Your2ndPlace

Last month, my credit card information ceased to work - but continued to work for a secondary account that I had. I contacted Linden Lab about this, and after lengthy email discussions with Linden Lab and my bank, I couldn't get the card to work for my account. It is an amazing thing. The same payment information works on one account, not the other, and Linden Lab said my bank wasn't authorizing the $1 request to resubmit my payment information.

I simply switched to PayPal - which worked. I don't really like using PayPal, but it had the benefit of working whereas the new payment system of Linden Lab seemed hokey. My bank is in the U.S. The information had worked previously. Suddenly it doesn't work. PayPal, using the very same credit card information, worked. Duh.

Today I get an email that there was a Billing Failure; it says:

If you are using Paypal, check your Paypal account's verification and backing. Your Paypal account must be verified and backed by a funding source other than a credit card. (We are unable to accept Paypal accounts backed by credit cards.)

Huh? When did this happen? My last usage of PayPal in conjunction with Second Life was on May 26, 2007, for $20.76 USD - so whatever change there was happened between May 26th and June 17th, 2007. Maybe I missed something in the Second Life blog - so I looked, targeting May 15th to the present day.

I immediately see In World Lindex Purchases Over the Weekend - but that isn't it. This isn't 'in world' - this is through the website. The post Errors when purchasing L$ through LindeX is apparently about the same thing, which doesn't fit my problem.

Foreign Transaction Fees do not appear to be the problem - if they were, it would mean that something was working.

The Support Portal entry is worrisome, since I'm not sure which exact method to use... So I used every way I knew (shotgun approach) in the hope that something would work. If any Lindens read this - I'm talking about #4051-4205229 in the support system with follow ups on [rt.lindenlab.com #833726] and [rt.lindenlab.com #833171] - the latter email references for last month's billing issues.

There were no more entries related to billing when I read back to May 15th, 2007. So I kept digging. I did a search on Billing, which brought forward two posts from April: [Updated] Billing Processing Error Update and We are currently experiencing issues with Billing Processing. These entries were as useful then as they are now - not very. And the knowledge base? No, not useful at all.

So - something happened between May 26th, 2007 and today which made PayPal backed by credit cards obsolete with no blog entries on it. So I'm sitting here, on a Sunday, with the full knowledge that even as a concierge user I probably won't get any support over the weekend.

All of this boils down to: I have the funds, and I want to pay, but Linden Lab can't seem to keep a consistent system for billing and I'm afraid to touch my account information for fear that it will take even longer to resolve - putting a lot more than my sanity at risk. They changed things and I was not informed of any changes until... I was billed. What's up with THAT?

Now when I speak with them, or I write to them, I am expected to be docile and amiable about this... but who in their right mind would be? This is silly. Still, one has to be polite and understand that it is not the fault of an individual attempting to assist one. These problems indicate a lack of communication somewhere - and that lack of communication desperately needs to be addressed.

Me? Right now I wish they hired a whipping boy so that I could call that person up and yell at them in good conscience. This has gone beyond irritating.

I simply want billing to work, as it did before. Am I out of my mind to want this? Apparently so. Thus the Flaming Penguin of Wrath.

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