The curious case of the handlebar bag scam
I encountered a similar situation to one mentioned in the article on Etsy - a scammer made a fake store for a real shop in Brooklyn selling high-end aprons. To me it looked like the legitimate web-presense of the store.<p>After placing the order I received no response, and after disputing the charge a month later they sent a tracking number. (The package never came, and a helpful UPS rep broke the rules to tell me the tracking number wasn&#x27;t even addressed to me - a saving grace and made me wonder if tracking numbers from legitimate purchases are resold to run this scam.)<p>Etsy refused to take any part in helping with the refund, and despite deleting the store they refused to tell paypal to refund people&#x27;s (including my) purchases.<p>Paypal had the tracking number, and could ask UPS for the address and recipient, but refused to help and made me feel like I was the scammer for wanting my money back. They insisted to the end that they could do nothing, despite knowing the Etsy storefront was banned and that the seller never sent me a package.<p>I would have been out $100 if not for Chase, who did the chargeback and got paypal in line. I will never use paypal or Etsy again, as it is clear they don&#x27;t care about criminals using their platform to steal money from trusting consumers.<p>The lack of response from Paypal in this article is no surprise - a lot of their business comes from people using their platform to steal from their users.<p>Can anyone who works at Etsy or Paypal explain why this system is so broken and anti-consumer?