This is the top article today on Digg.com...about how Paypal decided to add fees to personal transactions without letting anyone know about it.
The short article is a little confusing actually in terms of fee discussions, but one thing is clear: Paypal is dipping a little further into everyone's pockets these days.
The funny thing is that it's almost become standard practice for people to charge a 4% paypal fee on top of the price they're asking (in all forums, not just SZ) and I think it's laughable.
I've reach price agreements with sellers before where you agree on a price and then they send an invoice and add 4% to the agreed price 'because of paypal fees.' And then I've agreed to not buy the item because I don't agree with that kind of business approach.
If you're selling something, as the seller...you initiate the transaction by placing something for sell and I think any and all paypal fees should be the responsibility of the seller.
It certainly shouldn't be added to an agreed price after the fact, especially when you haven't mentioned anything about additional paypal fees. It comes off as sketchy and like you're trying to milk an additional amount of money from a buyer after the fact.
But I'm not writing to bitch about personal practices in classifieds selling.
I'm wondering about this 'new' fee that didn't exist before apparently that exists now that everyone was apparently paying for before.
Right now, it appears that the 'new' fee is .30 + 2.9% between personal accounts for 'goods' and 'services.' That's DOMESTIC transfers. Overseas transactions are subject to 3.9% + .30.
I've been using Paypal for about 10 years now and I've still never really figured out their mysterious fee rates.
There was a time when if you paid from a balance, there was no charge to transfer that money to another account. That was their way of encouraging people to keep the money they made in the paypal system.
And I've heard discussion about higher rates (that 4% fee I mentioned earlier) from credit card payments but I don't believe there is any truth to the idea that you are charged more to receive payments from a credit card as opposed to a pre-existing balance or a checking account.
One thing is for sure: It would be nice to see people migrate over to Google checkout but I'm not sure how their protection policies are.
Safety is THE number one concern for me as both a buyer and seller in open forums like the ones we use to buy/sell clothing but you have to adhere to a pretty strict set of guidelines set by Paypal or you don't really have any protection at all.
So the reason I bring this up in a fashion forum is because almost all of us use paypal, on SZ and off to buy clothing from various sources.
Does anyone really understand how their fee rates are determined? Does it concern you at all as a buyer or a seller?
Were you guys aware that there was no previous fee to send money from one personal account to another personal account if it was a 'good' or a 'service?'
I've never found anything on Paypal about 'credit card payments' causing a 4% increase in the fee a seller pays to accept the payment. In fact, there's little discrepancy at all between where that money comes from that goes to the seller.
Before the changes made recently, wasn't the 4% extra fee charged after the fact really just that: An additional needless charge?
The only reason I see this as a fairly pressing issue is because most of us use paypal regularly to buy clothes but very few of us actually understand how it works, what the fees are and how those fees are applied.
Here's the digg submission and here's the actual page.
The short article is a little confusing actually in terms of fee discussions, but one thing is clear: Paypal is dipping a little further into everyone's pockets these days.
The funny thing is that it's almost become standard practice for people to charge a 4% paypal fee on top of the price they're asking (in all forums, not just SZ) and I think it's laughable.
I've reach price agreements with sellers before where you agree on a price and then they send an invoice and add 4% to the agreed price 'because of paypal fees.' And then I've agreed to not buy the item because I don't agree with that kind of business approach.
If you're selling something, as the seller...you initiate the transaction by placing something for sell and I think any and all paypal fees should be the responsibility of the seller.
It certainly shouldn't be added to an agreed price after the fact, especially when you haven't mentioned anything about additional paypal fees. It comes off as sketchy and like you're trying to milk an additional amount of money from a buyer after the fact.
But I'm not writing to bitch about personal practices in classifieds selling.
I'm wondering about this 'new' fee that didn't exist before apparently that exists now that everyone was apparently paying for before.
Right now, it appears that the 'new' fee is .30 + 2.9% between personal accounts for 'goods' and 'services.' That's DOMESTIC transfers. Overseas transactions are subject to 3.9% + .30.
I've been using Paypal for about 10 years now and I've still never really figured out their mysterious fee rates.
There was a time when if you paid from a balance, there was no charge to transfer that money to another account. That was their way of encouraging people to keep the money they made in the paypal system.
And I've heard discussion about higher rates (that 4% fee I mentioned earlier) from credit card payments but I don't believe there is any truth to the idea that you are charged more to receive payments from a credit card as opposed to a pre-existing balance or a checking account.
One thing is for sure: It would be nice to see people migrate over to Google checkout but I'm not sure how their protection policies are.
Safety is THE number one concern for me as both a buyer and seller in open forums like the ones we use to buy/sell clothing but you have to adhere to a pretty strict set of guidelines set by Paypal or you don't really have any protection at all.
So the reason I bring this up in a fashion forum is because almost all of us use paypal, on SZ and off to buy clothing from various sources.
Does anyone really understand how their fee rates are determined? Does it concern you at all as a buyer or a seller?
Were you guys aware that there was no previous fee to send money from one personal account to another personal account if it was a 'good' or a 'service?'
I've never found anything on Paypal about 'credit card payments' causing a 4% increase in the fee a seller pays to accept the payment. In fact, there's little discrepancy at all between where that money comes from that goes to the seller.
Before the changes made recently, wasn't the 4% extra fee charged after the fact really just that: An additional needless charge?
The only reason I see this as a fairly pressing issue is because most of us use paypal regularly to buy clothes but very few of us actually understand how it works, what the fees are and how those fees are applied.
Here's the digg submission and here's the actual page.
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