I bought an item on april 2/16

[ollubub.5cwctpot]

hi there: I bought an item on april 2/16, I paid with paypal, next day I went to my bank and a withdraw from paypal was made, 2 days later I received a mail from the seller saying that a full refund to my pay pal account was made, no explanation whatsoever, just saying tha my order was cancelled, and the refund in full was on paypal balance, now my question is when I pay for an item the payment is automatically taken from my checking account, so why the money is not in paypal balance, it says it will take from 3 to 21 days to appear in it, why it takes that long I want to buy something else with that money, when I pay for an item paypal takes my money instantly but when it's time to refund it is really hard and is not the first time, shame on you people.  

[reallynicestamps]

when I pay for an item paypal takes my money instantly

Well, not exactly.

The money is taken from your account immediately, but it does not 'clear' until it has wended its way through two banking systems, in Canada and in the USA.

This can take up to 10 days, during which your seller does not have the money and is not required to ship to you. (In case your 'e-cheque' bounces.)

Then when the sale is cancelled, the whole process gets reversed.

Which is a pain.

The easiest way around this is to back your PP account with a credit card. Those payments go to your seller immediately and refunds are just as quickly transferred, I guess because there is no actual money involved, just 'credit'.

There are a couple of other advantages.

You can pay for your purchases at your leisure, the main point of a credit card.

And you have a third layer of Buyer Protection, eBay+ Paypal+ credit card chargebacks. Although you probably will never need them, it's nice to know they are there.

[dmil8030]

Hello 'ollubub.5cwctpot', 

<<my question is when I pay for an item the payment is automatically taken from my checking account, so why the money is not in paypal balance,>>

Because the money did not come out of paypal balance.  

It came from your bank account as an e-cheque and that takes a long time as the other poster has explained.  

When you pay with an e-cheque, paypal takes the amount but the seller will not have it for about 10 days.

If you are using a bank account to fund your paypal account, when you want to do some shopping you can always transfer money from your bank to your paypal account and pay for items from your paypal balance. 

Had you done that, your refund would have appeared right away.  Better yet, when you pay from a paypal balance the payment is instant and that will speed up the shipping time by up to 2 weeks.

So there is no shame owing to anyone.  Put some money into your paypal account and use that for your purchases.  If you don't use it, fine, it is not lost.  You simply take it back.