Almost every time I've tried to make a payment from my paypal account while in a foreign country, my account has been suspended.

They look at where your request originates and see that it is not your usual country, and suspend the account to prevent fraud.

It's recoverable, but still a pain.

Make sure you have your bank card and bank account details with you as you need them for the security re-set procedure.

Same experience here. And it took days to get through the recovery process.

...........shu

Thanks to everybody who has replied, I thought the account would come in handy if my other account was stopped, which has happened despite Nationwide telling me they wouldn't. It appears it might not be much use when I am abroad so I will look for another back up.

a very wise decision !

make sure you DO NOT have to relay on PayPal at all or you will be F***ed in no time.. rather stick to the traditional way of handling your pennies... in the real world PP is useless, where real services change from hand to hand and not electronic.. use cash in different currencies, bank card and "pre-pay" credit cards which you do top up as needed, or some one else can top it up by transferring money to that sub-account tight to the pre-pay CC.. and you are set... keep it simple..

you can apply even online for a "pre-pay VISA card", with no credit or debts check.. very handy for long term wacky traverses without regular salary and/or bad records too...
Still gives you all the advantages to pay for any item on the internet for mail order stuff you may need, and to be able to redraw local cash at any ATM machine world wide as well, which gives you a safer and better exchange rate without being ripped off by this exchange counter Mafia.

(a pre-pay VISA cost me only 2,90-Euros a month as accounting fee.. and a low %-fee for every transaction)
Important as well is, that in case of a scamp or loss of the card you may only lose the amount, that's actually on the card and not open all of your funds to be at risk...

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The trouble is that he was talking in philosophy, but they were listening in gibberish.

I've received over 50 payments to my PayPal account, and have sent at least 5 more, all since August 3rd, and all in South America (Colombia, Ecuador, Peru).

I've never had my account suspended, and never had my payments stopped, never have I not received a payment, nor have I had my account frozen.

I do have verified PayPal account versus non-verified, but I'm not sure it that makes the difference.

Still saying I'd keep it at least as an alternative.

--Alex

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NJ, NR, NBTTN

Lucky you.. congratulation...
Looks like you are a US-passport holder... which can make all a big difference for the paypal policy in case of not being such assy strict to freeze people's account on a frequent base... may be making a US-passport a bit more trustful to them compare to the rest of the world... which wouldn't be a surprising behaviour....
have a look at the following map... which "may" explaining the odd view of the high officials at paypal... but who knows... they may are not the only ones...

"the world according to the US"
http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...ding-u-s-59710 ::

Most complains coming from NON-US residents/citizens passport holders anyway... looks like another murky 2nd-class non-trusting policy of paypal, which makes it even worse to me... and dose confirm, or at least supporting my suspicion and not trusting paypal at all.. regarding my own and many other folks bad experiences reports with paypal..... which put paypal in to a dodgy line, of... similar like the Bulgarian money exchange Mafia... to me..

Yes definitely agree with keeping the existing PP account open if you got one, you never know, I'm just saying, do not relay on it, or open a new one for being on the road... which can give you a big backfire and blowback on your trip...

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The trouble is that he was talking in philosophy, but they were listening in gibberish.

I have had problems with my account being suspended, I had to send off bank account records, and copy of passport by fax to get it up and running again, a pain, but not difficult when not on the road.

Also, I have heard on a consumer programme on BBC Radio 4 about people selling in person, and then the buyers claiming a fraudulent transaction many months later, and paypal withdrawing money from the sellers BANK ACCOUNT without notice. Not great!

But on the whole it is useful.

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https://fernsforays.wordpress.com/

Nahh........no conspiracy here, I think. I'm from the US and it's happened to me twice. I think it has more to do with where you are when you make the request. I was in Russia heading for Europe, trying to pay for Euro green card insurance when they froze my account.

Similar to lists kept by banks of Credit Card fraud. My bank told me not to even try using my credit card in Turkey or Russia. They said they have experienced so much fraud there that they deny all transactions automatically.


...........shu

I don't think you know what you are talking about, I am a US passport holder and most of my bank and credit card accounts are in the US.

much as I dislike some of paypal's policies. in most instances paypal remains the safest with the lease amount of hassles to send/receive funds at a distance.

this is especially true for sending $$$ to folks at a distance you have never done business with. always fund paypal with your credit card if there is any question of folks you are dealing with.

if anything goes wrong, you credit company's clout is equal to paypal. ALL your funds will be yanked back if credit card co sides with you. which it almost always does. since credit card co is looking out for you, unlike paypal, who is primarily looking out for paypal's interest first.

paypal is not your friend ... their policies are to protect paypal .. plain and simple. but once you figure how to stay within their policies, odds are you will not have issues.

out of 400+ paypal transactions... I've NEVER had my funds blocked for any reason. I've never lost ANY $$$ when sending to a verified paypal account paid with a credit card.

what verified means is paypal sent a few cents to your bank account. then you've got to access your bank to find out what that amount is. 5cents or 22cents or what ever. then amount has to be input into verification form on paypal.

what this does is verify who you say you are... it's NOT possible to open a bank account anywhere without showing legal forms of ID.

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R90S, R80G/S PD

Well, figuring out their policies is much of the battle, isn't it? I've them them freeze an account for months and never even found out why. Just for curiousity, how many of your 400 transactions took place outside of your home jurisdiction, particularly Eastern Europe, etc.?