Archive for Bills
September 1, 2007 at 3:48 am · Filed under Bills · By JB
RevolvingDork says:
Hi all!
We’ve completed the new billing system and we’re just about ready to launch it.
Right now we’re running conversion scripts on the existing billing information to ensure a smooth transfer to the new sytem. Once that’s done, we’ll be generating statements all the way up to august and emailing the august statement out, along with information about the new system.
Once the conversion is complete, you’ll be able to pay off your bill quickly and easily. Here are some of the enhancements you’ll be seeing this weekend:
- Monthly statements contain *only* the activity that happened during said month
- Clear, easy-to-read account summary
- Ability to make partial payments towards your total balance
- Downloadable .CSV files of your monthly statements
Please note that Etsy bills will no longer be auto-charged. We are working on implementing an opt-in auto-charge system, which we’ll debut after we’re sure the new billing system is rock-solid. This information will be provided in the email that will be sent containing your august statements.
Thank you for your patience as we’ve been working on this project — we hope these changes will make things a lot easier for everyone!
update:
RD has answered the question (sort of) about whether manual payment is mandatory until Etsy develops the new autocharge system.
RevolvingDork says:
If you have an amount due, you should pay manually when the option is opened up. Waiting for the opt-in autocharge to be built should not be considered if you have an outstanding balance.
To see previous UEN coverage of the billing issue, please see these articles:
http://etsynews.com/367/more-billing-news-from-admin/
http://etsynews.com/322/new-billing-options-in-the-works/
August 29, 2007 at 5:31 pm · Filed under Bills, Bugs, Etsy Communications · By Elizabeth
I know some of my co-editors will have more to say on this. For now, here’s the latest quote (page 27, highly accessible):
RevolvingDork says:
No matter what, we will be closing the bills at the end of the month so they will be payable.
Autocharge will likely not be around for a while longer — probably a month or two after the new billing system has been released.
Posted at 4:44 pm, August 29 2007 EST
For previous coverage of the August bill question, please see this article;
http://etsynews.com/322/new-billing-options-in-the-works/
EDITS:
Some additional comments from RD on the same thread…
RevolvingDork
Etsy Admin says:
Every “sigh” pushes the system back another day. ;P
Posted at 7:03 pm, August 29 2007 EST
AliciaMae says:
RD Can you PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE post the information you stated a couple pages ago about manual payment being available for September in a new thread. And stop locking threads that point it out!!
Very few people will be able to read through this whole monstrous thread to see that we’ll be able to pay the combined bill in a week or two. SO many are worried about that and it would be negligent to not say something where it’s more easily seen!
Posted at 7:19 pm, August 29 2007 EST
RevolvingDork
Etsy Admin says:
AliciaMae, when there is new information, I will make a new thread — nothing has changed since the first post of this thread.
Posted at 7:21 pm, August 29 2007 EST
YarnGirlStuff says:
So again I’ll ask, since on page 27 RD says “Autocharge will likely not be around for a while longer — probably a month or two after the new billing system has been released.” shouldn’t you remove the part on my ‘Your Etsy Bill” that says I’ll be autocharged next month?
Posted at 7:06 pm, August 29 2007 EST
RevolvingDork
Etsy Admin says:
YarnGirlStuff, that will all change with the new billing system, so yes, it will be removed.
Posted at 7:15 pm, August 29 2007 EST
August 7, 2007 at 10:31 am · Filed under Bills, Bugs, Etsy Communications, Site Use · By Kate Black
August bills haven’t yet been generated because of the recent billing issues.
RevolvingDork says: Hi all,
In light of the billing difficulties we’ve been facing lately, we’re now in the process of revising the billing process to make it easier to use and more logical.
The August bills were not generated on the 1st, as we are waiting until the new billing system is ready to go before billing again.
The new system will take into account many of the things you’ve been asking for — charges will match up with monthly statements reguardless of refunds, you’ll be able to make partial payments, and we’re looking into adding PayPal as a payment method.
We’ll keep you posted on the new system as it nears completion — we hope to have it online this month.
As always, thank you for your patience — we’re working to make it better.
[ source ]
August 4, 2007 at 1:51 am · Filed under Bills, Blogs, Bugs, Customer Service · By JB
source:
http://blog.etsy.com/?p=384
(bolding mine)
August 3rd, 2007
Dear Etsy sellers,
We are still waiting to hear back from Citibank about the bug in their system that caused both a charge & a pre-auth to be sent to a portion of Etsy sellers who used a debit card to pay their Etsy bill.
If this situation has caused your bank to assess an overdraft charge on your account, we will reimburse you for this amount.
Please email billing@etsy.com with documentation of the overdraft charge, and we will send you via Check or PayPal a reimbursement for the full overdraft charge.
Kindly note that this reimbursement is only for Etsy sellers who used Debit cards and whose banks hit them with an overdraft charge as a result of the auto-charge we ran on the 27th, 28th and 29th, or if a manual attempt was made to pay a bill between the 27th and today.
This reimbursement is something it’s very important for us to offer to all who deserve it, so let’s make sure we can do that. Please only request it if you meet all the criteria above. Each claim will be verified on an individual basis before a reimbursement is made.
Sincerely,
Tim, Jim, Rob and Beth,
The Etsy billing team
see also
http://etsynews.com/312/etsy-says-no-double-billing-has-occurred/
http://etsynews.com/306/check-your-statements-for-double-charges-overdraft-fees/
August 3, 2007 at 9:15 pm · Filed under Bills, Etsy Communications, Privacy · By Elizabeth
We won’t point to it, because it’s not fair to the victim. But it’s yet another result of the hasty reactions to the most recent, and most FUBARed, billing situation.
Don’t ask about your specific bills in the fora. Etsy admin might answer with your personal info.
EDIT: The damage was done back in May, so it was a result blling problems, but not the current billing nightmare. That doesn’t make the admin’s post any less relevant, given Etsy’s violation of their privacy policy.
August 3, 2007 at 10:47 am · Filed under Bills · By Kate Black
The billing error which caused duplicate charges for some sellers lies with Etsy’s merchant processor, Citibank. They are trying to get Citibank to make things right by Etsy’s sellers affected by the problem and will switch merchant accounts if they can’t reach a satisfactory outcome. In the meantime, Etsy is changing how sellers will be charged for bills. One lump sum instead of several monthly charges would have prevented some of the fraud alerts and multiple overdraft fees some sellers recently received.
We’re overhauling Your Etsy Bill. Instead of separate bills for each month, you will have one Etsy bill. This bill will be made up of monthly statements, which we’ll add up into a single total. There will be a simple payment schedule, with payments due for your outstanding balance one per month. Partial payments will also be allowed, at any time. We will also be creating policies on paying your Bill. Sellers with a string of unpaid bills (we will determine the exact amounts soon) will have their ability to list new items suspended.
[ source ]
August 1, 2007 at 10:58 pm · Filed under Bills · By quirke
Rob denies that any seller has been billed twice here:
Rokali says:
To clarify: we did *not* bill anyone twice.
Our new merchant provider has a strange (and bad) way of collecting money from debit cards. They send in a pre-auth and then they send in a request for funds separate from the pre-auth (not as a follow-up to it).
The first pre-auth charge will reserve funds inside your account but the funds will never actually be pulled.
This is apparently something our merchant provider is aware of planning to fix. I wish they’d have told us about it *before* we ran any charges, as the issue did not show up during our testing.
EDIT by starrydesigns
Rokali further explains here:
My post here keeps getting buried so I’m going to lock the thread with an update.
Nobody’s account was double-billed.
Double-billing would mean that we requested the funds twice for a given charge.
This did not happen.
Every charge on a credit or debit card is actually made up of two parts:
1. Ask if the funds are available (this is called a pre-auth, and shows up on your statement as “pending”)
2. Collect the funds as a *follow-up* request to the pre-auth
The time between the two is usually quite short, so you don’t see the Pending phase.
If a pre-auth is not followed up by a collection request, after ~7 days the pending charges disappear completely from your statement.
However, with our new merchant provider, *some* debit cards & their issuing bank, in their interaction with our gateway, did this:
1. Ask if the funds are available (the pre-auth)
2. Collect the amount *as a separate request*, leaving the pre-auth dangling there
Step #2 is what’s causing all the problems, and it’s an issue between our merchant provider and the banks. I’ve spent many hours on the phone trying to find the right solution.
I’ll post an update as soon as I have one. In the meantime please understand what’s actually happening here. This is not a double billing. This is not a double billing.
Posted at 12:58 am, August 2 2007 EST
August 1, 2007 at 9:05 am · Filed under Bills · By Lis
Etsy bills for July (due in August) are now showing a zero balance. Charges appear to have been moved to August’s bill (due in September). See the forum thread here. This post will be updated as more information becomes available.
Update by JB
http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=5177870&page=2
walkonthemoon says: Regarding the Aug. Bills…Here is the email I got from Etsy Billing a few minutes ago in response to my email:
Our programmers are investigating a few problems we have had with the billing system and autocharging. The August bills are not being generated yet, as this is causes several changes in the system, and they need to keep working on these problems with the bills as they are. I’m sorry for this inconvenience, hopefully it will be resolved soon and the bills will be generated. The programmers will be posting in the forums with new information regarding this issue. Best, Tim
July 31, 2007 at 1:38 pm · Filed under Bills · By Lis
Etsy sellers are reporting more problems resulting from “the great bill charge of 2007” (see UEN’s coverage here and here), including double charges and overdraft fees.
Sellers should check their credit card/bank statement to make sure their Etsy bills were not charged twice (see forum threads here and here). If there are duplicate charges, email billing@etsy.com
Sellers should also check to make sure their Etsy account is not linked to a closed bank account/debit card, because this could result in massive overdraft fees (see forum thread here).
EDIT by Soap:
People are posting about replies they received from billing@etsy.com:
Missbluebirdandoscar says:
Well apparently admin doesn’t believe there is a problem, they emailed me back saying they only see one charge at their end. They tried to tell me that it was an authorization charge, which makes no sense because the first charge went through yesterday and today there is a second charge of the same amount.Why would there been an authorization charge after the first one was completed???? Arrghhhh…
[source]
and
SakinaNeedles says:
Billing told me that the problem was on the bank’s end, and I should talk to the bank. I called the bank, and it turned out Etsy sent through the authorization and the actual charge on two separate authorization numbers, which is why it showed up twice on my bank statement. The bank reversed the second set of charges and refunded the overdraft fees. But definately check your statements ASAP. With each month’s bill being charged separately, I got a $31 overdraft fee PER ETSY CHARGE. If the bank hadn’t reversed those I would be reeeeaaaally grumpy right now.
[source]
Read the rest of the thread - people are posting about what their banks and PayPal have told them.
EDIT by Soap : LATEST UPDATE
A couple days ago we began to collect unpaid bills from Etsy sellers. It had been several months since we ran auto-charges, owing to difficulties with our old merchant account. So, we finally got our new merchant setup and after a substantial amount of time testing everything, we began our bill collection.
As we collected bills, two issues came up:
1. Charges appeared twice on some people’s cards.
2. Your credit card company called you and asked about charges from Etsy made on your card, and if they were valid.
Let’s talk about each of these issues in turn.
1. Charges appearing twice
If you used a debit card (this included a PayPal card), the charges may have shown up twice. This is due to the way our new merchant provider processes debit card payments. They separate it into two halves: a request for funds and pulling the actual funds. Some banks show these as two separate transactions, deducting the amount twice (!) from your account. We’re working to figure out why on earth they did this.
We promise, we will not charge you twice. If we have to, we’ll walk over with cash in hand and pay you back.
2. A call from your credit card company
As we have just learned, if we attempt to run more than one charge on someone’s card in a single 24 hour span, the credit card company’s fraud alert system goes off. This means they call you and ask if the charges are OK to pay. Unfortunately they may have asked something like: “Did you make purchases with this card on Etsy yesterday?” And of course the charges on your card are not for purchases, but are the fees we charge for our service.
If you dispute the charge, it can end up in a chargeback, which is rather bad on our end. If your credit card company did call you, it would be a huge help if you could call them back and let them know that the charges are OK. (If you have any questions about the amounts, of course, please contact us first at billing@etsy.com.
What we are doing now
Because of the two issues, above, we have stopped running the auto-charge. We got about 1/2 the way through all sellers with unpaid bills before we stopped. If you look at your credit card statement and see no charges from Etsy, you were likely in the non-billed half.
It’s super important to us that we get this all sorted out, and every seller is treated fairly. We’ll get through this! We’re sorry for the confusion, and we now have a dedicated billing team to answer your questions. We’ll be providing phone support as well at (718) 855 7956. Please save phone calls for extra urgent support, because we only have 1 phone right now. We’ll be here from 10am - 6pm EST.
Love,
Etsy
ps. This blog post has been emailed to everyone whom we auto-billed.
(all bolding added by Soap)
July 28, 2007 at 7:54 pm · Filed under Bills · By JB
Be aware that etsy is finally running their past due bills, and this may be up to 7 charges on your credit card if you have not paid your bills manually. This may set off alarms at your bank or credit card company for fraud. It’s not fraud.
In this thread
mommyzlilmonsterz got a call from her bank alerting her to fraud, when it appears the charges were the 7 months of etsy autocharges. However she also says the amounts charged to not match her paid bills in her bills section, so there might be some bug or accounting error.
In this thread,
t8designs says:
..but i did get a call from my credit card company this afternoon to verify that the charges were valid. they thought there was fraudulent activity taking place on my account because of them and until i confirmed the charges they were putting a hold on the account.
In this thread,
thepearlgirl says:
I am on hold with the bank right now. I just checked my statement online and saw 5 etsy transactions that I never placed!!How is this happening???What does the bank do???
If you get a fraud alert or phone call, do not panic. Compare the amounts to your etsy bills, especially if the bills form Jan-July 2007 are now in the paid section. If the name on the credit card charge is etsy, this is most likely your bill being charged. It’s NOT someone making etsy purchases, because those will be listed as paypal or the seller’s shop name on your statement, they will not list etsy at all.
see also this previous discussion of billing and autocharges
Thanks to thedreamygiraffe for the tip!
EDIT by starrydesigns:
If you need help with regards to this issue and billing, please send an email billing [!at] etsy.com. Refer to Rokali’s official response here.
Also, here is Rokali’s response with regards to the bills that show less than $2:
Rokali says:
… They will *not* be auto-charged right now. Our billing system needs to be smarter in this regard, as we should be adding them up and running them as a single charge. Until we have this in place, we won’t auto-charge these smaller bills.
Posted at 4:47 pm, July 28 2007 EST
EDIT by Soap: See new thread for ongoing coverage
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