Rookie question - return request and paypal fund ?

[yesdealer]

Hi

We all know once a buyer opens a return request, the associated payment in your paypal account will be "Temporary Hold".

I had a return request opened last month, as shown in my paypal:

"Temporary Hold For  eBay Buyer Dispute  -$24.99 AUD"

Few days ago, the request was closed automatically, because buyer has been totally unresponsive, and nothing was returned.

I also received an email confirmation from ebay about this.

Now, here is the question.

It shows "-$24.99" so I assume that the amount was deducted from my paypal balance, right?

But I didn't see any new transaction that says "+$24.99" after request closure.

Where is my $24.99?

I lost trace of the total balance so I have no way to tell...

Tried to contact ebay customer support but they are no help.

Anyone?

[*tippy*toes*]

The money was never removed from your PayPal account, you just couldn't access it as PayPal had frozen it. It should have still shown in your balance. Think of it like depositing a cheque into the bank. If you had $100 in the bank before you deposited the cheque and the cheque was for $40, your balance would be $140 with available funds being $100.

You PayPal balance would have showed the full amount in there. The available funds would have been $24.99 less than the balance. If the balanace and available funds now show the same amount, they have released that $24.99.

[yesdealer]

Thanks for your reply.

I asked a friend of mine for the same question, then he showed me his paypal account.

On the 30th of Nov, he withdrew nearly all the balance to bank account, only about 50 cents was left in Paypal.

On the 1st of Dec, there was a return request opened for $24.87

On the 3rd of Dec, he sold another item and received $29.45 (after paypal fee)

But now, there is only $5.01 left, shown as "Total".

So from the looks of it, the $24.87 was still deducted?

[*tippy*toes* · Accepted solution]

No, it will only be deducted if the buyer wins the dispute. At the moment it is in limbo. Like the funds while waiting for a cheque to clear. They are there, you just don't have access to them.

Your friends account is only showing $5 because when they froze the funds for the dispute, it would have put his account into the minus. The payment he got went to the frozen funds and the $5 difference is showing up as credit....available funds. If he wins the dispute, the full amount will show up again.