so it was a successful day for me. I payed my 30% deposit through paypal and my additional 70% via wire transfer.

I contacted paypal yesterday who opened a dispute and contacted alpha about it, but the dispute was immediately closed due to the 45 day rule. I called back this morning and pushed the issue until I got transfered to a supervisor. She said she had to do some research on it, so I fully explained the situatoin and how other people had already reported alpha to paypal, etc etc. Within an hour the 30% was back in my paypal account.

Then I contacted my bank on a hope and prayer regarding the wire transfer. Turns out they do have some options on wire transfers (at least USBank does). They are contacting alpha's bank and requesting the funds on grounds of fraud, and I have filed a report with USbank's fraud department as well. I will know more by Friday hopefully- I'll keep you guys posted.

Moral of the story- if paypal gives you the run around, call again, and again, and again. Be very nice to the people and I recommend immediately asking to speak with a supervisor or protection services. It also obviously helps if you run a decent amount of money through paypal every year- I threatened to switch companies and payment processors for a bunch of my stuff which i think helped to put pressure on paypal to rectify the situation rather than just passing the buck.

I'll update when I hear more on the wire transfer.