PayPal has become a very popular way to pay for goods, but the company has also been a huge source of frustration for customers. It’s a brilliant idea, but if anything goes wrong or a customer needs more help with a transaction PayPal ignores the situation, callers say. The company recently reached a settlement in New York over claims that the company was misleading customers. The company made a statement on its site that if your merchandise did not arrive you were entitled to a refund. But that did not happen in many cases, and now the company has entered into a consent agreement to refund customers’ money. Although the company did not admit any wrongdoing, the agreement clearly states that PayPal does not provide the same level of fraud protection that credit cards provide. So, if you use PayPal, keep that in mind. It’s buyer beware. American Express and Discover have stepped up to the plate in the wake of this incident and both are now granting chargeback rights for people who use their cards in a PayPal transaction. It speaks to the arrogance of eBay, which owns PayPal, for failing to establish consumer safeguards. The companies simply not doing the job they should. Several other states and the Federal Trade Commission are also investigating PayPal. We’ll keep you posted on what happens with that.