warning about Linden Labs questionable business practises

[Ratany]

Warning:

 

Never put any money into your SL account that you do not intend to spend right away.  Never put any money into buying land and expect to get your money back after selling the land.  The Lindens will not let you sell your money and will want you to buy more money instead.  I can only consider their business practices as deceptive and fraudulent.

 

[Garnet Psaltery]

I was asking whether you had you deeded the land to a group, but now I see from your inworld profile that you were renting.  I'm afraid that is a matter between you and the landowner.  It is not the fault of Linden Lab.

Edited January 6, 2020 by Garnet Psaltery

[ItHadToComeToThis]

[Rolig Loon]

Or are you trying to send less than the $10 US minimum out of your account.  You may do that if you are closing the account, but not otherwise.

[Mollymews]

Ratany, if you can be a bit more specific about the issue that triggered your post, then we may be able to help you toward a resolution

Garnet has asked if your issue is to do with Group-owned land,  Another question like Rolig's is: Are you having an issue with cashing out your money from SL ?

will be helpful to you, if you can be a bit more specific

 

Edited January 6, 2020 by Mollymews
edir what Rolig said

[Garnet Psaltery]

No, it's a matter of land purchase/rental from a private landlord.  The OP has stated in his profile that the landlord requires payment via their own web server.  He did not feel safe with such an arrangement so did not pay the rental, and he says the landlord will not return his land purchase amount.  I can say all this because it's on his profile but of course I am not naming names.

[Ratany]

I have not rented and am not renting land.  There is no goup-owned land involved.

 

I have had a mainland parcel which I sold, and now I want to sell my money.  I have made a support ticket and their support is telling me I should buy more money to increase some kind of selling limit they have set to 0.

 

Their behaviour is just outrageous and unbelievable.

 

The note in my profile about issues with a land owner is entirely unrelated and has been in my profile for years.  They still owe me L$ 99.

 

Edited January 6, 2020 by Ratany

[Garnet Psaltery]

7 minutes ago, Ratany said:

I have not rented and am not renting land.  There is no goup-owned land involved.

 

I have had a mainland parcel which I sold, and now I want to sell my money.  I have made a support ticket and their support is telling me I should buy more money to increase some kind of selling limit they have set to 0.

 

Their behaviour is just outrageous and unbelievable.

 

The note in my profile about issues with a land owner is entirely unrelated and has been in my profile for years.  They still owe me L$ 99.

 

Well thank you for sending me on a goose chase trying to help you!  As for LL's rules about selling your Linden dollars, I'm afraid you agreed to their terms and conditions when you joined.  I'm quite sure that fraud has had a part to play in their tightening of security though I am not the person to explain it to you as I simply haven't enough knowledge of reasons and decisions made.  You can spend the money inworld or agree to the terms.  I'm sorry, but that's the way it is.

[Rolig Loon]

When you open a new account with Linden Lab, your trading limits are set low on purpose.  Your selling limit is set to zero. That's partly to protect you from yourself, because a lot of newbies go crazy spending money before they know how SL works.  It's mostly to protect SL, though.  Federal and state agencies can get really nasty on  Internet-based companies if they suspect that they have made it easy to use their businesses to launder money.  Setting your trading limits low is meant to discourage people from washing drug money and whatever else through Linden Lab accounts.  After you have activated your account by using it at least once to buy L$, your trading limits start to increase automatically. If you think that they are not increasing fast enough, you may submit a support case to ask LL to review your credit history and change the limits.  I suspect that they will be less enthusiastic about granting a request if you build a reputation as a "problem customer".

Edited January 6, 2020 by Rolig Loon
typos, of course

[Milk Pixelmaid]

35 minutes ago, Ratany said:

Warning:

 

Never put any money into your SL account that you do not intend to spend right away.  Never put any money into buying land and expect to get your money back after selling the land.  The Lindens will not let you sell your money and will want you to buy more money instead.  I can only consider their business practices as deceptive and fraudulent.

 

You have to buy some lindens, even $2USD worth will help to raise your limit. Now you know. 

[Mollymews]

11 minutes ago, Ratany said:

I have had a mainland parcel which I sold, and now I want to sell my money.  I have made a support ticket and their support is telling me I should buy more money to increase some kind of selling limit they have set to 0.

checking your inworld profile you mention on there that you are selling/sold a Horizon  estate parcel. These parcels are normally not cheap to buy at prevailing market rates.  Did you buy this parcel on your Ratany account at market rates?  Or did you buy it on another account and then transfer ownership to your Ratany account for L$0 or some small amount ?

if the first then I would definitely request a review of the review of your limit request

if the second then yes you will have to do as asked if you want to sell what seems like a relatively substantial amount of LS of which the Ratany account will be the beneficiary. Ratany account not yet having a financial history of activity with larger amounts of L$

in the normal course our buy/sell limits are automatically raised according to a formula based on our activity. This formula is designed to act as a brake, which is a method Linden use to be compliant with the US government FINSEC regulations. Regulations which Linden are bound to observe on pain of prosecution by the US regulators

[Ratany]

I didn't agree to anything.  I'm only trying to sell my money, and they won't let me.  It is my money, not theirs.  What would you think if you were to lend me money after even I assured you that you will get it back before you considered lending it to me, and I would simply refuse to give it back when it's due?  You might think it funny that I would ask you to lend me more money instead.  I for one don't think it's funny but deceptive and fraudulent.

 

[Rolig Loon]

5 minutes ago, Ratany said:

I didn't agree to anything. 

You read and agreed to the SL Terms of Service, which say (Sect. 3.1):
"You acknowledge that Linden Dollars are not currency or any type of currency substitute or financial instrument, and are not redeemable for any sum of money from Linden Lab at any time. You agree that Linden Lab has the right to manage, regulate, control, and/or modify the license rights underlying such Linden Dollars as it sees fit, and may revalue or make such license rights more or less common, valuable, effective, or functional, and that Linden Lab will have no liability to you based on its exercise of this right. Linden Lab makes no guarantee as to the nature, quality or value of the features of Second Life that will be accessible through the use of Linden Dollars, or the availability or supply of Linden Dollars. As Linden Lab deems necessary, in its sole and absolute discretion, we may limit the total amount of Linden Dollars that may be purchased at any one time, and/or limit the aggregate amount of Linden Dollars that may be held in your Account."

[Dakota Linden]

6 minutes ago, Ratany said:

I didn't agree to anything.  I'm only trying to sell my money, and they won't let me.  It is my money, not theirs.  What would you think if you were to lend me money after even I assured you that you will get it back before you considered lending it to me, and I would simply refuse to give it back when it's due?  You might think it funny that I would ask you to lend me more money instead.  I for one don't think it's funny but deceptive and fraudulent.

 

Hello Ratany,

I provided you with information in your support ticket.  Please review the information and then reply to the ticket so that we can continue to provide you support in the Support Ticket that you submitted. 

We do  NOT to discuss user accounts on the forums in order to protect the privacy and security of the users accounts. 

[Ratany]

@Mollymews

 

The parcel in Horizons that was mentioned in my profile is the one which has been sold.  I bought the money to buy that parcel before I bought the parcel, and that money is the very same money they do not let me sell.

 

The parcel has been bought on my own account and was never transferred other than selling it.

 

I already told them in the support ticket that they need to fix the selling limit and they say I should buy more money.  Why would I buy more money when I can't even sell the money I already have?

 

[Beth Macbain]

8 minutes ago, Ratany said:

@Mollymews

The parcel in Horizons that was mentioned in my profile is the one which has been sold.  I bought the money to buy that parcel before I bought the parcel, and that money is the very same money they do not let me sell.

The parcel has been bought on my own account and was never transferred other than selling it.

I already told them in the support ticket that they need to fix the selling limit and they say I should buy more money.  Why would I buy more money when I can't even sell the money I already have?

When you say you "bought the money", you mean you bought Linden dollars, correct? Because those aren't money. 

11 minutes ago, Dakota Linden said:

Hello Ratany,

I provided you with information in your support ticket.  Please review the information and then reply to the ticket so that we can continue to provide you support in the Support Ticket that you submitted. 

We do  NOT to discuss user accounts on the forums in order to protect the privacy and security of the users accounts. 

WELCOME BACK FROM THE HOLIDAYS!

[Mollymews]

5 minutes ago, Ratany said:

@Mollymews

The parcel in Horizons that was mentioned in my profile is the one which has been sold.  I bought the money to buy that parcel before I bought the parcel, and that money is the very same money they do not let me sell

 

the good thing is that Dakota Linden is dealing with your issue, so suggest that you should you want to continue then deal with Linden thru the ticket system

while we (forum residents) can give you suggestions and thoughts on what you might be able to do, your issue is not going to get actually resolved on this forum, as Dakota mentions

[Ratany]

@Dakota

 

Thanks, this wasn't intended to be discussion anyway.

 

See my reply; maybe I can finally get my money.

 

[Alyona Su]

1 hour ago, Ratany said:

Warning:

 

Never put any money into your SL account that you do not intend to spend right away.  Never put any money into buying land and expect to get your money back after selling the land.  The Lindens will not let you sell your money and will want you to buy more money instead.  I can only consider their business practices as deceptive and fraudulent.

 

Oh. My. Gosh! Please file legal action on behalf of all of us. Because class-action is a win-win for attorneys and no one else!

[Selene Gregoire]

39 minutes ago, Ratany said:

I didn't agree to anything.  I'm only trying to sell my money, and they won't let me.  It is my money, not theirs.  What would you think if you were to lend me money after even I assured you that you will get it back before you considered lending it to me, and I would simply refuse to give it back when it's due?  You might think it funny that I would ask you to lend me more money instead.  I for one don't think it's funny but deceptive and fraudulent.

 

LL isn't a bank nor does LL lend or borrow money. 

LL's system is set up the way it is to comply with federal and state laws, protect LL and protect the consumer. 

The ball is in your court to learn how the system works, not LL's.

[Ratany]

Right, I'm not getting my money back, hence the warning.

 

[Selene Gregoire]

1 minute ago, Ratany said:

Right, I'm not getting my money back, hence the warning.

 

I've been in SL for 16 years. Do you really think I haven't seen other residents go off the deep end because they didn't bother to read the ToS or familiarize themselves with how cashing out works along with any set limits? 

There's a link in this blog post that you can follow to see what your limits are. 

 

[animats]

25 minutes ago, Selene Gregoire said:

LL isn't a bank nor does LL lend or borrow money. 

Tilia, however, is a licensed money transfer service, which makes them subject to some financial regulation. The "it's easy to put money in, but hard to take it out" approach Tilia is taking is usually considered a red flag for a financial service, and attracts regulator attention. I'm not saying that LL is running a scam. But it's a key item on the list of signs of trouble. The big scams of the last decade - Madoff, Mt. Gox, etc. - started with delayed withdrawals. It's associated with Ponzi schemes. So regulators pay attention to complaints of that. LL needs to step carefully here.

[Annie Nova]

3 minutes ago, animats said:

Tilia, however, is a licensed money transfer service, which makes them subject to some financial regulation. The "it's easy to put money in, but hard to take it out" approach Tilia is taking is usually considered a red flag for a financial service, and attracts regulator attention. I'm not saying that LL is running a scam. But it's a key item on the list of signs of trouble. The big scams of the last decade - Madoff, Mt. Gox, etc. - started with delayed withdrawals. It's associated with Ponzi schemes. So regulators pay attention to complaints of that. LL needs to step carefully here.

This has nothing to do with Tilia, it has to do with the fact that according to him and I quote "I have had a mainland parcel which I sold, and now I want to sell my money.  I have made a support ticket and their support is telling me I should buy more money to increase some kind of selling limit they have set to 0." 

He simply has not bought enough lindens to have his selling limit set higher. Let's not get into a debate about something this has nothing whatsoever to do with. Just sayin'

[Ratany]

Their argument that having limits on L$ being sold might be acceptable if the limit wasn't set to 0 and if it wasn't being constantly changed --- if it is being changed, it keeps saying 0 since I'm trying to sell.  Why don't they set it to the same limit they set for buying L$ by default and, going from there, to what a customer requests.

 

That the buying limit is way too high by default is another issue, especially given that there is no further verification against taking your money once payment information is bound to the account.  Anyone breaking into an account can take money up to the limit of US$ 1999 per month, unless someone changed their limit, and there is no protection whatsover.

 

It is also not right that buying L$ and selling L$ should be tied to each other.  I should not have to buy L$ in order to sell L$, and I should not have to take the potential risk of a high buying limit in order to sell L$.  They need to improve their security.

 

Edited January 6, 2020 by Ratany