Paypal backs down, donates to blog Regretsy's Secret Santa fund

PayPal has backed off an online spat with humor blog Regretsy after getting withering Web feedback for shutting down a drive to buy holiday gifts for children in need. And the online payments service is even chipping in to help buy a few more gifts after temporarily shutting down the Secret Santa fund because the for-profit site was running it.

Run by actress-comedian April Winchell, Regretsy is a snarky blog created primarily to mock what it considers awkward, ugly or otherwise head-turning offerings on the arts-and-crafts site Etsy. But, perhaps in a bid for some good karma, the site maintains a charity fund that has given money to causes from breast-cancer research to Etsy community members in need.

On Monday, Winchell wrote that PayPal, which was processing the donations, shut down the drive because she had used a "Donate" button that she learned is only for nonprofit groups. She said she had a "very long and jaw-dropping conversation with an incredibly condescending representative," who told her she had to refund donations.

In a post Tuesday afternoon, Winchell thanked her supporters.

"I would also like to say that I did not expect this kind of global outpouring of support, and I truly believe that had you not all made your voices heard, no one from Paypal would have ever felt compelled to make this right," she wrote, noting that "Regretsy" had become a top trending topic on Twitter. "There is no real support or appreciation for the consumer anymore. The customer is always wrong.

Source: http://edition.cnn.com/2011/12/06/tech/web/regretsy-paypal-gifts/?hpt=hp_bn6