MANILA, Philippines (UPDATED) – While donations from various parts of the world are coming in from individuals who want to help in the aid and relief effort following Super Typhoon Yolanda (international codename: Haiyan), some PayPal accounts receiving donations may get temporarily suspended or locked down.

It may be an influx of goodwill that might cause PayPal to temporarily suspend an account, unless that account was originally created to accept donations for charitable causes or had its status changed appropriately in advance. 

While account suspension security functions on PayPal are meant to prevent fraudulent activities, these functions also present additional hurdles for getting online donations to their intended destinations.

A relief effort for Malapascua in Northern Cebu is one such initiative being hampered by Paypal issues.

According to a November 10 Twitter post by Rappler Do More Awards finalist Anna Oposa, one of the contact persons for the Help Malapascua relief effort, her Paypal account was suspended after funding came in following a call for donations.

Received a lot of donations in a short amount of time… Which resulted in PayPal suspending my account. Hindi po ako money launderer!!!!

— Anna Oposa (@annaoposa) November 10, 2013

In the above case, as well as in future others, one possible cause for this may be a regional issue, such as a Singaporean credit card.

According to a TechCrunch article from March, PayPal phased out the ability of Singaporean accounts to donate to foreign non-profits and charities. Depending on the regional restrictions for a PayPal account, some actions may not be allowed on that account, or cause a lockup.

While the circumstances behind account suspensions vary with the case, PayPal lists a number of additional causes for the suspension or holding of funds, mostly related to maintaining security for users if the company suspects strange activity on an account.

In this case, the rapid channeling of funds from multiple sources into a single account may appear to them as cause for concern, requiring them to take action to verify that the account isn’t being used improperly.

In some cases, account limitations may be imposed on a account. These limitations reduce the amount of money a user can transfer or withdraw from their account.

PayPal may also hold payments temporarily based on an account’s activity. According to PayPal’s Help article on payment holding, PayPal may hold payments based on the age of an account, its transaction activity, the type of business, past customer disputes, and customer satisfaction.

In both of these cases, it’s possible for an account to fail following PayPal’s acceptable use policies. According to the Acceptable Use Policy Page’s last update, dated December 22, 2011, pre-approval from PayPal is needed before an account can collect donations as a charity or non-profit organization.  

PayPal has guidelines for donation collection and nonprofits, which would require well-meaning individuals to send in documentation, informing PayPal in advance of their change in status to a charity or non-profit organization.

Rappler currently has a aggregated list of organizations, local and international, that accept PayPal donations for Philippine typhoon relief.

We urge those looking to donate via PayPal to undertake due diligence and confirm a PayPal account holder’s status and applicable restrictions to donating before sending funds via the service to ensure their donation goes to Typhoon Haiyan victims in a timely fashion. – Rappler.com