paypal

[B. Newman]

Maybe this should be on the computer forum, but it is business related.

I did a search on paypal and the only hits came up as slight references to it. Do any of you use paypal for payment of any kind. (Maybe John Ranes? Or anybody who sells online.)

I just had a customer ask for their invoice via e-mail, which I did through my QB software (it was soooo cool!) And I saw that I can accept paypal through Intuit (QB) for $14.95 per month.

Thinking about it... Any war stories or advice?

Betty

[Elaine]

I've used it to buy things on ebay - at first it was a bank account wire transfer, now you can set up credit cards to pay with. Not sure, but it may depend on the vendor and their capabilities. I had no qualms about it, but some people might. I guess I would have to justify selling enough online in order to pay for the service.

my 2 cents

[Mitch]

I tried to use it starting last march, to pay for something on ebay. I made a typo in my home address- the bank wouldn't verify my address. I then had to go through a verification process. a real PITA. I would much rather use my credit card.

[jvandy57]

Betty,
I've used PayPal for several years. I have never had a bad experience with them. It will cost you a little to get the premier service, but it's worth it.

[B. Newman]

Just to clarify - I am wanting to use it as the "merchant" not as the consumer (although I do want to know those experiences as well so I'll know how my customers might react.)

Betty

[Flintstone]

I don't use paypal, but I have heard some not-so-great stuff about the merchant side. I read somewhere that they were not passing the funds on to the merchants (sellers) in a timely manner. It will take me some time to remember where the heck I read that,but in the meantime here's a line to the Consumers Affairs site:

http://consumeraffairs.com/online/paypal_02.html

Also if you google "paypal complaints", there is alot of stuff there.

[MatFramer]

I am using Paypal regularly. In fact, I now have it set up to take payments; and I have a debit card set up that I am using to pay invoices. I use the debit just like a credit card. I also have a regular customer that I mail to nearly every month. We do all the transactions by PayPal.

So far, I haven't had any bad experiences. The payments do sometimes take a couple days before they are in the account, but that was true of my charge card machine also.

I would say, try it and see how it works for you!

Candy

[Framerguy]

Betty,

I have used PayPal for about 4 years and have had no problems with it. I don't pay a per month premium though, just a percentage of sales when they are made.

I have to request that the funds be wire transferred to my bank account. I didn't know that you could set up PayPal to automatically transfer funds.

It is a bit higher than using a credit card merchant service or another online service but, if you aren't making regular sales on the web, you don't pay for any months that have no sales and that is a savings in my opinion. After your sales become more frequent, you can request that the account be set up on a monthly premium plan and your rate will go down accordingly.

Framerguy

[Mike Labbe @ GTP]

I have used Paypal since the start, and have never had a problem with it. It doesn't offer the same consumer protection as a card, but its good enough for small items on Ebay. I believe PayPal is now owned by Ebay.

Having a regular account is free to send or accept payments, but if you plan to get serious about it they have corporate accounts that have a monthly associated fee. The free accounts have some sort of monthly limit.

Mike

[Bill Henry-]

If you do a fair number of e-sales, it would probably be worth it, but if you are a brick and morter company like (I suspect) the majority of us, it may be redundant since you’re likely already paying a premium for credit card services.

[B. Newman]

Originally posted by Bill Henry:
but if you are a brick and morter company like (I suspect) the majority of us, Bill, I am more of a "wood and gravel" company ;) (rural and farm located...) and I do a fair amount of credit card sales, but I also do quite a bit of mail order as well. Right now, I don't have a "shopping cart" system for the website, but the customer phones, faxes, or e-mails the order along with the cc card number. (E-mail orders sometimes split the card number between 2 e-mails for security. Does that really work, or is it false security?)

What I found yesterday was that I can e-mail an invoice through QuickBooks and receive payment via paypal back into QB. I didn't read it real close because I'm not ready to do it yet, but I suspect that the monthly charge is the Intuit (QB) charge for the money handling service, (of course sending the invoice via e-mail is free.)

One of my goals for the coming year is to take advantage of the website's capability. With almost no management whatsoever, I'm making quite a few online sales. Just think what it could be if I actually worked at it! :eek:

Thanks for all the input.

Betty

[John Ranes II, CPF, GCF]

Originally posted by B. Newman:
Just to clarify - I am wanting to use it as the "merchant" not as the consumer..........Betty,

If you're selling anything on Ebay, then Paypal is a logical and an obvious advantage. As most of us have posted, we have had positive experiences using Paypal as buyers.

If you have a real shopping cart on your website then odds are this will not be a key to success or an issue.

We are now in our third year of web sales, and have processed over 700 web orders and have never had a request or query for PayPal. Our cart accepts MasterCard, Visa, AMX and Discover, in both a secure and standard order form.

We do get some people who prefer to phone in orders, however.

Regards,

John

[ 12-09-2003, 10:52 PM: Message edited by: John Ranes II, CPF, GCF ]

[B. Newman]

Thanks John. I don't "ebay" at all (seldom even have time to look anymore.)

I don't have a shopping cart yet, and was thinking that when the orders came in, instead of running their cc and then shipping the order, I could just e-mail them the invoice, they could pay with paypal, then I would ship.

However, the more I think about it the more I think that (except for a cart system) the way I'm doing it is best anyway. Unless the customer already has a paypal account, they would have to create one before they purchased. That one extra step might be enough to derail some purchases. (Always make it easy, right? ;) )

I do appreciate all the info. Always looking and thinking of ways to do better.

Betty