Recently I supported a crowd-funding project from the PlaidStallion himself, Brian Heiler. It is for a wonderful magazine called Toy Ventures all about nostalgia toys and action figures. Unfortunately the crowd-funding process has not been kind to Brian. Kickstarter difficulty, Indiegogo quirks, but the latest is PayPal locking him out of his account with thousands of dollars being held hostage.
Below is an open letter from Brian to Daniel Schulman, President of PayPal …
Attn: Daniel H. Schulman
President of PayPal
Dear Mr. Schulman,
My name is Brian Heiler, I am writing to you today as the owner of a small start-up business who is in need of your help.
During the Pandemic shut down, I like a lot of other people found myself without employment and I decided that this would be the time to launch my dream business, creating niche publications.
Over the next few months, I and several collaborators created a publication I was very proud of, so much so that I threw caution to the wind and spent my much-needed funds to create it.
The dream became a nightmare when, on my launch date, I discovered PayPal was allowing me to take orders but not allowing me access funds to pay for postage or to pay for the other services involved.
I could not access my funds until I provided some proof that my business was real.
My business FYI has had a PayPal account for almost a decade.
I have sent document after document on that list and they’ve all been rejected with no explanation.
Your customer service has been nearly impossible to speak to, one person just coldly told me to “Just go buy stamps” another person reminded me “they’re busy” and it would be a ten-day wait.
I have sent the requested documents several times and spent over $200 (that I don’t have) getting the documentation PayPal demanded and woke up today to find it was again rejected for no explanation and again, the email asked for the document I already provided.
This dream project is now a nightmare, I can’t ship the orders yet people keep ordering (giving PayPal my money), I can’t do my press release campaign because I don’t know if PayPal will keep my money indefinitely. No one will speak to me or answer my questions.
The stress has now caused negative effects on my health and I have taken a leave of absence from my job.
All I want is to speak to someone at your financial institution today to advise as to how I resolve this manner in a reasonable time.
I hope that your financial institution can honour this reasonable request from a small start-up business that cannot survive to wait.
Yours Sincerely,
Brian Heiler
Head on over to the Official Plaidstallion website for more details and some amazing nostalgia articles. And look for a full review of the Toy Ventures Magazine as soon as Brian is able to send along my crowd-funding rewards physical copy of the magazine.
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