In an effort to clean up the mess that has arisen with regards to the donation efforts of the “fail blog of handcrafts”, Regretsy, PayPal has issued a statement. In the statement, it says that the funds donated to the site by readers for children have been released and that it has made a donation to the cause.
PayPal’s Director of Communications, Anuj Nayar, says that PayPal “can confirm that the funds have been released and we are working directly with the account holder on this matter,” continuing by stating that it is “making a donation to Regretsy to help their cause, and we’re truly sorry this occurred.”
The apology comes after a massive outcry over the rude treatment of the site by a PayPal representative after Regretsy incorrectly used the ‘Donate’ button on its site. While many attempts were made by the site runners to fix the issue, PayPal remained intractable, refusing to release funds without the owner jumping through hoops. The issue spiralled out of control as PayPal froze Regretsy assets it held that were unrelated to the giveaway and just got worse from there.
Nayar goes on to outline PayPal’s policies regarding donations and the requirements that it sets forth for people looking to collect them. Unfortunately, those policies may not have been presented as clearly as it says that they are.
The issue, in the end, wasn’t one of the rules being enforced. It’s one of customer service, which PayPal has struggled with in recent years, especially with charitable organizations. A helpful representative could have made this a non-issue with just a few minutes and a positive attitude.
It’s good that PayPal has spoken out about this but, honestly, this is the least they could have done at this point.
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