Paypal Fees
 

I am looking at buying some stuff online, used wheels, and the guy wants to go through paypal. I look into it some and it says the buyer never pays a fee. Guy is saying I need to pay the fees or gift the money to him to avoid the fees, which seems a bit fishy to me. Reasonable, not out of the ordinary, on price and shipping. As I understand it, paypal would give me some sort of protection if stuff is not as advertised, but how strong is that?


What does the brain trust say?

As a seller, I would never consider asking that the buyer cough up the fees associated with listing the adds. Shipping is usually paid for by the buyer.

PP will take a small percent out of the amount you send him.

That's what he means by you paying "X" amount more to make up what they take out.

I wouldn't do the "gift" thing.

Without knowing more than what you posted, perhaps you could split the difference on the fees to make the deal work (?)

On Ebay he can get into trouble for it. Its not really all that unusual to ask for credit card / paypal fee's. I don't do it but some sellers do. Paypal may not protect you if your buying off craigslist

Sometimes when advertising big ticket items like guitars, seller will state in ad that 3% will be added to price to cover Paypal fees. He should have stated that upfront. If you "gift" him the money Paypal will not cover you in the event of damage, misrepresented items, etc.

He's not talking about paying for the ad.

It's the % PP charges to do the transaction.

Who pays for shipping depends on the terms stated on the classified. It varies depending on the terms stated.

The seller should calculate fees in the asking price. Asking to be compensated after the fact is a douche nozzle request.

Sending a PayPal as a gift negates any buyer protection.

Fees sent out of the country are higher to the seller.

I've bought and sold several items over the last couple of weeks.

As a seller I have never asked for the buyer to cover the fee's and have voluntarily paid the fee when I'm the buyer.

Couple of reasons, when you do the family cash / gift thing as a buyer you have no protection. Is 3% worth it to you for peace of mind?

Other reason is PayPal, as much as they can suck, are offering a service, they are entitled to the fee.

Use a credit card when paying via paypal. It gives you greatest protection to chargeback a payment.

It is fairly common to ask for fees but more often, it is absorbed by seller. If the seller has a good reputation, gift isn't a problem. However, I wouldn't do that with a stranger for sake of 3% saving

It common on the canon camera sites to paypal gift or add 3%. I just add the 3%. Also if you do use gift with a cc, pp will add about 3% to your bill

Yeah because they have to process the transaction for you which will cost them $0.10-0.15 and 1.5% of the transaction.

I would like to know how to create a paypal competitor. Could start micro right here on classifieds with 2% fee, grow a little and them offer temporal lower rate packages to build some volume.

This is about how I had it figured. He did not ask about fees until I was talking about getting them. Price plus shipping is $1040, I offered a grand even in the response to his asking about PP fees.

The gift thing, no way I expose myself like that for a mere 4%.

You could probably create a competitor with a new email address, don't know if the would take a PO box for an address.

I presume I still get the protection if I use their service, even if not a member.

Because you can't get the transaction rate from CC providers that would make it break even much less profitable. You could not make it work at even 3%.

Like gas stations it's a volume business, the margins are pennies so you need to do volume.

He could have asked for a USPS money order...
I have only "gifted" one large transaction in the past. I trusted the guy completely, but he did come with a laundry list of credible references.

Ohhhhhh It's free for both of you guys if you have money in your paypal balance account...

If you are a buyer and have money in your paypal account to cover the full amount, or have money in a bank account to cover the full amount, you do not pay a fee.

If you are the buyer and use a linked credit card to cover the amount, you will be charged a fee.

If you are a seller, either way you are charged a fee. The only way to avoid the fee is to receive the money as a "gift," which removes certain protections. Also it is technically a violation of their user agreement to use the gift option to pay for things and if you do it a lot they may flag you.

As a seller, you need to sort out shipping and any added fees up-front. Typically when I sell on eBay I assume that I'll eat the paypal fees, and I list a fixed shipping amount. No muss, no fuss, and as long as I guess right about the shipping cost I'm fine.

We will see what he says, I offered to pay a quarter of the fee. I am not in any rush to get new wheels and can wait if that is what it takes. I guess I could create an account and put the dough in there for this, but that seems like too much trouble for too little money.

Yeah, I get that. We pay 2.9% for nano business, some of my stores pay 2.1% for micro business. My sense is you could get to 1.5% at 10% of Paypal's current volume.

Square is 2.75% if you want to do direct purchase transactions. I do them sometimes. PayPal & eBay "protections" are more hype than substance, IMHO. I don't think they're worth nearly the amount of self-promotion they do about them.

I've never had a problem yet (knock wood).

But you'd still need world class web security and the long history paypal has to be competitive. I'd venture you couldn't make a run at them without investing at least several hundred K, and even then you'd better have a revolutionary concept, not just a lower fee.