Payoneer’s cards stopped working last weekend. I was asked by a friend about the email they sent him on Saturday night. I couldn’t see the email so I check my email and saw this,
Email sent by Payoneer
So i went in and tried to withdraw my funds. I could not. I had a significant amount in payoneer and I have been delaying to withdraw for no apparent reason.
Oh NO! Why didn’t i withdraw before?
I tried again. Could not.
I went to bank to try the card in ATM.
Payoneer Card withheld at an ATM
Well shit. Now I lost my card which does show that the card has been suspended. I had no choice but to return back home as it was weekend and late at night.
Its been depressing. Now what? I lost a significant amount.What will happen to future payments, its been a reliable option to use for getting paid so far.
I went online to see whats happening, found that wirecard AG has been involved in a massive fraud. Well shit. What will happen to my funds? Did i sign any term or condition that could hurt me real bad? Found out that all of us did.
Found out there was a condition in the terms and condition document that was suggesting that if something happens to that form we may lose our funds.
So I talked to some of my friends and colleagues and it turns out I was not the only one going to lose a lot of funds. One of my friends had more than 10000 dollars in the savings that he had in Payoneer. All gone.
So I went to Twitter and started searching for it, there were a lot of people complaining and Payoneer was replying them with hopeful messages and telling them that to wait. I pitched in and expressed my anger.
Apparently there was no solution but to wait and see what they do and raise enough voice so to be heard.
So next day we found out that the company wirecard AG that had our funds is found to be missing a lot of moeny and are undergoing a fraud investigation so that was a very depressing and and we could they money gone forever. If there really is a fraud, we would lose our funds forever. for me it was a lot of money.
Payoneer was saying that authority that deals with this in European Union had suspended all transactions and no father activity can be done so I went in to be a need and right to withdraw funds which I couldn’t cause of my funds were being held in the ATM card.
I have been using Payoneer from years and tried many other services but to get paid in my country there is no other reliable service for long term transactions. I had no real alternative to this, talk to my clients and they said that we should really wait and see how this company handles the situation its a billion dollar company and they can’t afford to let go of this issue.
Payoneer announced that they talk to their European partner and the funds of the people are safe and they will be available as soon as the suspension is lifted, but the point is why would there be any suspension if there is no doubt of a fraud.
Anyhow later we did manage to get those funds, they started showing up but we still could not withdraw, the feature was unavailable until after a day or two that was also very depressing time. Later I was able to withdraw but it put Payoneer’s whole credibility in doubt and people were very skeptical to use this service again. Me included.
Payoneer said they will create a feature to choose whether we want to keep our funds in Payoneer account or we choose to withdraw the funds into the ATM card. this was the much needed feature, but like many other services we should be able to choose how much amount draw into the ATM and we should be able to that whenever we want. Payoneer announce this feature and said it would be coming soon but I haven’t seen that yet.
When this issue was resolved I reluctantly withdrew some of the funds in payoneer, went to the bank to get my ATM, tried the ATM, it was working, that was a relief at least it was okay.
Talked to my clients and they were ok using their service and they were also fine with the response Payoneer team had. similarly my friends and colleagues were also satisifed with Payoneers response and were okay using their services again.
It has been a very rough ride, depressing but I am glad that I was able to recover my savings.
What companies like these who have the responsibility to take care the money of thousands of people should do it let everyone know how their funds will be saved and which companies are involved. When we sign up for the services of a company, its the responsibility of that company take care of all our resources & data.
Hoping that this will not happen again and Payoneer seems to have ensured that as well.
