Why @PayPal is wrong regarding @Regretsy, according to their own policies.

Whether you love or hate Regretsy, only the most insane conspiracy theorists can deny that Regretsy and the Regretsy community do some kickass charitable giving. This year, April Winchell, the Queen of our fat jealous loser brigade at Regretsy, organized a charitable drive for needy children to get Christmas gifts. She popped a “donate” button on her blog, and the donations started pouring in–so much so that April announced that there would be even more giving.  Oh, such giving there would be.

Then this happened.

Take a minute to go read it, seriously. Then come back.

If you didn’t take a minute to go read it, here’s an inappropriate, dramatic interpretation of what happened:

PayBuddy: Hey, dude, you can’t use that button on your website. Cos, like, you’re not a charity or whatever.

April: Oh, shit, my bad.

PayBuddy: Yeah, you’re going to have to manually refund all of the transactions.

April: … that’s, like, so many transactions. Okay, I’ll do it. (aside) Hmm, I still need the money to make sure these families have an awesome Christmas. Since I can’t use the donate button unless I am a charity I was told that I can’t use the donate button unless I am a charity, I will use a “buy now” button and people can buy the gifts.  Off I go to my website to correct this honest mistake!

[Next day]

PayBuddy: Um, yeah, so . . . . you can’t do that either. You are going to have to refund all of the money you collected last night.

April: WHAT.

PayBuddy: You’re not really selling specific items? So like, um, it’s still the same thing with a different button? and you’re not a charity? So, we’re kind of onto your sneaky, underhanded generosity, and like, even though all we said yesterday was that you can’t use the donate button because you’re not a charity, we’re telling you now that you also can’t do charity through the buy now button.

April: ……… Okay, I really don’t get this. I see donate buttons every-damn-where, and a lot of them are not charities.

PayBuddy: Oh, non-charities can totally use the donate button, just not for charity. You can raise money to help your sick cat, for example, but not poor people. (NOTE: THE LAST SENTENCE WAS ACTUALLY UTTERED BY A REPRESENTATIVE)

April: Um. Can I speak to your supervisor?

PayBuddy: NO ONE ABOVE ME WILL TALK TO YOU.  No one at my level ever makes phone calls. We’re only doing this to help you. (NOTE: This is another one that was actually uttered by a representative. Caps emphasis mine.)

April: … can I individually sell each individual toy on my website? Then send them to the needy families?

PayBuddy: AS IF. No website is going to let you BUY something and have it sent to a person who isn’t YOU! [Except, of course, almost every website that will send items as gifts.--GGG] Besides, if you want to sell them individually, you’ll have to do it from a whole new website. And also I think this is all very reasonable of us, considering how clear and understandable our policies about charitable giving are, and how easy they are to find from the pages that are pushing you to use a donate button for your website. [Hint: they're not. Which you will see soon.--GGG]

April’s head explodes.

PayBuddy: Oh, hey, P.S.? We’re totally keeping all of the fees we assessed for each donation that you’re refunding. I’m going to make a big pile out of that money to lay on while I sodomize your corpse. [Not actually said by PayPal representative, but in my opinion, strongly implied.]

FIN

Now, because we who populate the comments section of Regretsy are a bunch of hateful, spiteful assholes, by all accounts from people who are too good to deign to visit such a nasty website, the next logical step was for us to lash out at PayPal, bringing our fat, jealous loser-wrath down upon their heads. As some people tried to point out on Twitter, Regretsy clearly violated PayPal’s Acceptable Use Agreement and therefore, we should stuff our butthurt and shut the hell up about it.

Except that, while I am not a lawyer, I’m pretty sure that Regretsy didn’t violate the AUP at all and that PayPal owes April and all of the families whose Christmases aren’t going to be as good as they were a few days ago a raging apology.

Evidence after the jump.

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