Paypal Personal Account Fees

I tried searching CPF & CPFMP but couldn't find a thread. If there is one please point me to it.

Well as of yesterday cash payments for goods to a Paypal personal account is no longer free. Now it's only free if you send payment as "personal". Send it as goods (invloving a sale as we do here) & you will get charged.

"4.2 Receiving Payments for Commercial Transactions and Personal Transactions.

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a. Fees depend on whether you are making a commercial transaction or a personal transaction. A commercial transaction involves buying and selling goods or services, and payments received when you send a "request money" using PayPal. A personal transaction involves sending money to and receiving money from friends and family without making a purchase.
b. If you are selling goods or services, you may not ask the buyer to send you a personal payment for the purchase. If you do so, PayPal may remove your ability to accept personal payments."

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Policy Update

Thanks for the info - Not too suprised - eBay owns PayPal and eBay has been going down hill since Meg left as CEO - all kinds of bad changes. Guess they have to keep the stock investors happy with bigger profits somehow. If Google ever decides to do an auction site eBay will go down the tubes IMO. eBay and PayPal have made a lot of people mad. IMO they are only still in business because they are the biggest and were the first in both their respective arenas. That can change though - even more easily with PayPal. Google has already stepped up to that scene with Google Checkout.

Looks like now even if you send/receive (yes even sending) personal payment from anyone outside u.s. and canada there is a 1% fee.

https://www.paypal.com/row/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=p/gen/ua/policy_fees

Not to derail, but it seems to me a lot of people complain about paypal and their fees. I find it extremely convenient to be able to pay and receive money without having to get a money order or a check, have to buy a stamp, get an envelope for the check, etc. When you stop and think about it, the fees that they charge are worth a lot less than the time you waste running around mailing checks or money orders and the convenience of being able to send money isntantly.

But their fees are a moving target, and they aren't moving down.

true, I guess some good competition would keep fees more in check.
but if the alternative to mailing a check or MO is paying a few extra cents or even dollars per transaction, id take the extra fees.

I can even generate an e-check through my bank free of charge don't have to pay for a stamp or anything, but I still rather use paypal.

Here is a working link to their changed fee structure (see section 8). Did anyone get advance notice of this? I do not recall getting an email about these changes.

I agree PP is very convenient for the most part but it is getting very expensive for small dollar transactions especially. On a $10 cash transaction, the fees are now 0.59 (for US to US) which is 6% of pure profit for paypal. That is on top of the interest they make on your money when you keep a balance in their account. There is no longer any advantage to using cash transactions since they are as expensive as using a credit card.

I understand. But how much gas are you going to waste driving to your bank to deposit a MO or check? How much is your time worth to you?

It would be nice if the fees were lower, but at the end of the day most of us wouldn't be able to function as nicely with no paypal. So the alternative is not an option.

As a seller you can choose not to accept paypal payments, but then you will loose customers over it. I guess the only real options we have is to put up with it, or raise the prices accordingly.

Convenience is a hot commodity.

I use paypal to buy and sell and I did not receive a notice either.

PP *******s are charging another fee unless you mark the transfer as Personal! That's what I recommend we all do from now on if we are dealing with people we trust.

I am not giving away any more $$ than I have to!

problem is, if there is ever a problem and they find you you were selling and using personal, they may suspend your account. If there's a problem I don't see how the buyer would be protected if he doesn't mark " for goods or services " on the outgoing payment.

exodus125 said:

problem is, if there is ever a problem and they find you you were selling and using personal, they may suspend your account. If there's a problem I don't see how the buyer would be protected if he doesn't mark " for goods or services " on the outgoing payment.

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It seems the sender can choose who pays the fee, so I guess it's up to the sender to eat the fee and have protection or send it as personal and take the risk.

There are some other options, but I have not checked the pricing lately.

- PPal - kind of the standard
- Google checkout - about the same as visa fees I think
- Amazon pay - similar pricing
- Western union - on line transfer
- Get your own credit card acceptance account
- Wire transfer

Ebay is hard to beat for lower priced transactions. As the amount increases and the qty / month increases, PP becomes less competitive and wire transfer and having your own credit card acceptance becomes cheaper. I get paid every month via an international wire transfer, and it is MUCH cheaper than any other rmethod (about $ 70 with currency exchange), so way too much for a small transaction, but far cheaper than any other method.

I just checked the WU on-line transfer: $ 10 for a $ 100 payment.

I am kind of surprised in some ways that the CC companies have not done more to get CC acceptance by individuals to be more common. The price is not bad, but the monthly fees (even with no transactions) is painful.

It starts to help us all understand why some cultures developed the "money changers" business. Basically, you paid a person locally, he told his friend in another town to pay the person you owed the money to. Over time, the money moved around and back and forth enough to work out. It is all by the honor system, and of course, cheaters didn't last long.

Banks of course hated this sytem, and have done everything they can to get it banned.

sending or receiving personal payments.or money owed is free for me so why not use it more

TITAN1833 said:

sending or receiving personal payments.or money owed is free for me so why not use it more

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As far as I can tell from the fee schedule it's only if both parties are in either u.s. or canada. If one of the parties is outside there will be a fee regardless.

jzmtl said:

As far as I can tell from the fee schedule it's only if both parties are in either u.s. or canada. If one of the parties is outside there will be a fee regardless.

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maybe but! in the UK it's free either way





[edit] Actually shall we try this out now! PM me with your PP addy and I'll send a couple of $'s I would lilke it refunded tho :thinking:

jzmtl said:

As far as I can tell from the fee schedule it's only if both parties are in either u.s. or canada. If one of the parties is outside there will be a fee regardless.

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please let me know if you get the full $2 :twothumbs

Just tested with titan, a balance funded personal payment sent to my personal account has no fee.

Not sure if it's really this way or the new policy is not implemented yet. I don't think I'm reading it wrong, the wording is:

Personal Transactions. Fees depend on the payment source that the sender selects. The amount of the fee will be shown at the time the payment is sent. This Fee is paid by either the sender or the recipient. The sender decides who pays.

Domestic Personal Transactions – Canadian or U.S. sender and recipient.
Payment Fully Funded by PayPal Balance or Bank Payment
Sending / Receiving Free


International Personal Transactions – The sender or recipient is outside Canada or the U.S.
Payment fully funded by PayPal Balance or Bank
Sending / Receiving
This fee is based on the country of the recipient.

Recipient's Country:

Australia 1%

Canada 1%

China 0%

Germany 2%

Hong Kong 0%

Singapore 0%

Taiwan 0%

U.S 1%

Elsewhere 0.5%

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Sgt. LED said:

PP *******s are charging another fee unless you mark the transfer as Personal! That's what I recommend we all do from now on if we are dealing with people we trust.

I am not giving away any more $$ than I have to!

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I just tried to pay someone under Personal and its asking me again for my Bank info. Yes this is real Paypal but I have no idea what they are doing! I'll check and report back.

EDIT:

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Does the sender's mailing address still show if you select personal transfer and does it still allow you to print a shipping label?