Guest carlsbadrolex Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 As many here know Ive been collecting rep watches for several years. What even fewer people know is that I started out by collecting gen watches. In 1988 I was given my first Rolex, a brand new 16610 for my high school graduation gift. I was on my way to The University of Miami, FL. and my dad thought I should have a nice watch. What he didnt realize was that I would sell it to Coral Gables Pawn (still open for business) for $750 the third week I was in Miami. That next Christmas I had to fly back home for the holidays and knew that I needed to have the watch or my dad would be upset. So I found a guy in downtown Miami who sold replica's. I bought what was an absolutely horrible replica 16610 and flew home. Either my dad recognized it as a fake (he still to this day has an incredible watch collection) or he was simply to sad to mention it... but the watch NEVER came up in discussion over almost two weeks. Over the years as I earned a little more money, I would buy and sell Rolex watches (gens) to earn a little extra spending money. I would buy them from friends, buy them from friends of friends or trade them for drugs (just kidding, kinda... but thats another story). When I was married the first time, I married a woman whos father owned three pawn shops. So my knowledge of watches (although its very limited) was useful to him as he had a bunch of idiots working for him. And now the why I hate Paypal (and Fedex)... In 1999 I bought a really clean 16613 from my then father in law. He had given a $1200 loan on it, and I bought it from him for $2000 (with box, papers, hang tags, anchor). I listed the watch on Ebay and sold it in three days for $3750. The buyer was in New York and requested that I ship the watch to him via Fedex Express and he paid around $75 for shipping and insurance. I packed the watch in a Fedex Express mail flat rate box and took it to a real honest to goodness Fedex location (not a satellite store or a place like Kinkos). I handed the box to the woman, she asked what was in it and I told her a Rolex watch and that I wanted to insure it for $4000. She wrote all of this down on the form, took my money (including the money for insurance) and I left. The next day I get a call from Fedex saying that the box arrived OPENED and EMPTY in New York. They said the pull tab had been ripped open and that it had most likely gotten caught on some equipment and that they would find the contents. He asked what the contents were, and I told him. I think he actually DID drop the phone and came back and said, well maybe it wasnt the equipment. He passed me on to his supervisor who explained that although the woman who took my money had charged me for insurance, that Fedex DID NOT offer insurance for JEWELRY OR WATCHES and that all I would get was a check for $100. I contacted the customer, explained the entire situation and he was obviously upset. I explained that HE had requested it to be shipped by Fedex, and that I didnt feel responsible. He threatened to sue, and we agreed to settle for a 50% refund. I immediately refunded him the money via Paypal (he had paid with Paypal). Two days later, my Paypal account was suspended and the remaining remaining balance of my Paypal account was taken and given to the buyer. I had taken out about $500 of it, so he didnt get a full refund (but close). I was told I had to transfer $500 in to my Paypal account to refund him if I wanted my paypal account opened again, and I refused. In 2005, I was some how able to open another Paypal account... I think because I had moved a couple times, changed bank accounts, changed credit cards, etc. I was now buying more replicas than anything... and sure as grass is green someone sent me a nice memo with a payment saying that the payment was for a REPLICA ROLEX DAYTONA COSMOGRAPH. And that was the end of that Paypal account. This account was only open about 4 months. SO, since 2005 I have not had a personal Paypal account. Ive always been able to use someone elses if absolutely necessary... but I hadnt tried again to open one UNTIL TWO DAYS AGO. I logged in, created an account, verified a bank account, verified a phone number, verified a credit card and thought all was good. The account was open, and I was receiving money. I took a deposit on a watch I am selling, and a friend sent me some money for some consulting I am doing for him. I make a great deal with a very respected member of this forum and send off $385 for a CHS GMT IIc. 5 minutes later, he gets an email and I get an email saying "OH NO YOUR NOT... WE KNOW WHO YOU ARE...YOUR ACCOUNT IS ON HOLD BUDDY." Well thats not what it actually said, but close. So to make sure the respected member here doesnt get freaked out and think Im pulling a scam I get on the tele with paypal ( 6 times in 4 hours for a total of 128 minutes of talk time) I have to fax in a copy of my drivers license, a utility bill, a voided check and I think they asked for a drop of blood to be mailed in... I am then told to call back. They review all of the paperwork and say, "Hey, your the guy who owes us $500 from 1999. Would you like to transfer that from your bank account or your credit card?" NOW, I pulled some OLD AND DUSTY documents out of my file cabinet in the storage locker and found the guy who bought the watch in 1999 info. I looked him up on Ebay (No Longer a Registered User). I ask the rep if the funds were ever given to the buyer, and he replied that they had not. SO, basically Paypal is collecting $500 from me to KEEP because they had not paid a Paypal insurance claim on this transaction and the guy is no longer a registered user. So where is the money going to go??? Are they just going to put it in their general account and pay it out to the stock holders? SO I was left with a great dilemma... They were NOT going to give the seller of the GMT IIc the funds... They were NOT going to return the funds to me. If anything, they were going to confiscate them and put it towards the $500 balance. I could transfer $500 from my bank account in to my Paypal account and they would take it immediately. Or I could tell the seller of the GMT IIc that they were going to take the funds back from him and I was very sorry for the inconvenience. Then Paypal would keep the money and reduce my balance and I could then pay the new balance and keep my account or AGAIN tell them to suck off. So I really want the GMT IIc... I transfer the $542.79 from my debit card in to the Paypal account, Paypal takes it in the blink of an eye and they release the funds to the GMT IIc seller and tell me "Welcome Back Mr. ^%$#$%^^#" So the moral of the story is... Paypal is DAMN good with the security systems they have in place to take your money. They may offer no protection at all to buyers or sellers, but you better beleive THEIR money is safe! And DONT under any circumstance ship anything of value (jewelry, watches, paintings, antiques, collectibles, etc.) with Fedex... THEY WONT PAY AN INSURANCE CLAIM ON IT. I now have a fully operational Paypal account for the first time since 2005 and I have now refunded 100% of the $3750 that I had received for selling a watch that was lost/stolen by Fedex. I think its time for "Call girl and Vodka night"! 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krustybrand Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 I don't know of any courier company that will pay out a claim on jewelery. Horror stories from Paypal are the reason I would sooner give things away on this forum (or others) than sell them. My Paypal account is for purchases only. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikellem Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 Great Story CBR.. You have me on the floor laughing... Except you are 100% Correct... MM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
asf Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 Im infuriated haha Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HauteHippie Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 Keeping a sense of humor through this situation is a lot more than I could have done.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shundi Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 Keeping a sense of humor through this situation is a lot more than I could have done.... Very true... I'm going to send every Paypal executive on an all expense paid trip to the moon...sans spacesuits. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_brian_ Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 I hate paypal too and I Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest carlsbadrolex Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 This morning this debacle gets even stranger... It appears that even though the funds have been cleared from my account and all holds have been lifted from my account, the seller of the GMT IIc has now had a hold placed on his account and the funds are not available to him. So in otherwords, when I jumped through the hoops to get the funds released and they were obligated to do that, they decided to hold the funds a little longer by not releasing them to the seller. On a rather eerie side note... Out of curiosity I decided to call the buyer of the 16613 from 1999 this morning and see if he had received a mysterious $500 deposit yesterday. I called the telephone number on the communication we had back in 1999 and a very nice woman answered the phone. I asked for the buyer by name and she stated that he had been killed in 2001. I said I was very sorry and asked if she recalled the situation. She stated that she did not and that her husband had bought dozens of Rolex watches and that she did not remember the particulars of this transaction. She went on to say that he was an accountant (He had stated that to me) for Lehman Brothers and that he had been killed when the planes hit the twin towers........ Now Im in an even worse mood for the day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corgi Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 Horror stories from Paypal are the reason I would sooner give things away on this forum (or others) than sell them. My Paypal account is for purchases only. I want to enlarge this to x300 font, make it flashing red, and put it in my signature. Truer words have never been uttered. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_brian_ Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 Hmm, that seems to be standard procedure.... I had some paypal transactions last month and there were some rwg sales too. Suddenly I just got a message that I received funds of over 1.800 Euro - which was NOT true - and therefore there is a need for security check: credit card check, invoice with my address was requested, some info about the transactions, etc. I managed to transfer all the amount from paypal to my bank account so it turned out ok after all but paypal still sucks! I think if someone transfers money from paypal to the bank account immediatelly after receiving it, they block the transaction for some time out of security reasons too... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ammandel Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 The saddest thing about this story for me is that you gave a gift from your father away Aside from that; I've had massive PayPal problems in the past to the point at which they were attempting to summon me to a court appearence in San Jose, CA. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
P4GTR Posted April 10, 2009 Report Share Posted April 10, 2009 The saddest thing about this story for me is that you gave a gift from your father away Me too. I know that feeling and its not a good one. Live and learn. Paypal.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stilty Posted April 11, 2009 Report Share Posted April 11, 2009 Wow, some crazy circumstances there! There is only one way to ship high end watches. ParcelPro.com I've used them a few times with no problems. Actually used Fedex as the carrier. They are 3rd party insurance. Up to $75K per package. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chronoluvvv Posted April 11, 2009 Report Share Posted April 11, 2009 good read live & learn, i guess Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oberblender Posted April 11, 2009 Report Share Posted April 11, 2009 just to add: I HATE PAYPAL, TOO!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slay Posted April 11, 2009 Report Share Posted April 11, 2009 I can feel your pain, I had similar situations with Paypal... The most ridiculous thing that happend was that I once shipped something back to the seller because it was a fake item even though advertised as genuine (Paypal told me to do so), he refused to accept the package, it got lost on the way back and I didn't get a refund whatsoever, Paypal claims its my fault! And then those e-mails you get, they are an insult in their nature! They don't address the problem but are basically pre recorded snippets. I'm the kind of person that is calm for a while, but if someone sends me replys that advise me to do things that I have said are not possible in the previous mail, then I tend to lose it! I actually got a mail after that stating that Paypal customer support would not converse with me anymore unless I apologize for my language (after the 32nd mail I did use the F-word a little bit here and there) and refrain from using it again when talking to Paypal customer service (because they are also "human beings" with feelings). I'm not going to say what happened afterwards, but I don't think I will ever be able to send an e-mail to customer service at Paypal (so now the only thing I have left is phone calls). No problem though, their customer support via e-mail is bullcrap anyway and doesn't answer any question besides those listed in the FAQ anyway! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TeeJay Posted April 11, 2009 Report Share Posted April 11, 2009 Damn, talk about an unfortunate series of events Hard to believe that companies can be allowed to get away with that. I'd've thought that if you could have proven that the package was damaged and the contents 'missing' (which Fedex weren't denying, they were just refusing to pay out) then surely paypal should have accepted that it was circumstances beyond your control... Damn. That's a bitch about the GMTIIc deal as well You might as well go for the 'call girls and vodka' plan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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