not paypal will protect
artists from scammers trying to get out
of paying for commissions is pretty much
as impossible to determine as ever some
artists have found a workaround by using
the friends and family option for
payment rather than goods and services
but doing so is technically a violation
of paypal's terms of service if it is
actually for business purposes and a
large number of significant friends and
family transactions with that in mind
runs the risk of paypal finding that
suspicious and banning your account
immediately which is a recurring theme
with them but we'll get into that others
myself included have found the use of
paypal invoices to be helpful with this
as it allows you as the seller to have
much more control over the transaction
and hold your clients to your own terms
of service that can protect you better
than paypal's own but that protection is
still quite limited and it's really just
a band-aid on the gaping wound that is
paypal's policies for artists the point
i'm trying to make with this background
information though is that while paypal
has a long history of screwing artists
over whenever possible most of us have
still continued to use it anyway because
of the sheer convenience but as luck
foxo 33 brought to my attention things
have gotten much much worse and artists
everywhere are no longer facing the
question of whether or not they should
keep using paypal despite those problems
they're being told that whether they
want to or not they can't and they can't
have their paypal balance back either
thousands of artists around the world
are getting the same email you can't use
paypal anymore upon opening that email
they're told that their account has
violated their acceptable use policy or
has been found to be too high risk and
therefore not only will their paypal
account be banned but any money in their
existing paypal balance will be held for
up to 180 days before they're finally
able to get it back any attempt to get
more information is met with a wall
paypal's own terms mean they don't have
to tell you how you violated their
policies so they absolutely never do
they will never tell you why your
account was banned and in many cases
they don't even know themselves because
all evidence points to a bot being
responsible for issuing the bans in the
first place human reviews can be
requested assuming they even let you
escalate the conflict with their support
team but unless you're loud and
persistent enough or have a big enough
following behind you the human will
uphold the initial ban and still refuse
to tell you why if you are lucky and
relentless enough to get your account
reinstated as a result of this process
they still won't tell you why you were
banned in the first place and you'll
simply receive the vaguest possible
email informing you that the ban was
lifted and what happens if you wait 180
days well for a lot of artists paypal
simply seizes the money in your balance
anyway to allegedly cover the damages
for their user agreement violations or
the cost of the investigation into their
account that's right some artists have
ended up waiting half a year for money
that they need to run their business and
live only to have it stolen by paypal
anyway with as little explanation as
they received for the ban in the first
place luck foxo 33 after having their
account banned and their funds held
decided to do something about it they
made a twitter thread to not only detail
their experience but also to provide a
platform for other artists with similar
ones to share them and bring attention
to the problem this thread as well as
their update thread will be linked in
the description for you guys to go check
out yourselves but it went viral and it
received massive amounts of engagement
and attention it revealed in no
uncertain terms that they were not the
only artist dealing with this there were
thousands out there in the exact same
position helpless and held financially
hostage by paypal's shady business
practices and policies luck foxo shared
those stories and even illustrated many
of them and while they did finally get
their own account and money back they
have not stopped fighting for all of the
artists who haven't they've been
compiling an extensive document of all
of their experiences many with plenty of
detail and receipts and have been
reaching out to journalists and
youtubers all over twitter to bring more
attention to what's happening also
starting the hashtag of stop paypal i'll
link the google doc of detailed paypal
experiences in the description as well
so that anyone interested can read all
about what these artists have been
dealing with foxo has also been working
with the indie sellers guild to build a
web page of resources for artists who
fall victim to paypal's wrongful bans
including information on how to get
funds back how to set up alternative
payment methods the do's and don'ts of
paypal use how to file small claims in
court and more all of this will be
available on indiesellersguild.org
also linked in the description once it's
complete but now that i've gone over a
little more about what is happening
let's look more into why it's happening
because that's naturally going to be a
major point of contention if paypal
themselves won't tell us
i did reach out to paypal for a comment
on this to which paypal support on
twitter thoughtfully and eloquently
replied i'm really sorry to know that
without reason and having people money
held up to 180 days we can only assist
account holders and inform them to reach
us with their email address registered
to the paypal account and we can assist
accordingly so clearly an automated
response or at least i hope it was
because jesus i asked again to speak to
a real person and request an interview
and was put in contact with their press
team via email and after all of that the
only response they were willing to give
me was as follows thank you for reaching
out to us while we cannot provide
specific customer account information
per company policy we review each
account closely and on an individual
basis based on our long-standing
acceptable use policy holds or other
actions applied to paypal accounts may
be based on the management of risk when
this occurs we look into the matter and
take whatever action is deemed
appropriate our dedicated customer
service team is always available to help
customers with their questions and that
was it they declined the interview and
refused to answer further which they've
done with every news source and member
of the media that has requested a
comment including bloomberg and there's
already so much wrong with the brief and
evasive reply that they did bother to
write like your dedicated customer
service team is always available to help
sorry is this the dedicated customer
service team that has without fail
immediately responded to every artist in
this position with sorry we're not
obligated to tell you anything we can't
and won't help you the same team that
will only allow them to speak to
supervisors if they spend days weeks or
even months begging them to the same
team that regularly ignores those
artists and hopes that they'll just go
away if that's the kind of dedicated
help you're so proud to offer your
clients you can keep it and then there's
the bold ass claim that they closely
examine every single band themselves
with care and on an individual basis i
luck foxo was told outright that they
were banned wrongfully by an ai and they
are far from the only one you're telling
me you thoroughly investigate every ban
yourselves while thousands of artists
are being banned by bots and the
hundreds who actually get their accounts
back are being told they were simply
banned by mistake this coming from the
same company that when de duriart asked
them to check how they violated paypal's
terms they told them i would have to go
through every single transaction so no
you know what okay i'm not surprised
it's the same company that also told
daduri art we at paypal don't make
mistakes if you got banned then you
clearly did something wrong while in the
same breath was probably sending out
hundreds of emails reinstating accounts
that their bots banned by mistake all of
that is effectively to say that the best
explanation that i got from paypal was
the same crock of they've been
serving to everyone who asks them why
this is happening so instead of relying
on them i looked into it myself and what
i learned can be broken down into two
very different categories why paypal is
banning these artists and why paypal is
holding their funds for 180 days you
would think that those would be the same
but they're not so let's start with the
first one by now we've effectively
established that actual human paypal
staff are not responsible for these bans
but rather their ai obviously the larger
problem here is that whether or not an
artist's livelihood and financial
stability is at risk should not be in
the hands of an ai to begin with and at
most it should be used to flag their
account for human review but if we can't
stop them from allowing that
unbelievable carelessness we can at
least examine the ai that they're using
a little more closely we naturally can't
look at that algorithm ourselves
especially since paypal only admits to
using it like 10 of the time but we can
certainly look more closely at the
things that many banned accounts have in
common to establish some form of
educated guess at the criteria that the
algorithm considers firstly the one
thing paypal will tell people when they
ask why they were banned is that their
account was too high risk what they mean
by that is that either based on the size
or frequency of your transactions paypal
is concerned about the consequence of
potential chargebacks a chargeback is
when a buyer after the transaction is
completed and finalized requests their
money back if the chargeback is
successful for the buyer the seller will
have to refund the original purchase and
if the seller has funds in their paypal
balance this will happen automatically
but paypal's concern lies with the risk
of it happening to a seller who doesn't
have funds in their balance because in
that case it's up to paypal to cover
that cost the seller will obviously owe
them that money and be expected to pay
it but depending on their circumstances
and the legitimacy of their account
information they might be able to get
away with effectively abandoning the
account and never paying so if the
seller has a high number of transactions
or a history of very large transactions
paypal will consider that account to be
high risk because of how much they would
have to cover out of pocket if the
seller got a lot of chargebacks and
decided to bail on their account this is
especially problematic on their end
because they allow chargebacks for up to
120 days after the transaction's
completion which gives the seller plenty
of time to transfer their balance to
their bank account and call it quits
before their buyers realized they didn't
get what they paid for and file their
chargebacks it's a legitimate problem
that paypal is well within their rights
to be concerned about especially
considering how many users they actually
have and the prevalence of scamming
online but even so banning any account
that an ai decided could fit the
criteria of being high risk is not a
solution that in mind we can safely
assume that the ai is looking primarily
for activity that reflects this
potential high risk behavior and based
on both research and the comparison of
banned accounts i and others have found
that the paypal bots tend to ban
accounts that have recently received
more or larger transactions than their
previous average have received one or
more chargebacks or have received
complaints from buyers what this means
is that as far as paypal is concerned if
an artist's business starts taking off
and they start getting more commissions
or raise their commission prices their
bot is essentially liable to consider
them a security risk and ban them on
site already that's unacceptable but
that's just the criteria based on risk
level that's not all there is paypal's
bots will also ban you based on the
nature of your content now most artists
know that the sale of not safer work art
or commissions is banned not only on
paypal but on most payment processing
platforms that's not new information and
it's also industry standard but paypal
takes it one step further because they
won't just ban you for using their
service to sell not safe for work
content they'll ban you if you make not
safe for work content on the same
website where you've integrated paypal
in any possible way even if it's not
what you're selling recently they
updated their user agreement to include
the following effective september 19th
2022 if you integrate or reference
paypal services on your website we are
clarifying that paypal may use automated
technologies to assess your website to
ensure compliance with the user
agreement and to combat fraud so what
does this mean it means if you so much
as reference paypal on the same website
where you also have your not safe for
work art posted they can ban you and not
only that they're openly using bots to
make that assessment which means we
could easily be back in the tumblr era
of automated art policing where a bot
will decide that any image with a skin
tone is explicit no matter what's in it
but instead of having a post hidden and
immediately approved by a human when
appealed with no further consequence
artists now have to worry about having
their entire paypal account banned and
their funds held even if their site
doesn't actually contain any nutsafe for
work at all those are the most
significant reasons that paypal appears
to be arbitrarily and wrongfully banning
artists but i'm sure there are many more
false red flags that their bots are
using to justify these horrendous
actions that we just don't and can't
know rather than dwelling on the fact
that we're going to be indefinitely in
the dark about it let's move on to the
next part why paypal is holding their
funds for so long or sometimes
permanently seizing them altogether like
i said you would think that the reasons
that these funds are held would be the
same as the reasons for the bans in the
first place and on the surface they seem
to be paypal claims that this hold is to
prevent loss on their end in the event
of chargebacks reinforcing their prior
assertions that risk prevention is their
primary concern although as a side point
it's interesting to note that buyers can
only issue chargebacks for up to 120
days after a transaction and paypal is
holding funds for 180 days over a full
month longer than necessary but
regardless while that's consistently
their default explanation given to
everyone they refuse to give any further
information as to why the funds are
being held in cases where the accounts
were not banned for being wrongfully
deemed high risk but were rather banned
for alleged acceptable use policy
violations and when artists press
further to try to get that information
paypal claims they have no obligation to
tell anyone why their funds are being
held and have gone so far as to tell
account holders that if they want any
basic information about their money or
their account at all they have to get a
subpoena but upon further investigation
it turns out there's a much more likely
reason that paypal is so adamant about
keeping this money for such a
ridiculously long time they're using it
as it turns out the money held in your
paypal balance isn't actually just
sitting there paypal is actively
investing it in stocks and bonds so that
by the time you do take it out or spend
it they've already used your money to
make a profit of their own this practice
is explicitly stated and defended by
their user agreement which says the
following paypal combines your paypal
balance with the paypal balances of
other paypal customers and invest those
funds into liquid investments in
accordance with state money transmitter
laws paypal owns the interest or other
earnings on those investments so with
that context in mind there's suddenly
much less mystery surrounding why they
want to keep this money for as long as
possible normally paypal users can use
their balances at their discretion with
no holds or restrictions which would
presumably make this practice of theirs
a little less efficient but if they can
look at an account with a large balance
and say they can't touch this for half a
year with their policies thoroughly
backing them up they're gonna do it
because that is as far as they're
concerned a lucrative business endeavor
for example if they put ten thousand
dollars into a gic or guaranteed
investment certificate which is the
lowest possible risk investment for six
months they would make anywhere from a
hundred dollars to two hundred dollars
just by letting that money sit there and
i'm confident that they're investing in
riskier avenues so the yield would in
all likelihood be much higher it
benefits them in every possible way to
keep your money for as long as possible
and that's assuming you ever get it back
now let's talk about how they feel
justified in defending taking it all for
themselves even after the 180 day hold
in this section there's very little to
talk about for now the permanent seizure
of frozen funds is something i'll be
discussing in more detail later on based
on the interview i conducted but for now
all i'll say is that paypal's primary
defense when it comes to explaining why
they've stolen all of the funds that
were frozen is that they're collecting
damages in many many cases people have
reported that after waiting the 180 days
to get their money back paypal simply
told them that since they violated the
acceptable use policy the money was
seized from their account and i quote
for its liquidated damages arising from
those acceptable use policy violations
pursuant to the user agreement basically
paypal is putting a redundant and
seemingly indiscriminate dollar value on
the so-called damages resulting from an
aup violation that most of the time
didn't even take place and is collecting
it without anyone having the power to
stop them in the case of one artist who
i won't name because she specifically
said she didn't want to be contacted by
media regarding this as a result of an
anxiety disorder she waited 178 days for
her money and after barely having been
able to make ends meet for six months
she was finally able to access her
account balance which was zero the
transaction that had wiped the balance
was from paypal and was simply labeled
adjustment and when she contacted
support to get more information she was
told that all banned accounts could be
held liable for fifteen hundred dollars
in damages per violation while still
being told that they couldn't or
wouldn't really even tell her what that
violation even was she was then told to
be happy that they weren't suing her for
more because her balance was 778 dollars
which did not meet the maximum that they
could apparently sees as she says at the
end of her segment that 778 dollars may
have only been half of their maddeningly
vague damages but it was most of a
month's income for me and the inability
to use the platform with a monopoly on
quick and easy international money
transfers has had a lasting effect on my
business but we're seven pages into this
script and many weeks into my research
for it and i'm still not able to use any
of what i've learned to offer any
solutions as it stands paypal is
seemingly within their user-agreed terms
to keep abusing artists like this and
while i can tell you how to try to keep
yourself safe on their platform and try
to take action against them that seems
to be all i can currently do but before
i do get into keeping yourself safe
while using paypal there is one more
thing i want to bring to your attention
and it's the lawsuit
unfortunately for paypal they happen to
screw over enough high-profile account
holders to be hit with a lawsuit as a
result not their first one either
although the earlier instance i'm
personally aware of that took place in
canada was due to hidden conversion fees
and that was settled still a history of
legal controversy is not something that
sparks confidence in their platform and
the class action suit currently
spearheaded by laina evans is further
evidence of that the plaintiffs involved
here just like the artist mentioned thus
far had their accounts inexplicably
banned and their funds held but in their
cases these weren't small businesses
they were big now to be clear i strongly
believe that small businesses should
have the same rights as they do but in
terms of social status and ability to
reach media they don't which is why the
thousands of artists aren't being heard
despite dealing with similar issues
regardless because these plaintiffs are
larger their losses are too as it turns
out the amount the paypal claims it can
legally seize from an account is not
limited to 1500 which for anyone that's
as poor as i am is already a huge amount
one person had roughly twenty seven
thousand dollars taken from her account
without reason one had forty two
thousand dollars taken from her account
for dubious and vague reasons and one
had a hundred and seventy two thousand
dollars taken from his account with
absolutely no explanation as a result of
this they've partnered with the
bensomoken law firm in beverly hills
california and they're not letting
paypal get away with it they're fighting
them with everything they've got and
they're not fighting just for themselves
anyone who has experienced a similar
issue is encouraged to submit their
experience via the intake form on their
website linked in the description and
this firm will fight for their rights to
get their money back so for any artist
listening to this that has fallen victim
to paypal's awful actions go check them
out you might have someone fighting for
your rights after all no matter how
large and insurmountable your enemy here
might seem to be anyway i was left with
a lot of questions after my initial
research into this topic largely about
legal technicalities that i had no way
of verifying one way or the other so
instead of just ignoring them and moving
on with the video i instead decided to
contact the bensomoken law firm
themselves who were very receptive and
helpful to the point that like if you
guys have legal questions about what's
going on with this i would strongly
recommend that you just ask them about
it because they care enough to answer at
least in my experience which is not
something i experienced with any other
intended interviewee do be aware that
they are very busy though and please be
patient with them in terms of time frame
i emailed and messaged them relentlessly
like the annoying journalist and outlast
and they were kind enough to forward my
questions to their head attorney who
will be voiced by me and also responded
to by me since i don't have friends i
said paypal claims that they're
completely within their rights to
suspend slash limit ban accounts without
disclosing the reason why and that by
agreeing to their policies by using
their service you're accepting the risk
of your account being banned and your
money being held for up to 180 days are
they actually legally allowed to do this
they replied the issue is not if they
are allowed to do this but rather how
they go about it liquidated damages
clauses are not illegal per se however
they have to be in direct relationship
with the loss that the other party may
suffer a random amount of 2500 per
violation does not seem to coincide with
any actual damages or loss for their
alleged costs to investigate we have
seen amounts in excess of 170 thousand
dollars confiscated without paypal so
much as providing a report of the
alleged violations and wrongdoing i
asked is disputing their policy the
basis of your suit or are you claiming
damages on behalf of those affected they
replied the basis for the suit was that
paypal is engaging in widespread
conversion of people's hard-earned money
with impunity they simply cannot be
allowed to continue to do this i asked
do they actually have the legal right to
be doing what they're doing solely
because their user agreement defends it
they answered that is a question left up
to interpretation again a liquidated
damages clause is not illegal per se but
how it is enforced is a different story
i asked many have claimed that not only
were their accounts banned and their
funds held the remaining balances were
actually seized by paypal after the 180
days have you personally received any
similar testimonies and how does paypal
defend it they said yes literally
thousands of people all around the world
have reached out to the firm with
similar stories i asked some suggest
sending a gdpr to paypal when this
happens claiming that it forces them to
return their funds and close their
account within 30 days is this correct
they replied i am not certain that this
is correct i asked is the goal of your
lawsuit to seek financial compensation
for those affected to seek a revision to
paypal's policies and subsequently stop
this from happening or both they
answered the goal is to get all people
all of their illegally taken money back
and to get paypal to change their policy
going forward i said do you have any
information on the timeline of the
lawsuit i.e a rough estimate of how long
it will take to reach a resolution they
said
paypalclassaction.net is the official
site with updates as to the status of
the case so while their answers didn't
end up actually answering all of my
questions largely because many of them
were and still are questions without
clear answers they certainly provided
much more information and insight than i
had before particularly surrounding the
legal basis of their claim since
paypal's terms of service do seem so
airtight i had begun my research into
this suit with a lot of confusion if
they do have the right to freeze these
accounts based on their acceptable use
policy then how can they realistically
be sued for any damages what law are
they actually breaking this firm
definitely cleared that primary concern
up for me it's not their policy that's
the problem at least legally that's not
what's breaking any kind of law it's the
way they're enforcing it particularly
the way they're using the nebulous and
undefined umbrella term of damages to
seize funds unlawfully they're claiming
that these amounts are owed to them
based on user agreement violations but
if the amounts don't actually correspond
to anything tangible monetarily they
don't have any legal right to be doing
what they're doing it was also
reassuring to learn that the priority
here isn't just to get people's money
back but also to persuade paypal by any
means necessary to change their policies
and prevent further damage in the future
if you'd like more information on the
lawsuit i would encourage you to check
out their site and follow them on social
media all linked in the description i'm
personally going to be keeping a very
close eye on it to watch for updates and
see how things turn out because it feels
like this might actually be a real
chance to see paypal face some genuine
consequences and after seeing what so
many artists have gone through that's
something i very aggressively want to
see but even with all of that in mind we
as artists are still for the most part
at paypal's mercy until any kind of
proper resolution is reached so if we
have to put up with their ridiculous
policies and abusive power at least for
the time being the best we can do for
now is keep ourselves informed and as
safe as possible and keep fighting for
our rights how do we do that well i have
some suggestions of my own that i'll get
into now but i'd first like to remind
you guys once again to keep an eye out
for the information page coming up soon
on the indie seller's guild site because
their information will likely be much
more thorough as soon as it's ready
anyway for now let's start with how to
do everything you can to avoid being
banned by paypal under these
circumstances
one thing i will mention right off the
bat is that the vast majority of paypal
accounts that are banned are business
accounts to my understanding personal
paypal accounts are either exempt from
this risk or at least under much less
scrutiny potentially because a different
bot is scanning them so if you're
choosing between the two for your own
commissions or online store i would at
least consider that particular
distinction when doing so because going
with personal rather than business might
be the safer bet here there are
downsides to that of course you can't
send invoices with a personal account
and your full legal name will be shown
with every transaction which is less
than ideal for dealing with clients that
are strangers on the internet especially
if you don't use your real name in
association with your art and you don't
want people knowing it i would recommend
looking into the pros and cons yourself
to decide which option suits you better
but at least in this context it seems
like a pro to personal is that it is
safer conversely others advise that if
you already have a business account or
require one for one reason or another
try to have all of your transactions
completed via invoice not direct
transfers i have heard some people say
that this prevents customers from
issuing chargebacks but that is
unfortunately not true others though say
that it does prevent customers from
flagging your account with their
feedback when they do so which would
reduce the risk of bans i can't verify
that myself so take it with a grain of
salt but even if that's also untrue as i
mentioned before it still allows you to
add your own terms of service and have
more control over the transaction this
is particularly relevant when it comes
to intangible item eligibility for
seller protection what i mean is that as
i discussed earlier digital goods can
technically be protected by paypal under
their seller protection program if the
seller can provide proof of delivery of
the item in question by using invoices
you can specify the method of delivery
particularly by email for example and
ensure that the item's description is
clearly intangible so that you're as
protected as possible if the buyer
claims to have not received their
physical item and it'll be easier for
you to prove that the goods were sent
and received all of this means that not
only will you be vaguely safer if a
client tries to scam you that scamming
attempt will be more easily proven to
paypal which would subsequently lessen
the risk of your account being flagged
as high risk and potentially banned next
since paypal appears to be banning
artists based on them either having a
higher number of transactions or larger
transactions than normal it could be
beneficial to try to split your earnings
what i mean is that if you're accepting
a lot of commissions wherever possible
try to accept payments through
alternatives instead of paypal use
stripe square e-transfer etc so that
even if you are still using paypal for
clients who don't or can't use those
alternatives you're still much less
likely to be setting off their bot's
alarm bells this way another tip is to
avoid having any not safe for work art
or even suggestive art posted on any
website that you have your paypal
account integrated or even referenced on
not safe for work content cannot be sold
via any major payment processor so if
that's what you're actually using paypal
to sell i can't help you there you're
running the risk of having your account
rightfully banned and i would strongly
encourage you to instead research other
payment methods but if you're only
selling safe for work art and just
happen to also have not safe for work
art on the same site you're selling it
on paypal is apparently still well
within their rights to ban you so please
be as cognizant of that as humanly
possible avoiding chargebacks and
refunds wherever possible is also very
important although given how difficult
that is for anyone to control it's not
particularly helpful advice finally
what's perhaps the most important advice
that i can give you is to keep your
paypal balance empty at all times
whenever you possibly can because worst
case scenario if you do get wrongfully
banned maintaining an empty balance
means that all you'll lose is your
account not all of the money that you
received using it before researching
this video i kept a significant amount
of my funds in my balance at all times
just to have it separate from my
personal funds and ready to be spent on
business expenses but the decision to
sacrifice that convenience was an easy
one when faced with the alternative of
potentially losing it all at the
discretion of a bot and the negligence
and corruption of a corporation but none
of that can help you if you've already
been banned and had your money frozen so
let's get into the next section how to
fight it
unfortunately if you've already fallen
victim to this ridiculously abhorrent
power abuse there's not much you can do
but keep contacting them don't let them
shut you down or talk over you keep
messaging them and emailing them and
calling them and don't let yourself be
ignored or dismissed push to speak to a
supervisor whenever possible the artists
that i've seen find the most success
getting their accounts restored are the
ones who fought back so hard and so
relentlessly that management had no
choice but to look into the issue
themselves just to get them to shut up
it doesn't always work but it can't hurt
i would also encourage you to reach out
to both the bensomoken law firm and luck
foxo 33 as the former may be able to
help you get your money back and the
latter will help you share your
experience and connect you with
resources that could help you again the
information for both are in the
description finally you could also try
sending paypal a gdpr request a gdpr
request or a general data protection
regulation request is a relatively
complicated thing in and of itself and
i'll include a basic explanation of it
in the description because i'll only
actually be discussing it in terms of
how it affects this particular issue
which is the tip of the iceberg really
as the article a link puts it gdpr
requirements give consumers or data
subjects the right to ask companies for
information held about them within a
month's time companies must be able to
fulfill the request data subject access
requests force organizations to know
where collected data is at all times
what information is being collected how
it's being used by whom and when it's
being accessed if the consumer finds an
error the organization must correct it
if the consumer opts to invoke their
right to be forgotten the company must
erase their data if the consumer doesn't
like the way their personal data is
being collected and used they can object
basically all of that is to say that
when paypal bans an account and says
that any bank or credit card information
linked to your paypal account cannot be
removed nor can it be used to create a
new account that is not actually true
and technically speaking you as the
account owner do possess the right to
tell them to remove all of that
information close your account and
subsequently return your money within 30
days it also means that again
technically they have to tell you what
information prompted your account to be
banned i have read accounts from people
who have said that this did not work for
them and as you might recall the bensomo
confirms representative also said that
they cannot confirm whether or not it
would work so i can't tell you for
certain that it's in any way a surefire
method but it's still worth a shot
especially alongside the fight you put
up against them through other
correspondence paypal clearly doesn't
care about making things right for you
but it does care about shutting you up
if you're making enough noise and even
if a gdpr request isn't a confirmed
method that works on its own it is a way
to make yourself even louder
in conclusion paypal is not a safe
platform for people to use much less
artists who have been historically even
more victimized by their shitty business
practices than other groups the more i
learn about what they do behind closed
doors the more disgusted i am by it and
the farther i want to stay away from the
platform myself but that's so hard to do
given the undeniable monopoly that they
have over payment processing and it's
not like you can make money from art
without processing payments personally
i'm going to be doing as much of my
business as possible with alternative
services from now on and using paypal as
nothing more than a backup and i would
strongly encourage you guys to do the
same whether you're like me and just
want to avoid both supporting them and
risking their wrath or you've been
banned and you have to here are some
alternative platforms to consider
looking into square stripe venmo cash
app patreon kofi google pay apple pay
facebook pay skrill zell western union
wise revolut commish.eo payoneer
subscribe star and etsy i'm sure there
are more than just those and i'm also
sure that those themselves have their
share of issues most of them aren't even
available in canada where i live so i
can't try them out but it is worth
researching each of them individually
because everyone has different financial
needs and what i look for in a payment
processor is going to be completely
different than what you do so me sitting
here and telling you which ones i prefer
and use isn't going to be anywhere near
as useful as you looking into it
yourself the point here is that while
paypal is the biggest and most versatile
internationally used option they are not
the only option and no matter your
circumstances i'm confident that you
could find another one instead
regardless of what you choose to do with
your money from here on out what's most
important is that we keep talking about
this that we keep standing up for the
artists being taken advantage of and
silenced by this corporation that we
keep making noise and we keep pushing
for better because this is not okay
and i for one have no intention of
tolerating it quietly follow the lawsuit
share the stories of people like
luckfoxzo33 and the people whose voices
they're boosting use the stop paypal
hashtag and just keep fighting thank you
for watching thank you to everyone who
helped me get as much information for
this video as possible and i hope you
all enjoyed it or at least learned
something about what's going on behind
paypal's adamantly closed doors special
thank you as always to channel members
cafe soleil joseph solomon unknown code
abyss reborn dolph and appa is lucian as
well as patrons batman kyle lowe blue
swanson this is totally my name unity
cora fear jamisha walker and jason
oliphant for their support and i'll see
you all in my next one
[Music]
uh