Open Letter

Dear Customer who paid with PayPal online and then returned merchandise and was issued a credit via PayPal:

At first when you said you didn't see the credit on your account, I took you seriously--because the guy who does returns around here is useless and never tells the right person to go into our PayPal account and issue a credit when he is doing a PayPal credit. So I just figured that once again, he had forgotten--so I left a note on Geoff's desk, telling him to see if a credit was given to you and if not--to put it through and let me know ASAP so I can call you back and tell you that the credit has now been applied. Boy was I wrong about you.

Geoff printed me a copy of the credit transaction that was issued 2 days ago. I figured maybe for some reason you just couldn't see it on there yet--still giving you the benefit of the doubt. So I dialed your number, ready with the information that it was issued and should be there. You answered and I was happy to give you the good news.

But my happiness was very quickly transformed into confusion, then into amazement. Because your reply was, "Yes, I can see that it is in my PayPal account, but why isn't it back in my bank account yet?" This is where the confusion occurred. I explained that you would have to do whatever it was you wanted to do with your credit funds now sitting in your PayPal account, yourself--and if that was transferring it to your bank account, you would have do this from PayPal, yourself. I thought that my tone made it pretty clear that we had nothing to do with anything after crediting it back to your PayPal account, but apparently for you, this was not clear.

Entering my amazement phase of this experience. You proceeded to ask me how to transfer the funds into your bank account from PayPal. Well, I know how to do this, but only because I use PayPal for personal use--and it is not my job at all to explain to you how to use websites for personal reasons, so I just repeated that you have to transfer the funds from your PayPal account into your bank account. You then told me your PayPal account doesn't give you the authority to do such a thing. How in the past, you placed an order using PayPal and had a return and got a credit--and it went right back into your bank account and you didn't have to transfer the funds. I guess the transfer fairy must have done that for you back then. I don't know. I told you that it is your responsibility to transfer your funds to your bank account, and at this point I am so amazed, annoyed and amused, all at the same time--then I just broke down and said something like, "It's easy, you just go to transfer funds, type in the amount, choose your bank account and submit." Your silence led me to believe you did not grasp this concept at all. You then gave up on it, I don't even know what you were trying to do--get me to transfer your funds on PayPal for you somehow?--and you said, "Well alright then, I will try to figger this out." You said this in a tone like I was the stupid, crazy, confused one. Then you hung up.

Later on, I was on a call with a normal customer, helping them place an order, and I heard Melissa take a call from you. She forwarded your call to Geoff. After interviewing Geoff on the matter, I am told that you went to paypal.com, logged in, and looked at your transaction history, and saw "Payment to TragicScarf.com, 866-XXX-XXXX, so you called us, figuring it was our problem because our phone number was listed. ...Huh? You just called me, at the Magic Scarf, at the same number--so why would you call again? Never mind all the obvious stuff, like how this is just the description of the transaction and has nothing to do with you transferring your money to your bank account on your own. If I hadn't been clear about it being your own problem, Geoff was. He was off the phone in seconds.

I wonder if you'll call back. If you don't, I will go on living my life, believing that $24.00 is still sitting in your PayPal account, untransfered, until the day I die. I am left with just one question: How in the world did you ever set up your PayPal account and link it to your checking account in the first place?

I just wanted to say, thank you for giving me something to believe in.

Your friend,

--"Bett-ney"