Public Service Announcement
Feb. 4th, 2010 04:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bladesparkBecause apparently people don't know this.
When somebody asks you to pay through paypal and send it as a gift so they don't have to pay fees... well first off, hello! They are telling you that they are competely okay with ripping off somebody, because they are ripping off paypal. Admittedly paypal makes out like bandits on fees, and they are a faceless corporation, which most people don't mind ripping off, but it's still a red flag.
That's not the big, fat, dangerous red flag though. The big problem that should be staring you in the face but most of you apparently haven't thought of it, is that a gift is a gift. It cannot be disputed. I mean what are you going to say. "Hi, paypal? I freely gave somebody a gift, but now they're not giving me anything in return, so give my gift back please."? Yeah, no. You send that money out and you will never see it again, no matter what they person you're paying that way does. They can take the money and run and you are left without any form of recourse whatsoever. And remember that just by asking you to do this they've already told you they don't mind a little fraud. What's to say they won't mind defrauding you too?
So unless you're willing to write that money off as an actual gift and get nothing in return, don't pay somebody with a paypal gift. Seriously, don't.
(And you artists asking people to pay this way, firstly shame on you! And secondly, good luck if paypal should notice you're doing this, they can and will shut your account down for fraud if they catch you at it, and what are you going to do then?)
When somebody asks you to pay through paypal and send it as a gift so they don't have to pay fees... well first off, hello! They are telling you that they are competely okay with ripping off somebody, because they are ripping off paypal. Admittedly paypal makes out like bandits on fees, and they are a faceless corporation, which most people don't mind ripping off, but it's still a red flag.
That's not the big, fat, dangerous red flag though. The big problem that should be staring you in the face but most of you apparently haven't thought of it, is that a gift is a gift. It cannot be disputed. I mean what are you going to say. "Hi, paypal? I freely gave somebody a gift, but now they're not giving me anything in return, so give my gift back please."? Yeah, no. You send that money out and you will never see it again, no matter what they person you're paying that way does. They can take the money and run and you are left without any form of recourse whatsoever. And remember that just by asking you to do this they've already told you they don't mind a little fraud. What's to say they won't mind defrauding you too?
So unless you're willing to write that money off as an actual gift and get nothing in return, don't pay somebody with a paypal gift. Seriously, don't.
(And you artists asking people to pay this way, firstly shame on you! And secondly, good luck if paypal should notice you're doing this, they can and will shut your account down for fraud if they catch you at it, and what are you going to do then?)