posted on December 6, 2002 09:07:46 AM new
We are considering using Pay Pal, but have reservations- especially after reading some messages on this message center-- we are having second thoughts. We accept credit cards in our shop and just wonder if it would be better for us to personally accept credit cards rather than going with Pay Pal. We're thinking that the cost might be about the same.
Anyone have "words of wisdom" for us?
If some of you take credit cards, do you take the information via email- or ask that the buyer call you with the credit card info?
posted on December 6, 2002 09:27:24 AM newdo you take the information via email- or ask that the buyer call you with the credit card info?
You can do this both ways. Just make sure that the address is the same for shipping. Get their full billing address, then you can confirm name and address via your bank. Do this always.
Make sure that you have proof of shipment via tracking and signature if you can. In other words have as much documentation as possible.
There is always a risk, but you can keep it down to a minimum. The upside is that you have more control as you can verify a buyer.
If you think something is not right ask them to pay you via payingfast[money order] postal or bank draft, wire .
posted on December 6, 2002 09:37:28 AM new
If you accept only credit cards via your own methods and exclude PayPal you may surely lose some sales. Many buyers will trust PayPal and not trust you. Personally, I would never use my credit card info through a seller's auction payment methods.
In my opinion, 95% of the sellers like PayPal but the other 5% really let their point of view be known on message boards like this.
I'm now ready to hear that small 5% minority bellyache away.
posted on December 6, 2002 09:40:07 AM new
if you sell on ebay,you may as well start accepting paypal,as ebay and paypal are integrated so well and many bidders prefer to troop up to paypal and make payments after auction ended.
many ebay bidders do not feel comfortable giving out their cc to an auction seller.
i dont know what you sell,if you sell high ticket items and/or items which are in high fraud category such as electronic goods or controverial category such as antiques and jewelry and you feel you can handle chargeback and dispute better without paypal in the middle,then continue to use your merchant account to accept payments.
paypal is very convenient for small ticket items.
posted on December 6, 2002 10:08:14 AM new
PayPal is soon to be an even larger force in the online auction scene as ebay payments aka BillPoint is soon to be dismantled by ebay.
posted on December 6, 2002 10:12:47 AM new
My experience (five years on eBay, PowerSeller twice over) is that you don't need to accept either credit cards or PayPal to be successful on eBay.
Even when you do offer cc/PP, many folks will still send a money order or check.
posted on December 6, 2002 10:52:43 AM new
large ticket items ,more and more buyers prefer the credit card route,for the chargback protection as well as not having the cash in the bank,also the mileage points they earned
posted on December 6, 2002 11:28:15 AM new
As a buyer I'm going to be very reluctant to email or call and supply a low feedback seller my credit card info and address. Reluctant to the point I probably won't do it.
At one time few eBay sellers accepted credit card payments they were a rare breed. Now most sellers accept credit cards via a payment service. VHS videos are dying, dialup access is dying, and money order only auctions are dying. The writing is on the wall some see it and some deny it, but the writing is there.
posted on December 6, 2002 11:49:11 AM new
I've occasionally bought on-line using my credit card. I always send two e-mails, with each one having half of my credit card number.
posted on December 6, 2002 12:59:29 PM new
I pay for most auctions I win with PayPal because I look to make sure they take PayPal before bidding. If two of the same items are up for bid and only 1 takes PayPal I will pay more so I can use PayPal to pay.
I never pay a seller with a credit card unless it is through PayPal. If I have to have the item and they don't take PayPal I will pay with money order.
When selling I find 70-75% are paying me with PayPal.
posted on December 6, 2002 01:21:15 PM new
I find that about 50% pay with paypal - I do think it can affect your sales, because there are people out there who will ONLY use paypal to pay for auctions, and if they don't see the paypal logo, they move on. Nobody is going to walk away from your auction if you accept paypal, as opposed to only checks or money orders. Can you be successful without accepting it? Definitely. Does it increase your chances of doing better if you accept it? I believe that is true.
I've had zero problems with paypal on the seller end. I did have a problem on the buyer end, and it was not even an auction. It was an unauthorized charge to my debit card, and I got that reversed pretty quickly.
As a buyer, I tend to prefer paypal because I know I have a lot of extra protection. I don't really like to buy insurance (unless the item is pretty valuable) so for smaller items, I know that unless they send the item with delivery confirmation (and very few do) I KNOW I have a claim with paypal regardless of what their policy is. I've never had to use this though, but I know it provides me with that protection. I also will NOT purchase electronics without it, but since you accept credit cards, that would work for me as well...
posted on December 6, 2002 01:29:00 PM new
personally I dont think PayPal "protection" and "security" is worth anything... but yeah obviously there's a build up for trust in there. the majority of users probably dont know of PayPal's shady business practices. I mean, they screw over a few thousand but they have millions of users... so...
PayPal is no doubt easy to use and is currently being intergrated into eBay. If the cost is the same, and you're selling low amount items... PayPal is probably easier to go with, since it seems most eBay buyers have an account already. I stray all my new buyers away from PayPal though, in fact, I stray all my buyers away with a detailed email explaining to them the pros and cons of using PayPal.
I suppose it really depends on what you're selling. if the buyer really wants it, they wouldn't mind going through the trouble of getting a money order, or etc. I mean, if you're selling generic items like everyoen else, that someone can easily go to another source because its simply easier to process the check out.. then maybe you should go with PayPal.
I think once you establish some rep and higher feedbacks, you should probably offer buyers to pay via your own merchant account...
posted on December 6, 2002 01:43:04 PM new
again, I dont think there are that many "extra" protection there is caught up to be with PayPal. if you read their TOS, you'll find that they can do anything they want with your account and your money.
and this has been done.
in fact, its so easy to start up a scam with Paypal and ebay. as a buyer, I have someone did that to me. I filed for transaction dispute, PayPal "investigated" and told me okay seller is at fault, but they cant extract any money for me from his account (probably cuz its already cleared out) so thats it. case closed. what can I do about it? I can probably drive to the seller (he lives about 20-30 miles away) and confront him about it, he also did this to many others, I was going to ogranize a dispute and call his local authority... but boy do those things take time. I the $28 he scammed off me doesn't motivate me that much... and my own sense of justice doesnt go that far too. heh.
I learned a lot from that experience though. I was so naive! lol. PayPal, eBay, all that is just a portal... they dont really have that much protection, especially on low amount items, since the insurance eBay offers is only for items between $25-$200.
you really should read the horror stories out there. they're worse than my $28 problem. for sellers and buyers.
posted on December 6, 2002 04:18:28 PM new
someone mentioned paypal sellers do not use delivery confirmation,which is rather foolish as they are not getting paypal seller protection.
i dont know whether sellers are too cheap to spend an extra 55 cents to protect himself or just ignorant??
paypal seller protection is better than paypal buyer protection,a seller can just send a box of rock with delivery confirmation and paypal would say we dont get involved in content issue.
but back to big ticket items,it is better to stay away from paypal and go thru merchant account,if you already have a store,you can use the me page to tout your credibility OR some sellers acutually have a website set up so buyers can key in their cc data.
i think the key is professionalism,if you can separate yourself from the fly by nite sellers,bidders would not mind forking over the cc data.
posted on December 6, 2002 05:30:21 PM new
With electronic delivery confirmation, it actually only costs 13¢ for delivery confirmation, and if you ship priority it is free. That makes it even less smart NOT to use DC.
posted on December 6, 2002 06:06:04 PM new
it is free if you print the priority label online which takes a lot of time and ink on my printer.
and who has the time??
posted on December 6, 2002 06:08:47 PM new
Well, I guess it can be time consuming if you have a dot matrix printer. If I send out 200 packages a week, that is about $80 or so in savings, more than enough to justify a toner cartridge...
posted on December 6, 2002 06:54:48 PM new
I am another one that refuses to use paypal every again. did in the beginning but after some VERY bad experiences with them, I threw in the towel.
I don't think my auctions have suffered too much because of it. I do accept Bidpay.com. It is even better since they lowered their rates.
posted on December 6, 2002 09:39:39 PM new
Gotta agree with paloma91 on that one. BidPay was smart to lower their fee for low-dollar-amount money orders.
posted on December 6, 2002 10:07:48 PM new
Your Merchant account fees are already in place, you paid for the Merchant account set-up and most likely fees are now less than the fee that PayPal Charges. If you can supply the buyer with a secure checkout I would suggest using your own merchant account. Paypal is not a bank and you are only adding a fourth party to the transaction. Makes more business sense to have just you, the customer and the Credit card company.
I use a Yahoo store and customers can use the standard secure method of credit card payment or PayPal. The cards are rounted through First Envoy. I would say its a 50 -50 preference for either method with my customers.
One problem you need to check on is the percentage of Internet sales you do versus Store sales as some Merchant accounts will not allow more than 10% to 20% Internet sales.
Chargebacks are an issue with PayPal and your entire account can be frozen when your customer does a chargeback plus customer service is not as available as with the credit card merchant account.
Check out Yahoo Stores. If you have a MA it can be set up using your own account in 24 hours. Runs about $50. per month. Also a business web hosting without the store is about $12 and you can add a Verisign Shopping cart. When your customer wins the auction you can direct them to a secure check out.
posted on December 7, 2002 07:41:45 PM new
I do offer PayPal in addition to my Merchant Account. More and more people pay us directly. We provide a link to our server (ssl) and it seems to be working quite well.
posted on December 8, 2002 09:14:57 PM new
Paypal is starting to piss me off. I only use Paypal for payments, and they default the payment type to withdraw directly from my checking account. I did revert to credit card each time I pay someone, so I just did 3 payments, one came up directly as credit card, the other 2 items as chekcing transfer !! Those are high priced items and I do not have enough fun in my checking account to cover it. My bank will charge me big money for NSF !
I sent a question to Paypal support and and them how I can either cancel or revert the type to credit card and here is an idiotic reply, I'm not sure which part of my e-mail they did not understand. Anyone having the same problems ??
> Dear Minh,
>
> Thank you for contacting PayPal.
>
> Once you have requested an electronic transfer or check withdrawal, it
> cannot be reversed. You must wait until the transaction has completed
> before sending the funds to a different destination.
>
> Please note that International members cannot request a check
> withdrawal.
> If you have any further questions, please feel free to contact us
> again.
>
> Sincerely,
> Jenelle
> PayPal Customer Service
>
> Original Message Follows:
> ------------------------
> Hi,
>
> My problem is I DID CHOOSE CREDIT CARD PAYMENT ON 3 TRANSACTIONS ! And
> only
> one of them comes up as credit card. The other 2 shows up as a direct
> withdrawal from my Bank !! I know exactly how to chose credit card, it's an
> error from your system and it does cost my money because I do not have
> enough
> fund in my checking account and the bank will charge me lots of fees for
> it.
> Can you somehow revert the payment back to my credit card ?? I've over
> $2000
> in Christmas shopping from Ebay and I do not want to pay any users and will
> go
> the check way, if I cannot make sure that my credit card payments will come
> up
> as credit card and not a direct withdrawal from my bank.
> This is so frustrating, I want to use Paypal for all my business, but
> now
> I'll have to evaluate other options.
>
> Regards,
> -Minh Lai
