[Three of Seven]

Greetings,

It is the season of gifting, so you can expect to see Father Christmas make an appearance, giving members free games, so I’m sure he will arrive sometime during the day, he has a busy month ahead afterall! There will also be the end of year raffle to look forward to, and so much more.

But that’s not all this year, COVID has hit many people hard, as have other disasters all across the world, which is why at the end of December, the UFP will be donating 15% of funds made from donations to Doctors Without Borders. They have worked hard since their founding, and often in terrible conditions, helping many people all over the world.

If you would like to help the UFP, and give to charity this month, you can make a one off donation to us here, or you can become a subscriber here. However, if you much rather go directly to the source, you can click here to be taken to a list of all the local websites for Doctors Without Borders, and make a donation to them in your local currency.

Thank you, and happy holidays!

Three of Seven,
Fleet Admiral

[timverbesselt]

A very nice initiative it is indeed.
I also donate to Doctors Without Borders regularly.
Keep up the good work

[Quackers]

Such a great idea!

[Chris Wilkinson]

I have to say is great to see father Christmas returning this year, especially as this year the community will also be donating to a worthy charity

[Mack]

[Heyallo]

Doctors without Borders most awesome people!

[deuZige]

I am terribly sorry,

i tried, i really really tried,

but Paypall support just broke my brain to such an extent that i cannot bring myself to... Go through their solution for not being able to logon.

Allow me to regail you with this tale of Terror that was the final nail to the coffin of my use of Paypall.



I wanted to release my Christmas spirit and go all out with the donating thing by subscribing & doing a single donation of a to be determined amount. Clicking happily on my way to do so i banged my head against an obstruction. Only way to pay was by using a pall.... paypall....

After dutifully rolling my eyes and letting out a sigh, i resigned to fate and went to the next browser tab and directed it to paypall.com.
One click later (logon) i found that the Lord our God Google is a benevolent one and filled in the password for me which i would have never ever remembered on my own, and less than a second later i was.....



Not logged in completely. My existence if not my authority was being challenged once more! This time by a warrior of the order of 2FA!
It's taunt challenged me to enter the code it had just sent to my phone!

W8... my... old phone... The telephone number of which the simm was blocked by Lebara for not upping the saldo for more than 6 months, which i did not do due to having a subscrition now, with a new number...

Too stubborn to acknowledge i knew how this was gonna end i determined to fight on, and defeat this knight 2FA-ler through use of my high stats on Charisma, Intelligence and Persuade!

I clicked "Use other method"!!! "That'll teach em" i thought, and was rewarded with.... Another code sent to the same telephone number...
"Aha! A worthy opponent!" I said, changing shape into the silent assassin of the Night, a Ninja!

And i proceeded to take a secret route through the "Smarthelp-contact_us" section. There i summoned the "I cannot logon" and "Problems with 2FA" Hyperlinks through which i travelled to another etheral realm, on my journey... my quest to Donating with Paypall!!!!



There the Sentinel that stood guard over the Vaults of knowledge and Magical Assistance quickly submitted to me. It did so knowingly and in awe to my greatness and showed me the hyperling travel portal to "Change the 2FA telephone number" which i did not hesitate to traverse.

Ready to... w8... wut?!

Please verify your identity by entering the code sent to....

Cursed be the souvereigns of fate!!!!
Thwarted yet again!!!

I was left with no other option than to cry "Victory or Death!!!!" before picking up my teklephone to call the telephone number in order to take this fight to the support gods personally! It took all my skills, power and intelligence to break through their defenses made up out of the "Please make a choice from the following Menu options" of hell and was even forced to do battle with the demon of "You have selected an option that is not available, please listen to the menu options and select the one appropriate to you problem" but i prevailed none the less! I was awarded with an audience with (fake name for privacy reasons) ARIE, who asked me if i had a problem he could solve.



Sowing confusion with my spell of humorous replies is intoned "Well, i have a problem. Whether you can solve it is something you'll have to tell me!"

Stunned but recovering quickly He dragged me through through the process that had me explaining... well... Everything above this line....
He lured me into a false sense of safety and comfort by chanting the spell "Well, don't worry, we can change the telephone number for you sir, just a second..."

A few moments of blissfull silence provided me the opertunity to wonder about a hole in the OpSec... which then was brutally anhialated by the words of the CHAOS-inatorl

"Can you tell me the last four numbers of your credit card?"

My HP was almost decimated right there and then, but i clung to the last shreds of sanity and life by calling a Time out!
"I'm going to have to get my wallet for that, i'm gonna put the phone down for a few moments. I'll be right back!" i said, and the support god aquiesced reluctantly. Placing the connection to the godly realm of the support gods on "mute" i went off to complete the "Find my credit card" side quest. That journey though is a tale for another time, and another place. What's important is: After closing the connection to the Support God's realm temporarily promising to call back, I went and battled on until i completed the quest and obtained the quest item "Visa Credit Card".

My HP recharged somewhat over time i pressed redial and defeated the "Press one for..." demons of the depths of the Phone Menu hell again, and followed the path to once more face the Support God's "The Challenge of the Credit Card Numbers"!!! This time though i was ready for the CHAOS-inator's wrath, blocking the spell deftly and strike back with my spell of "calling out the Visa's last four digits"!!! The silence shattered, the universe shocked with awe as i spoke with reverence;

"5352, end date 01/24!" embueing them with as much Mana and Power i could muster.



Surely my victory was now inevi......

The devastation of the shocking counterstrike with "No, sorry sir, i have a different number here. Are you...." was total and complete!

This where my sanity and willpower began to unravel, and i interrupted the Support God angrily snapping "I only have one credit card, and never had one before this one, or after this one!" which seemed to silence the Support God, but before i could wonder if that would be good or bad the Devinity demonstrated its awesome power once more.

"I see that you have registered with a bank account when you opened the account sir, if you can provide me with the last 4 numbers of that bank account i am allowed to assist you and change the phone number for the 2FA."

It was a trick, but i didn't fall for it! I was on to it and knew that the account number was of the bank account the bank had blockaded and closed in 2010… Ofcourse they counted on the bank account number being lost to time and enthropy but within thirty seconds I stuck hard with “5932” knowing there was no other way but the Support God’s submission and handing me the victory I so richly deserved.



Indeed, the SupGod’s voice declared solemnly “Yes, that’s correct, I will now change the phone number to a new number. Which number should I set it to?”. This surely ended my tribulations you may ask?

No, if only it did. If only it did….




The journey seemed to go effortlessly for a while, through the sms with a code which I read out to the SupGod, him confirming that it was correct and passing along the path of righrious login all the way up to the Enchantment of Completion he spoke, saying “Okay, please try to logon again now, you should receive a 2FA code on the number we’ve just entered and tested.”

Alas, it was not to be… My screen, now no longer satisfied with repeating the torture of before, showed me “We cannot verify your identity at this moment.” with no other hint or clue as to what I could do. I told this to the Support God, and was met with thunderous deafening silence!

A moment passed before the God of Support spoke again.



The words will haunt me, and stay with me even into my Urn that will hold my ashes for eternity!

“Sir, I see your account has only 6 cents in it. I think the best thing to do right now is to transfer that 6 cents to a good cause and close this account. That way you’ll be able to register a new account immediately and you’ll be able to use the account within 15 minutes for your transactions.”

“Sir?……..Hello?……. Are you still there?…….” I heard after that, as if coming from somewhere far far away, but the only thing I was capable of was saying “Yes, you know what, that’s a good idea.” and then interrupt his “Do you give per…” by stammering “Yes, I do, I give permission to transfer the remaining funds in the account to any of the available good causes and I give you permission to choose which one. Please close the account. Thank you for your help, Happy Holidaymas and a Merry Goodyear 2023! Bye”



And as I tapped the disconnect button on my phone, I knew I had lost. I had lost, and I would never again have the audacity, the hubriss…. The Arrogance to think that I could be powerfull enough to use the infinate… dare I say ULTIMATE powers of the realms of Paypall!

I just received the notification my account was closed. I will not be creating a new account. I simply can’t bring myself to do it….

So I am sorry Doctors without Borders. It seems that there are borders of a sort after all!
Merry CHRISTmas though, and who knows…. Maybe in 2022 things will be different.

[Jestersmith]

So in a nutshell you forgot your login details had your 2FA to an old phone and did not update it. This is one of the first things I do when I get a new phone takes a while for me with the amount of stuff that I have on 2FA but for me, if a site has it I use it. I even go to the extreme of all things that all online stores are registered to an email that I do not use for anything other than that.

[deuZige]

So in a nutshell you forgot your login details had your 2FA to an old phone and did not update it.

Almost....

My Paypal account was old, and i hadn't used it since before 2FA. I didn't even know 2FA had been implemented as a requirement, nor did i know i had filled out the Phone number field when i registered the account.

Almost the same thing, but i think the nuance here matters. (explains why he asked for a credit card number when it was actually the old bank account number (pre-IBAN or SEPA) from an account that had been blocked and closed in 2010)

[Jestersmith]

I didn't even know 2FA had been implemented

The only way 2FA is set is if you had done it or your account was already compromised and done by whoever had compromised it they do not just turn it on willy nilly had mine since 05 had issues prior to 2FA but never since I have found them decent in the past an account was set up in one my emails that was not done so by me called them up and went through it all and long story short they also deleted that account as I did not want it associated with me. If you never set the 2FA up I would have asked them to go to fraud within them to investigate and ensure nothing untoward has occurred unknown to you. Either way its good you got it sorted though and closed

[deuZige]

Jester, don't know what else to say but i literally had not opened or used the account since before iban bank account numners were implemented, which was in 2007. So i don't know what happened in the intervening 14 years with the account to jumble it up so much even the Support desk gave up and just said, "let me close and delete the account, then you can create a new one that does work."