HVTM Outdoors DL 409595716

If you’ve ever been curious about our sport of choice, a Try Shooting Day is a great way to give it a shot!

Today we attended the SSAA Newcastle Branch and it was fantastic to see so many new shooters having a blast.

There were plenty of first timers taking aim, hitting their mark and discovering that shooting was well within their range.

A huge shout out to everyone who helped make the day possible. It was great to see so many people bite the bullet, step up to the line and take their best shot at trying something new.

Safe to say, the day went off with a bang!

If you’ve ever thought about trying the sport yourself, don’t miss your shot — keep an eye out for the next Try Shooting Day!

A massive happy birthday to Hayley, our number one admin lady!

Fun fact, Hayley never lets us photograph her so please enjoy this rare happy snap showing off the girls Christmas spirit!

We’ve been advised by Daracon that pending weather, James Street will be closed again from Tuesday 1st September for 1 week.

There will be a pedestrian detour in place however depending on how the detour looks, we will assess if we will need to open our side gate for entry early next week.

Campbell Street will remain open which will allow easy access to our carpark via Margaret Street.

We know it’s not ideal but we’re all working together for everyone’s safety during these roadworks.

For all of our customer who have braved the roadworks and supported us during this period, we are so thankful for your continued support.

Don't forget! You'll find us on Sunday at the SSAA Newcastle Branch Family and Friends Try Shooting day!

Bookings are essential! https://www.ssaanewcastle.org.au/events

We found something a little exciting tucked away at Husqvarna!

If you're in the market for a new lawn tractor, the TS 138 is for you!

Only 4 in stock, they will not last at this price! Call today to secure your spring perfect grass!

When the team all start refusing to model for social media, Mel has to hit up AI for help... and apparently AI took the assignment VERY seriously.

Fresh in at HVTM Outdoors — our new shooting vests!

$59 each
Available in M, L, XL & 2XL

Perfect for the clay target range and a great Father’s Day gift...

In store now!

WAIT STOP!! Perfect gift for Father's Day!

Free ZeroTech Bino Bag with any Vengence Bino Purchase!

Only whilst stocks last.

Why HVTM Outdoors no longer accepts PayPal – and why we think small businesses deserve better.

Feel free to share to spread the news to other small business owners!




This is a long one, but it’s a story we think our customers, particularly other small business owners, should hear.

On 7 May, we received an order through our website for a chainsaw valued at $351. Payment was made via PayPal.

Nothing about the order raised any red flags. The customer details appeared normal, the payment was processed, and we fulfilled the order exactly as we would any other online sale.

A few days later, we received an email asking for the tracking information.

We happily provided it.

Then, a few days after that, everything changed.

PayPal notified us that the person associated with the transaction was claiming they had not made the purchase and their financial institution had been asked to reverse the payment.

We were confused. We had received a seemingly legitimate order, followed by correspondence requesting the tracking details.

So we provided PayPal with everything we had. Order information. Correspondence. Tracking. Proof that we had supplied the product.

Initially, PayPal told us they would dispute the reversal on our behalf.

Great. We thought common sense would prevail.

Three days later, we were essentially told: bad luck.

The financial institution had decided in the buyer’s favour.

The payment was reversed.

The chainsaw was gone.

And HVTM was left $351 out of pocket.

Now, $351 might not sound like much to a company the size of PayPal.

To a small family business, it matters.

But what happened next is the part that really made us angry.

Because when we felt PayPal had let us down, we started doing our own investigating.

What we uncovered indicated that the person whose details appeared on our order hadn't actually placed the order with us at all.

The same chainsaw had apparently been sold through an eBay store under the username shi_9379.

From the information we were subsequently able to piece together, that seller apparently didn't have the chainsaw they had sold.

Around two weeks later, their buyer began asking where his chainsaw was.

Shortly afterwards, an order for that chainsaw was placed through our website.

The order used the eBay customer's details, but the payment involved a different credit card through a PayPal account.

From our end, it looked like an ordinary, legitimate online transaction.

We then managed to speak directly with the man whose details had been used.

He was shocked.

He hadn't purchased the chainsaw from HVTM Outdoors. He had purchased it through eBay and had no idea his personal details had subsequently been used in an order through our business.

He contacted PayPal himself and explained what had happened. He made it clear that we appeared to be another victim in the situation and asked PayPal to support us.

We have since made multiple attempts to communicate with PayPal and provide the information we uncovered.

Yet, as of today, we are still $351 out of pocket.

At this point, it stopped being about $351.

It became about the principle of it.

So yes... we put our grudgy pants on.

We contacted the eBay seller ourselves, initially posing as someone interested in purchasing the same chainsaw. After a few minutes of conversation, they appeared to realise something wasn't right and terminated the conversation.

We then contacted eBay and reported everything we had uncovered.

To eBay's credit, they were helpful. They explained that they couldn't recover our money because the transaction hadn't taken place through their platform, but they took the information seriously and advised us that the store would be investigated to help prevent further potential fraud.

We also gathered the information we had and took the matter to police.

And still, PayPal has not returned our money.

Perhaps the most frustrating part is that there are two innocent parties in this story.

There is a customer who simply purchased a chainsaw online and appears to have subsequently had his details misused.

And there is a small family business that received what appeared to be a legitimate, paid order, supplied the product, provided tracking information and did everything expected of it – only to lose both the chainsaw and the money.

We even told the customer that despite everything that had happened, HVTM would still honour the warranty on his chainsaw. If he ever has an issue with it, he can contact us directly and we will help him.

Because none of this was his fault either.

Our issue is with the system that was supposed to protect legitimate transactions.

PayPal had the information we provided.

The customer himself contacted them.

We uncovered further information and tried repeatedly to have the matter looked at again.

Yet we're still the ones carrying the loss.

For a global company, $351 is insignificant.

For a small business, it represents stock we've paid for, wages, electricity, insurance and all the other costs that come with keeping the doors open.

And the financial impact didn't end at $351.

Following this experience, we made the decision to remove PayPal from the HVTM Outdoors website.

PayPal was also processing our website's credit card transactions, so removing it effectively removed almost all of our online payment capability. Approximately 99% of our online sales had previously been processed through PayPal or its credit card merchant service.

We knew removing it would hurt us financially.

And it has.

Since May, we have lost online sales because customers haven't had the payment options they previously had.

But after this experience, how could we confidently continue putting transactions through a service when we no longer felt protected as the merchant?

We're a family owned small business in Cessnock.

We're not a billion dollar corporation.

We don't have departments of people dedicated to fraud investigations and payment disputes.

Yet somehow we were the ones who had to investigate what happened. We were the ones who tracked down the real customer. We were the ones who contacted eBay. We were the ones who gathered the evidence. And we were the ones who went to the police.

All while the company that processed the transaction continues to leave us carrying the loss.

So no, this isn't really a post about $351 anymore.

It's about what happens when a small business does everything it is supposed to do and discovers just how little protection it may actually have when something goes wrong.

We removed PayPal from our website because, after this experience, we could no longer justify trusting them with our online transactions.

It has cost our business considerably more than the original $351.

But trust, once lost, is very difficult to put a dollar value on.