Customer Paid But I don't Have the Money

[Wellspring]

Background: I opened a new Paypal account, got it all set up and linked it to my eCrater stores. This is the first sale to this new account. (I had previously used another Paypal account with no problem.)

I got an email today from a customer wondering when I was going to mail her item. The order showed in eCrater (as not paid/Paypal) and I checked the Paypal account. Zero transactions there.

I sent a Paypal invoice to the customer. Paypal said I needed to verify my email address. I did.

Customer responded that she paid through the eCrater links when she initially ordered the item and included a copy of the Paypal receipt (which had the correct account email on it.)

I go back into Paypal. NOW it shows two entries:

*an unclaimed payment from her dated TODAY and
*my invoice to her.

So I decide to 'claim' the payment, but Paypal is requiring me to Verify my account (link my bank acount).

"PayPal requires that accounts receiving payments from our PayPal Website Payments and Instant Purchase for Auctions features be Verified".

I have two other Paypal accounts and have never had to verify it to receive payments through eCrater.

Is this account in the Twilight Zone? What am I missing here?

Why is her payment "unclaimed?"

Why is Paypal requiring me to get verified (and yet it doesn't require it for my other Paypal accounts which I used with eCrater)?

[kjscreations]

i am only guessing however... is your new account a premier or biz account? Not a personal acct?
Also... I believe you can only have 1 premier acct on paypal.
You can just add another email ON 1 paypal account so the money all goes to same account but customer will see the email connected to any ecrater store.

Hope that all made sense.

[MaggietheCatsMeows]

She may have sent money to your email address and not paid the invoice. That might have resulted in you having unclaimed money.

Ask if she clicked PayNow or if she logged into her paypal account and sent you money.

I never had an option when I opened my PP account. They had to verify my bank account.

[acread]

Why are you opening more than one PayPal account. At PayPal all you are allowed is one personal and one merchant (business or premier) type account.

You probably had a merchant account and the second one you opened is personal account. If the customer paid with creadit card PayPal automatically tries to make you upgrade to merchant accout. But since you already have that it will be a problem.

Use the same PayPal account in all your stores.

And contact PayPal about this issue to resolve it.

[Wellspring]

Hang on to your seat. I have three paypal accounts.

One is for personal (ebay) purchases and sales. I remember upgrading it to a Premier account (required because of eBay sales transactions)
2nd is for Etsy sales (they don't calculate sales tax, so I have to config Paypal to do it). It works fine.
3rd is for eCrater (the new one) business sales because eCrater calculates sales taxes.

Each has a different credit card and email address. 1st and 2nd work fine and were never 'verified".

I suppose I could turn off eCrater's sales tax calculations and use the 2nd account, letting Paypal do it. I hesitate because eCrater is much more reliable. Paypal has been known to 'forget' to add the sales tax and the seller has had to eat the tax (per Etsy forums).

Customer says she followed the buttons.

I'm assuming that once the bank account is 'verified' I'll be able to accept the payment.

[poopsheet]

FYI, here's what one of their help pages says:

[acread]

Well if their site is still saying you can only have 2, maybe that is the issue. They just woke up to say "hey wait a minute".

When will your accout will be verified?

[YourRainyDayBookStore]

In case you ever need the phone numbers to PayPal:

1-800-836-1859

1-888-221-1161

[Wellspring]

Thanks for everyone's help. Payment finally cleared (at Paypal's discretion). Customer got her item and was very understanding.

I don't know how to 'close' this Paypal account, but I will be transferring the money out, UNlinking my bank account, and have already recofigured my eCrater stores to the same Paypal account I use for Etsy (letting Paypal calculate the tax).

Paypal may have a two account limit, but apparently it's easy enough to circumvent, though the confusion and weird behavior isn't worth it

[acread]

Isn't there a way to set up tax calculations at Etsy?

[Wellspring]

No, they don't calculate taxes and soon we won't even have to manually upload our items ourselves into GoogleBase.