Voucher failed

[sheilakangaroo]

I was emailed a $10 voucher to spend on an Ebay Paypal purchase. I have a programme that puts a key beside real Ebay emails and this one had the key. I bought a swimsuit and applied the voucher. It seemed to be accepted and took the $10 off the total but when I went to do the final payment I was informed this email address is not connected to your account and asked to pay the full amount. I would not have bought the item if I had not been given the voucher but I was now forced into paying the full amount because I bought it on a "buy it now". The statement about the email address not being connected is false. It is my connected email and the voucher was sent, by Ebay, to that email address. The fine print on the voucher email says Ebay will not be responsible for failure while trying to use the voucher. I feel cheated by Ebay and want to warn others not to fall into this trap/scam/whatever it is. If it is not a scam and someone knows what I did wrong, please tell me. i would like the $10 back.

[sheilakangaroo]

I deleted the second voucher they sent me. I'm not willing to get bitten again.

[i-love-my-sheep]

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@milo2oatis wrote:

My theories just went out the window. I decided to try it again & it worked. I bought something from the UK instead of AU. Maybe that makes a difference? Or maybe it was a time difference thing with the start date? So confused.

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Often the time difference does play a part. Everything seems to work on eBay time, which is US west coast time (PST). At the moment they are about 18hrs behind us. I know as far as selling goes, our monthly free listings reset at midnight, but the monthly selling limit doesn't reset until the evening of the 1st. It's hard to keep up with it sometimes!!!

Glad you managed to get it to work. Hopefully the others will have the same luck.

[ambercat16]

Tried again and got the same error message so I called PayPal on their 1800 number.  The person I spoke to put me on hold for a minute or two then came back and said that there was a problem with the voucher and he would escalate the matter and that my PayPal account would be credited with $10.  

About 20 minutes later, the $10 was in my account.  

[i-love-my-sheep]

That's not a bad outcome given it was never your money in the first place. Hopefully everyone else who had problems contacted them too. That's a lot of $10 they will credit accounts with. It might force them to be more careful in the future.

As an aside, I made a purchase yesterday using the 20% off thingy for some technology sellers that finishes today. I was a bit worried at first whether it would work after these glitches with the PayPal/eBay vouchers. It went through OK and I saved $37 which wasn't to be sneezed at! Actually, I save far more than that because it was a fair bit cheaper ($100) than what it was to buy at DSE locally (and DSE on eBay too after they put their price back up right when I hit the BIN button!).

[davewil1964]

My $10 buyer whose voucher bouncd last week paid yesterday. Presumably the voucher worked

[sandypas]

I've had the voucher sitting in my mail box as well as the second letter but had never tried either of them.  This morning I found something I wanted no matter if it worked or not but was really pleased it went through without a hitch.  I use my paypal account weekly when my few auctions finish on a Sunday night so it's not just for those who haven't used paypal for ages.  Thank you paypal.

[elisandtobysmum]

Hello! Yes I can confirm the voucher is INVALID but that this is NOT A SCAM.  Like some of the others, after phoning paypal's tollfree online number, and discussing it with them, I was put on hold for about 30 seconds, and then they apologised and credited my paypal account with $10 to take advantage of the offer.

It seems to be a known issue to paypal, who seems happy to rectify it, tho from the forums I've read only the people who call ther hotline number seem to get credited. Anyone who emails them doesn't seem to get a reply. There was no waiting times when I called, it was quick and easy. Definatley give them a call if you have this issue.

[elisandtobysmum]

Me too. Very quick, easy phonecall

[i-love-my-sheep]

I wanna know where I can get me one of these vouchers so I can get a free $10 for making a 20 second phone call. That would have to be one of the highest rates of pay in the country!!

If I got $10 for free like that, I'd be transferring it out of PayPal and not use it to buy anything. Prove a point that they shouldn't just be giving money away like that. 

[4myson2003]

happened to me too a few months ago and had to pay full price.

Since then i might have received half a dozen more voucher emails and i just delete them.

GOOD ONE EBAY  !