Thread: PayPal fees

Thank you for posting this.

They say you can't get blood out of a turnip but our governments and businesses have figured out how. It's everywhere, we as friends can't even barter with each other without having to pay someone.

It's like everything, we give a little and THEY take a lot.

Greed in human nature.

Quite, but half the fun in life is trying to beat the system

Originally Posted by gregs656

Makes a big difference if you sell a lot of stuff, not just on here but in general. I think paypal might price them selves out of the market if they're not careful, it only takes someone to set up the same gig, they might keep the ebay sales but it's getting a bit out of hand otherwise. IMO anyway.

It's 3%, if you sell for profit you should have figured it in your business expenses - any other electronic processing option costs more.
The more you sell the bigger your expenses, but the bigger your profits too.

Google has the exact same fee structure - they had them lower for few years, the first year was even free, but that didn't get them any significant market share.

Now there is always the option of doing it by check and most banks don't charge fees for that. If the convenience and the larger market of electronic transaction is not worth the 3% overhead, it's even easier to not use it.

I use it a lot, buy and sell, so I get hammered. Lot's of folks charge you extra for if you use Paypal.

Originally Posted by gugi

It's 3%, if you sell for profit you should have figured it in your business expenses

Absolutely.

However, if 3% can become 0%, I'm signing up.

Do what you will, I did not intend this to get into specifics or a debate, you either choose to use it or you do not.

As far as customs fees go, you don't have to use a customs form in the US if the items is sent first class and weighs less than 16oz. If you get insurance or anything like that you have to declare the value, obviously. The actual rule is "non-dutiable" items weighing less then 16oz, but the post office I go told me not to bother filling one out a form for the items I was shipping ("you don't need that"). They didn't even ask what it was. You may have to argue with the post office guy though, not all of them know this rule.

"A customs form is not required on the following categories of mail:

Non-dutiable First Class Mail International items that weigh less than 16 ounces.
Non-dutiable First Class Mail International items that weigh 16 ounces or more when they are tendered by a known mailer (tenders volume mailings through a Business Mail Entry Unit or other bulk mail acceptance location; completes a statement of mailing at the time of entry; pays postage through an advance deposit account; and utilizes a permit imprint as an indication of postage payment. International Surface Air Lift and International Priority Airmail customers and federal, state, and local government entities are considered to be "known mailers" for this purpose)."


From this: USPS - Customs

I charge a little extra due to paypal fees.
it's just the cost of doing business.

EDIT

BUT I WENT AND LOOKED AND THERE IS A PERSONAL BUTTON

FROM NOW ON IF YOU BUY FROM ME CLICK PERSONAL IN PAYPAL

going to list stuff now and make an extra $6 heh heh heh

I made a payment last night and chose the personal tab. I chose the "other" option within the personal tab, but some other choices included Gift, Living Expense, Payment Owed, and Cash Advance. After the payment I got a message from paypal that said that the payment was free and that there were no fees for sender or recipient. It mentioned that it was because it was a personal payment and that I used a bank account.

I think we are fine. As long as people now choose the new personal tab and use an option there, it doesn't seem like it's any different than before.

Hopefully gratewhitehuntr can verify that there were in fact no fees as paypal stated.

Just wanted to let everyone know that it seems like the personal tab workaround is no problem. You do still need to use a bank account transfer though.

AOL has started a competitor to Paypal. It might work for us in the classifieds.

I have looked it over, but would like to see what others think of it. It isn't clear if it is also overseas, but I have emailed them with that question.

Free enterprise should benefit both seller and buyer. If the seller isn't making the money off their investment they need for feel they could/should be making. They are free to raise fees, price, etc. If the users of that service feel the fees or prices are too high. They can take their business elsewhere. It is important to make sure that there are viable alternatives.

How much do you think IE would cost without free competitors? how much would MS Office cost without lower cost or free competitors?

Paypal is going to make these charges because they can and are in a place of market dominance. If there continues to be no competition, there will be further increases in fees. I have no doubt.

So looking around for alternatives makes sense to 1) make sure there is a viable competitor to Paypal and 2) Try and save our membership money.

The best thing I have found is:
https://www.revolutionmoneyexchange.com/

It was started by AOL which I see as a positive. Not because AOL is any better than Paypal, but because they are big enough and have enough financial backing to be seen by Paypal as a legit contender.

Paypal is not going to notice what we do. We are way too small for them to notice in their aggregate statistics. They certainly won't see the difference unless large numbers of groups like ours do the same.

If, however, someone were to send a message to thier customer service to say we are a group of x persons and have done y dollars worth of business through our classifieds - most using Paypal. This group has reached a decision that due to a continual rise in fees (the latest changes being the last straw) we are switching over to z service. Our membership will probably make this suggestion to other communities to which they are members. We are hopeful that this will spread rapidly through the virtual world.

Py (rabble rouser at large, believer in the keeping the free market free and person with a serious bug up his ***)