PayPal’s Live Chat Falls Short

May 19th, 2008 · Comments · User Experience

I just had a very strange interaction with a PayPal sales rep. I suppose I was sitting on the Website Payments Standard Pricing page for a while, so I was a prime target for a sell.

A pop-up appeared (that I failed to capture) asking me if I needed help, so I decided to say yes. I had used Apple’s Live Chat feature when purchasing my MacBook Air (wrote about it here), and I loved the experience. Both are powered by LivePerson, so I figured this could prove helpful as well.

Not exactly.

The conversation started like this:

My initial impression was that the chat window was a little buggy. Notice how the “Agent is typing a message” is cut off. And by the way, it was always there. Even when he wasn’t typing and I was.

I left the conversation — rather, Lee the agent left me abruptly — without getting the information I needed. I was simply asking about discount pricing for non-profits. He wouldn’t send me to a webpage, wanting instead to send the info via email. And for some reason wanted my name, business name and phone number to do it. When I asked why, he backed off and split. Extremely bizarre.

I’ve pasted the entire chat below, which lasted no more than 3 minutes. Read it for yourself and let me know how you would have taken this. It’s been an hour since Lee left the chat, and I still haven’t received the information from him. Just as I was pretty sure I was going to use PayPal for my client’s website donations, this experience has left me looking for other options.

Please wait while we connect you with a sales representative.
You are now chatting with Lee. For your security, PayPal representatives never ask for your account password.
Lee: Hi this is Lee. How can I help you?
Whitney: I am trying to find pricing for non-profits
Whitney: I’d like to set up credit card donations on our website
Lee: What is the email address on your PayPal account?
Whitney: i don’t have one yet
Lee: Ok
Lee: I can email you info on setting it up and using our donation service.
Whitney: that would be great
Whitney: it’s whitney@whitneyhess.com
Whitney: is there a webpage I can go to?
Lee: What is your name, company name, and e-mail address?
Lee: And phone #
Whitney: why do you need all of that information?
Lee: Ok
Lee: I’ll get that info over to you.
Lee: Thanks for contacting paypal
Thank you for contacting PayPal Merchant Services. If you require additional assistance, please feel free to contact us again.
You are not currently in a chat session.

Share this post:

Tags: Customer Service·Pain·User Experience

Jack

strange..!

paypal even have "powered by livechat" surely they would not put that on.

Martha

The live chat at llbean is fantastic. There's an old company that has embraced the best of the new technologies and run with them complementing an already successful venture.

Jo0Lz

Jeez, that is one weird sales rep. Isn't he supposed to be the "Face of Paypal" when you address them?

Kind of shady indeed, in fact, I'm closing up my paypal as we speak. To many phishing and shady things happen with their name/logo on/in it.

Reading that log almost got me thinking he wasn't really there to begin with.

Sam Zaiss

Wow, not only is the design a bit off, but that interaction is incredibly shady. Even if the design had been well conceived and visually appealing, I think I still would have been wondering what happened.

I'd almost write to PayPal help and demand an explanation. I guess your email address isn't too much information, but if it were me, I'd have a serious trust problem with PayPal. (In fact, reading this, I do have a trust problem with PayPal!)

Nathan Rice

The execution of IM tools seem to be so important - they have to be authentic - someone has to believe they are talking to a real person not an "auto response" tool. I want to be able to provide IM - but getting over the hurdles of executing this well is a challenge. Have you seen sites/places that do this well?