PayPal To Something Awful: We Can Only Give The Money To United Way. $30,000 In Donations To Be Returned To Contributors.

According to updates posted to the Something Awful website's front page, conversations with PayPal have only caused more problems for Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka and the thousands of website visitors who donated nearly $30,000 in less than 24 hours to his pledge drive.

Earlier in the day, Kyanka spoke with a representative at PayPal who indicated that they had no way to get the money to the Red Cross as he was requesting. PayPal is only capable of delivering contributions to the charity of their choice, United Way, and offers no opportunity for individuals to donate to other charitable organizations thru their website.

Kyanka wrote, "'But the donations are still going to the relief organizations in New Orleans, right?' I asked. She confirmed yes, they were. 'Then transfer all the money to that fund. I doubt any of our readers will send in hate mail proclaiming their love of the Red Cross but adamant despise of the United Way.'"

What users did, in fact do, was to email Kyanka and point out a number of links demonstrating where United Way's former chief executive, Oral Suer, pled guilty to defrauding the charity of almost $500,000 just last year and where Charity Navigator rated United Way's handling of New Orleans prior to Hurricane Katrina at only two stars with 14.1% overhead cost while giving Red Cross a four star rating and only 8.9% overhead cost.

"I have begin to form doubts that giving more money to the United Way, money that Paypal is taking a percentage and profit from, is a bad idea," Kyanka wrote in his most recent update. "I wanted to donate the money to the Red Cross, but Paypal insisted they are unable to do this, instead claiming the only organization the funds could be diverted to is the United Way. I called their offices back and asked them to refund everybody's money, which [PayPal's Customer Service Representative] promised would happen soon."

There has been no official word from PayPal on how they plan to resolve the issue other than in refunding money to the thousands of people who made contributions to Something Awful's pledge drive.