Dating Site Operator Can Proceed With Lawsuit Against PayPal

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An entrepreneur who runs "nontraditional" dating sites like WhatsYourPrice.com has won a round in court against Paypal, which he said wrongly refused to process payments to the sites.

U.S. District Court Judge Susan Illston in the Northern District of California rejected PayPal's motion to dismiss the case before trial. She ruled that the sites' owner, Lead Wey (also known as Brandon Wade), alleged enough facts to warrant further proceedings.

"The Court finds that whether PayPal breached the parties’ contract by terminating plaintiffs’ accounts is a question best resolved on summary judgment or by a jury," Illston wrote. The ruling, issued late last month, rejected PayPal's motion to dismiss the lawsuit at a preliminary stage.

Wey alleged in court papers that PayPal permanently stopped processing payments to WhatsYourPrice.com and other sites last year. PayPal allegedly told Wey that it had banned his sites because they violated the acceptable use policy, which prohibits the sale of "certain sexually oriented materials or services."

WhatsYourPrice.com allows people to purchase dates with other users. "Just name a price, and if your offer is right, you'll get a YES and you're off on a first date," the site says. Wey says in court papers that WhatsYourPrice and his other dating sites don't allow nudity, obscenity or prostitution ads.

Wey alleges that PayPal's reasons for terminating his accounts were pretextual, arguing that the company continues to process payments to other dating sites that potentially violate its terms of service.

The complaint against PayPal also included an allegation that the site violated antitrust law. But Illston ruled in PayPal's favor on that count. She found that Wey didn't sufficiently allege either that PayPal participates in the online dating market, much less that it is attempting to monopolize it.

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1 comment on "Dating Site Operator Can Proceed With Lawsuit Against PayPal".

1. John Sanders from Reebok
   

   commented on: April 12, 2013 at 12:31 a.m.
   Brandon Wade, Your Paypal lawsuit proves what a hypocrite you are. You talk about how your websites allow women to be more "choosy" when it comes to the men they date, but you don't think Paypal can be choosy about who they do business with. Sounds like a double standard to me! And you think the law allows you to sue anyone who creates a website even remotely similar to yours? Last time I checked, monopolies were illegal in this country. It's called competition, so deal with it. And the What's your Price concept isn't even patent-able, regardless of whatever your lawyer is telling you (he obviously just wants your money). Even if you do eventually get it patented, it will be several more years of failed patent applications (and a lot of legal bills on your part) before they finally approve it. By that time, congress will have probably passed a patent reform bill which would outlaw business method patents! So you will have wasted your money on nothing.P.S. Nice job creating your own Wikipedia page. Normally, D list celebrities like yourself don't get more than two sentences on wikipedia, but you somehow get like three pages....I wonder how that happened? Because you wrote it yourself you narcissistic hypocrite!

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