You are forgetting one thing that was previously stated in the comments: this isn't Paypal responding through their normal support channels.
This is a fire-fighting attempt from the CEO of a company that snubbed the people they should live off of, prompted by a bigger than average shitstorm created by their persistent crappy handling of accounts.
Think of it this way: suppose Mercedes went around, burning the cars it sells to their customers - much to their chagrin - and one of the customers creates a big enough fuss for the CEO to come and personally give him a new car. Is that an acceptable handling of the situation in your eyes?
A CEO is a pretty busy person ... when one responds (no matter how it was escalated) it says something about his/her viewpoint.
Many CEOs would hand this off to their customer experience personnel (if they have some still) or maybe marketing department.
This was not a manager's or director's reply though. The wording indicates someone (relatively new to this president's post) who appears to see that change is necessary. He understand that his offer may not be accepted (he get's it) and still offers a direct link to himself.
I don't read this as a PR ploy or gimmick.
If a CEO offered someone a new car PLUS their ear, I'd be watching for changes. PayPal didn't burn everyone's car. Enough damage was caused to affect the brand though. If I was one of the affected, I'd be watching for more action.
I feel that the response was appropriate. There is something in the wording that gives me hope. Maybe I'm just being naive.
Practically every major company has a corporate/CEO escalations department that tries to put out fires that their typical customer service path fails to fix. This isn't a novel approach.
PayPal has a notoriously bad customer service reputation. It's going to take more than a typical CEO apology letter to really fix the issues that are embedded within how PayPal operates. The fact that a CEO has to issue such a letter indicates there are problems that probably aren't going to be easy to fix.
Executive escalation departments are not the CEO. I served some time in customer experience before going into quality and then PM. UE and CE are very important to me. This letter does not have the ring of a typical escalation path.
Either he discovered the issue on his own or someone else within PayPal escalated it to his attention. Either is a good sign. The former path indicates a CEO who is actively listening to users and is deliberately making time to gather user feedback outside of normal channels - a very good thing for any CEO worth their salt. The latter indicates that someone else within PayPal or closely tied to PayPal had the good sense to escalate it to the CEO's eyes - that person deserves a promotion (he/she probably has some relavent skills that PayPal really needs at the moment).
I just don't see this as a typical CEO apology. It's personal and the wording actually suggests something more than a typical CEO response - I've seen a few.
No one should be getting kudos or promotion over recognizing an internet shitstorm because people A) didn't do their jobs or B) did their jobs as usual which caused said shitstorm.
It's like a bully saying he's sorry only when your bigger brother shows up to defend you.
This is a fire-fighting attempt from the CEO of a company that snubbed the people they should live off of, prompted by a bigger than average shitstorm created by their persistent crappy handling of accounts.
Think of it this way: suppose Mercedes went around, burning the cars it sells to their customers - much to their chagrin - and one of the customers creates a big enough fuss for the CEO to come and personally give him a new car. Is that an acceptable handling of the situation in your eyes?