Problems with paypal & simons card for lifting limits

ploughman · #1 05-02-2009

Am stumped by this. Have been humming along with a fairly high transaction volume on low-dollar transactions, maybe $2,000 a month worth of $12 average sales.

Recently had 2 bank reversals filed from Canada, one for $12 on an old transaction and one for $24. Both items had been shipped, but because it's air mail and the market won't support higher shipping costs for low-dollar items, I'm probably stuck there and am thinking fraud on the buyers' parts. The buyers don't appear related.

Have also noticed a recent spate of phishing attacks, but haven't followed any of the links.

Then at the start of the month I get a "legitimate" e-mail notice to update my credit card information on file. A card ending in 3666 was about to expire. I recognized the card as a giftcard from giftcards.com that I had used in fall 2006 to register the PayPal account initially. It already has expired and wasn't listed anywhere in the credit card list.

So I get on and see that my Simon card is still listed, and still with address confirmed and not set to expire until 2010. I try entering all the details from that again under "lift your limit" and it said that the credit card number was already on my account.

So for some reason it's "ignoring" the Simon card that has been the registered card for 8 months now. The Simon card has only $2.89 as balance, so I don't know if that is affecting anything.

Is this a symptom of deeper trouble? I could go and get another Simon card easily enough, but I'm not sure what's going on.

Lyda · #2 05-02-2009

No, all you have to do remove your old credit cards and add new, never used simon vcc..you will be fine.

ploughman · #3 05-02-2009

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lyda

No, all you have to do remove your old credit cards and add new, never used simon vcc..you will be fine.

Thanks, I feel better. Any idea why it would suddenly not treat the already-registered and linked Simon giftcard as valid anymore after 8 months of doing so? Was it trying to authorize an amount larger than the account had in it, or maybe the Canada things were triggering some kind of unwanted human intervention? I always go on the theory of not trying to bring in humans on something with PayPal unless absolutely necessary. I wish I knew what caused the Simon card to no longer work, as I thought I was good until 2010.

Lyda · #4 05-02-2009

No idea why, but it has been reported ..............If Simon does not work this way any more, than there are other ways.

ploughman · #5 05-04-2009

Okay, so for whatever reason PayPal suddenly gives me a $500 limit as of May 1. It's a stealth account for a different name/address (regged in fall 2006 under advice of the Robert Windsor book). Since last fall the credit card used to register the account was a S1mon giftcard, not set to expire until 8/10.

So I go get another of those S1mon giftcards as of Sunday and register it with S1mon. Then Monday night I try registering with PPal and get the error message:

"We cannot send the 4-digit PayPal code to this card. Please choose another card."

I do later get an e-mail saying the card has been added to my account, but no mention of anything related to withdrawal limits.

Something definitely seems to be awry with S1mon cards now. Help! What other cards to try? I'm already up to around $400 of the $500 limit, so this could cause some real trouble.

Lyda · #6 05-04-2009

This can happen.. I think what you need to do is remove first your previous Simon card and expired cards out of your pp account, than add a new card. It should work..

ebaykilla · #7 05-04-2009

ploughman....why do you keep spelling Simon like this: S1mon?

ploughman · #8 05-04-2009

I tried removing both and then re-adding the new card...it gave me the same error message "We cannot send the 4-digit PayPal code to this card, Please choose another card."

It did add the card, and is showing the address as confirmed, but it's not letting me use it to link-and-verify.

Any suggestions for other card vendors to try. I tried giftcards.com some months ago and that one didn't work.

Anxiety level ratcheting up again... Thanks for helping, though.

ploughman · #9 05-04-2009

Quote:

Originally Posted by ebaykilla

ploughman....why do you keep spelling Simon like this: S1mon?

In some venues it's a convention to keep it from being a search term. I see that on Usenet a lot by posters who want to be under the radar. Don't know if that's a concern here but wanted to err on the side of caution.

Lyda · #10 05-04-2009

Hmmmmm...strange.

Cabo · #11 05-05-2009

I just used Simon cards on 3 limited accounts this weekend. That plus call forwarding / phone verification removed the limitation on every account. As for a different giftcard, I've successfully used american express cards on several accounts; however, that was during the initial setup period. I haven't tried amex on an account that's already been limited.

ploughman · #12 05-05-2009

I wonder if it's a backdoor way for them to try to force revealing an SSN (which wouldn't work anyway with a stealth acct.). The first four digits on the new Simon card that didn't work are the same as the first 4 on the old one that had been working and suddenly stopped.

It's as if something (automated process?) came along to de-link the first Simon card, causing the expiration notice to be generated automatically. I don't have any e-mail for the $500 limit.

This is most worrisome. There's already not much left on the withdrawal limit, and future funds are much depended-on. I saw the Sept. 18 list of working cards & may try, but am also concerned about making too many failed attempts.

Cabo · #13 05-05-2009

It's funny you mention that. I'm not sure if this is related, but I had 4 accounts that got linked together last week (same ip + cookies). They were all partially verified with a prepaid cc but no bank account. Instead of limiting the accounts, I got the following error message when I tried to purchase something using any of the cards:

"You cannot use this credit card for this transaction. Please use another funding source. You will need to add and confirm your bank account. Once your bank account has been added and confirmed, you can continue this payment. Add your bank account information below."

None of the accounts had any type of error message and I don't recall checking to see if the sending limit was reduced, but as soon as I transferred a little money in... BOOM all 4 were limited within 24 hours and they put a temp hold on all payments I made for the past 30 days. Fortunately, this was my first limitation and I was able to fix most of the accounts with a simon card + call forwarding phone verification.

ploughman · #14 05-05-2009

Update: Got a Gift-2-Go gift card at Walgreen's, a $25 "Congratulations" card. In reading the fine print (which you don't get to do until after opening), I see it sez it can't be used at online merchants that require address verification. Also no Website to enter details. Grrrr....

Dunno if that's peculiar to that card or if it applies to the yellow-packaged Gift-to-Go cards as well ($30/50/100). I stayed away from the Green Dot ones they had.

Will try the VisaVCC website next (would have done earlier if I had seen)

Looks like the withdrawal limit is about to be crossed. This is very aggravating.

ploughman · #15 05-05-2009

Update: Tried it with a Staples (Blackhawk) card purchased earlier.

Same result as the Simon card. It returned the error message "We cannot send the 4-digit PayPal code to this card. Please choose another card."

It did add the card to the profile and with the address as confirmed, but apparently would not allow it for the expanded use purposes.

Am wondering if address or other info should be changed before trying another.

Lyda · #16 05-05-2009

This happened to me one time when I was trying to lift $500 limit by adding another cc. Every card I tried, be it Simon , my regular new debit or credit card.. I tried like 4 - 5 times and every time it did not go through, but I would be getting email from paypal that I have successfully added a credit card.
Than I read here on the forum, can't remember who said it, but basically, if you remove ALL of your unsuccessful, error giving cards/attempts and THAN add new card that was never used before, it should work.

You may tray AMEX, available at Publix or maybe other places too...It works, but you have to be patient for paypal number to show up, takes 2-3 days. You can first register the card on AMEX website with your paypal address and than go use it.

Go ahaid, remove the cards, WAIT day or two and than add your new Amex.

ploughman · #17 05-05-2009

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lyda

You may tray AMEX, available at Publix or maybe other places too...It works, but you have to be patient for paypal number to show up, takes 2-3 days. You can first register the card on AMEX website with your paypal address and than go use it.

Go ahaid, remove the cards, WAIT day or two and than add your new Amex.

OK, all cards are now removed from profile. Will go get Amex & try adding Friday.

Lyda · #18 05-05-2009

The smallest amount on Amex is $25 and it costs about $3.75. After you put in the number,
you will get a message from pp that they will charge your card for a $1.00 or so, and that you need to check after that in your statement the EXPUSE 4 digit number and enter this number to into "Things to do" section and will lift your limit.

What will happen, you will see next day that paypal charged the card in your AMEX Gift card transactions, but there will not be EXPUSE number. Just don't panic when you see that and keep on checking every day, it will show up within 2-3 days.

ploughman · #19 05-08-2009

Well, it looks like the Amex giftcard and registering address on that via phone worked! I didn't get the error message, got the screens for the next steps with expanded use, etc. The statement at present has the -$1.95 and -$1.00 entries with no detail, so I'll wait for the code to post.

FWIW, I cleared cookies and used the "enter new address" screens, even though the address was the same. I also like it that the Amex card doesn't expire until 2013, though they'd burn off the balance with their "administrative fee" well before then.

I know not to count chickens until they hatch, but it's good to get something other than that error message. Thanks to Lyda & others who posted.

Lyda · #20 05-08-2009

No problems Ploughman, you are welcome! ... Your Expuse # will be there in few days too.. I just don't understand why you messed with"enter new address if its the same, before you had a chance to finally lift the limit? With Paypal its "safe and slow going" the best, one thing at the time...You'll probably be ok, but I am just curious.

ploughman · #21 05-08-2009

I guess I was so frustrated with getting the error message on the previous times (all using the stored address) that I wanted to try something at least slightly though not really different. The only difference was that on address line 2 instead of "Unit XXXX" (as if for an apt. number) I put in #XXXX. But that is how I had said it on the phone to the Amex rep.

CBarnes1986 · #22 07-23-2009

I have this same problem... Simon card give me the ""We cannot send the 4-digit PayPal code to this card. Please choose another card." error. Should I try an AMEX card?