Hello everyone,
I just became a member of this forum even though I first visited this website about two months ago. I have never found such an efficient and helpful community platform before. At this point I would like to thank ebayhateluv and specially Modee for all the interesting information I've been able to collect during the past months. Furthermore it should be mentioned that without aspkin's help a platform like this forum would have never been possible. I'd like to take the chance to introduce myself with my eBay and PayPal story:
I was born in the mid 80's in Europe. Between the year of 2000 and 2006 I travelled through the United States about four times a year. I didn't take very long until I felt in love with this wonderful country and its inhabitants. Finally, in 2006 I decided to leave home country to come to America. I entered the country under a temporary business visa which allowed me to establish all necessary legal grounds to operate a business in the U.S. At that time I was working together with an immigration lawyer, whom I paid 5000 $ for giving me wrong advise.
I started selling mostly goods made in the U.S.A and products which are not available abroad. eBay was one of the trade-platforms I used to get in contact with my customers. After six months I had to leave the country to renew my status. It was too early to apply for a real business visa (which allows you to stay and work for your company in the U.S.). My lawyers advise was to come back to the States for a few more months (to increase the sales volume of my company). So I went back to Europe for two weeks. At the point of entry I was being held for 24 hours, including an overnight stay at the local prison (because the airport closes at night). I was accused for working illegally by selling goods on eBay. The next flight brought me back to Europe and the fight between my attorney, the consulate general in my home town and me began. On the bottom line it took 10 months to get a long-term business visa. During this time I had to find an employee in the states, keep the business up and running (to still qualify for the visa), etc.
The advise of my immigration lawyer was simply false. I was never allowed to work under the temporary visa. She kept telling me that I would have to generate a sales volume of at least six digits to qualify for a business visa.
Anyways, during this time I was able to increase my monthly sales volume to up to 55.000 $ and thanks to eBay I had customers in more than 60 countries. The average item sold at around 150 $. I became Platinum Powerseller after a few months and everything went fine until January 2008. I had 'item-not-received' disputes on packages that were going abroad. The tracking information only showed that the items had left the States. I initiated inquiries with USPS and one of the customers left a negative feedback on eBay and escalated the dispute with PayPal. The negative feedback caused the other customer to leave one also. He in-fact even initiated a charge-back with his credit card company. My PayPal account was put on hold with a balance of 14.000 $ and I was asked to provide information like copied of drivers license, proof of inventory, SSN, etc. I also had to provide proof of shipping and I had to enter tracking-numbers. After a few phone calls PayPal insisted that the tracking status has to say 'delivered'. Now, Priority- and even Express-Mail shipping takes 1-3 weeks internationally. In some countries packages are not being scanned properly at the time of arrival. In-fact, there were three sendings that were officially still in transit. I was forced to stop selling on eBay, because I wasn't able to buy more merchandise. That was a big mistake. Within hours I received message from customers which had already paid for their item and asked me why I was not selling anymore. One, two, three, more and more people got nervous because they had not received their item yet, just the tracking-number and started leaving negative feedbacks. Some initiated charge-backs, item-not-received disputes... it was a real chain reaction. This all happened two days before I was finally issued a business visa. If I had been in the states myself at that time I probably could have reacted a little faster. Well, finally, after more than a month my PayPal account was reinstated and I was able to transfer the money into my checking account. I started selling again with about 5 or 6 positive feedbacks and packaged that were delivered when I received message from both, eBay and PayPal that they would close my accounts. A fight began between my attorney (not the same one that gave me false information regarding my legal status :-)) and PayPal. Their decision, of course, was final. There are still around 1.200 $ in the account which I won't received before September. My life completely changed overnight with no income. Also, I also rely on my company since it is bound to my visa. I started looking for other ways to sell, Amazon, iOffer etc. etc. I also own anther company back in Europe which were still doing business. That allowed me to be sometime without any income here in the U.S.
Overall I had like 0.2 orders in average per day. So after a month I decided to go back to eBay with new accounts. Today I know I did some mistakes. I opened a new checking account, used a new address, phone number, name, new IP but I did not delete my index.dat files and I also kept receiving e-mails in html. After two weeks of selling I was linked and another 1.300 $ got frozen. That was the time I began doing research, days and days.. almost two weeks. That's how I found this forum with all its helpful information.
I am finally back on eBay and PayPal with new accounts under a DBA, new bank account, credit card, etc. etc. I have already sold about 20 items, received payments, shipped them and received positive feedback. So far all is good and I am getting prepared now for the upcoming games PayPal is going to play with me as soon as I start selling in higher volumes again.
The Floridian
My story 
