posted on October 6, 2000 10:52:09 PM
Don't take this personally, but I believe anyone who signs up with PayPal is a fool.
Read about all of the personal intrusions they are making. New ones week to week!
In this world of shared info. there is already toooo much info about us floating around for all to see. Why add to it?
PayPal IS NOT a bank, yet they are acting as one. Something really stinks about that. I wouldn't touch them with a 10 foot pole. Not with my money, not with anybody's.
They're just another internet company that sounded like a good idea, but are really not able to pull it off effectively and efficiently. Too many holes and drawbacks.
Look at what is happening to Amazon and Priceline. The Emperor has no clothes!
When the PayPal ship starts to founder, my money will be safe and sound SOMEWHERE ELSE!
I have successfully executed far too many transactions the "old fashioned way" to worry about this.
Items vary greatly in condition and starting price and bidder activity, so this notion that anyone has to "worry" about losing bidders to PayPal sellers is mere propaganda.
posted on October 6, 2000 11:02:09 PM
Well I like Paypal and so do my customers so I will continue to use them. I have had SEVERAL customers tell me they wouldn't have bid if I didn't accept Paypal. My customers love the convenience. Besides - I don't like waiting for payments in the mail that never arrive.
____________________________________
The only place you'll find success before work is in the dictionary.
posted on October 6, 2000 11:13:51 PM
I second the vote for PayPal. At first I was skeptical but now I like PayPal better than Billpoint. PayPal has been very fair to me and their policies seem to be very well thought-out. BTW I tried a "real" online bank called NetBank that was a disaster for me and their online bill payment system was so bad that I got a credit black-eye out of it through no fault of my own. PayPal is absolutely professional compared to NetBank in my opinion and PayPal even has a real human being that you can talk to for service questions on the phone and they are readily available without going through tons of menus. PayPal even responded to an email that I sent them and this was absolutely astounding to me. Yes, PayPal gets an A++ from me and I am by no means an easy customer either (I admit it
posted on October 6, 2000 11:21:38 PM
I have a vote for PayPal. I love it as a buyer mostly because I can get my items faster, as a seller I also like it I wish more people would use it. It keeps my house a little cleaner. If buyers would use PayPal
they would have their item in 4 days if mailed out the next day after auction closes.
posted on October 7, 2000 06:14:23 AM
I WANT to like PayPal, but I can't afford their new commission structure. I'm just an eBay hobbyist, but am I to understand that if I accept any money for a purchase, I'm now a "business?"
Others have suggested that I'd have to have $500 coming in in a month before I was considered a "business," is this true?
posted on October 7, 2000 06:23:27 AM
Jeeeeeez.... that's not sounding very promising. My last batch I sold 4 items, and ALL my bidders paid via PayPal...
Do you have a URL that will take me directly to PayPal's explaination? I keep searching but can't find that criteria.
So, what do I do? add 1.9% to the buyer? Would a buyer be willing to pay the increase for the ease of paying that way?
Or do I just STOP accepting PayPal? >sigh< too bad... it was pretty cool.
posted on October 7, 2000 06:26:42 AM
There is no free lunch. A normal business is in the business of making money. Someone got to pay for the operation AND the profit. No one is in the business of just give services and goods aways without ever making money. Paypal is a business. Why should we expect Paypal to be any different.
posted on October 7, 2000 09:45:48 AM
Pochwaman -- I'm in the process of disengaging from my *fool* status . I've asked for a bank transfor for my remaining $6.16 and once that's complete, I'm closing it. Nope, I don't even trust them to mail me a check for the balance.
These personal intrusions are indeed worrisome. I want none of it. I almost closed my account (intended to) after the upgrade fiasco, but hung on a little, tho esp. after that kept my account in the very low double digits.
Equally troublesome to me is the overall tone, arrogance, lack of customer orientation, silence when problems surface, obfuscation, doublespeak, and on and on. I cannot / will not support a company like that. Nor will I give them the chance to *suspect* fraud in connection with my account and funds.
More and more people will eventually wake up. Word will continue to spread about their practices. Will the exodus ever close them down? Um, probably not. But I do believe, as I like to say, that "Time wounds all heals." LOL.
The amazing thing to me is that the email I got in response to the question about how to close my account was the NICEST, MOST customer-oriented thing I've seen or received from them. Too little, too late, but at least it was amusing. I wonder that they haven't found a way to prevent people from closing their accounts. Maybe that's next.
BTW, for those interested, you can close your account by going into your Profile (sorta hidden away). They snail mail you a check for your balance. I'm taking my balance first (electronic transfer), then closing it.
posted on October 7, 2000 10:35:36 AM
the fee for paypal business account is a quarter for all transaction $15 or less.
less then the ebay listing fee on $10 or $15
the average hobbiest selling on ebay would rarely have over $500 in Credit cards transaction in 6 month remember money paid from buyer bank accounts and paid from paypal balances dont count against the $500 limit.
They are not after this seller but they are after the sellers with thousands of item listed with hundereds in paypal tranactions weekly.
For those Who say paypal is not a bank yet they try to to act like one.
many of the Mortgage leanders and home equity lenders out there are not banks either yet look at the information you give them and you trust these people to hold a leans on what for most is the most valuable thing you own.
Many of the new car finance lenders also are not bank no more one who will loan to high risk Borrowers many are people like you and me with some money they are willing to take more of a risk with for the higher returns.
yes they are Licensed paypal too is Licensed and must live up to california law as a credit card merchant.
Face it credit card transactions are costly they gambled more people would keep balances then happened. They have 4 million users and growing they cant earn money on float if funds are removed nearly as soon as they hit paypal they must stay there at least 1 month to earn anything.
take the lowest credit card merchants fee mulitply this by 40 or 50 million transaction weekly if all balances arent staying in paypal accounts for a min of 30 days they are not makeing this in legal float its what they are loseing to fund our sales but it dont stop there even there is the $5 sign up bounuses as well staff to pay price it cost to make out thousands of checks daily.
remember ebay is not the only place paypal is offered all auction sites have sellers and buyer useing and lots offer it as a credit card method on web sites. check out IRC these people use paypal bounuses on IRC channels to fund IRC channel partys for hundered not only that they use paypal $5 sign up bonuses as a way to fumd a trip for a single user.
many MLMs use palpay $5 bonus as a way to make hundereds and thousand in free money.
there are people useing this to make cash advances. money launder and god knows what else.
this thing they are doing is buy no means the simple easy way for buyer and seller to tranfer money any more.
there is loads of internet web businesses loseing money going out of business and its mainly cause of millions of people not willing to buy or pay.
in this paypal issue auction sellers are sounding like auction buyers who complain about starting bid being to high, shipping and handleing being outragious.
They are complaining that the rare anitques or collectables they bid on that was 30 to 150 years old dont look new freash from the factory when if it did look as new as today it would more then likely be a fake or reproduction not worth what they paid.
all know that to make money you must spend money. The more you spend the better you will look and the more you will make in the end.
When you sit at your computer and type things like I cant afford paypals fee which is small .25 for $15 and under and 1.9% for over that.
If I was a buyer reading this I would be questioning if you cant afford this bit how will you be able to ship my Item even if they pay with check or credit card there is a 5 to 10 day delay in getting funds shipping and packageing cost must come out of that pocket that cant afford the quater that in the end is paid by there bidder.
I know I am a small Time seller and I have had up to $200 just in shipping cost come out of pocket some weeks before I see a penny in my bank account from these sales.
If Sellers or buyer want any online business to survive one more year they must start helping by paying there way the free ride only lasts untill the venture capital runs out if you want things free really forever, forever can be now defined as a year or less as there is less venture capitalist willing to take the risk now in online business.
This everything must always be free on the net additude and mantality is not just effecting big business like ebay price line and disney look at the surf for pay MLM programs they are droping like flys too now that users must click banners and buy and veiw to be paid look at these boards look at your auctions its effecting all big time.
remember the days before venture capital and IPOs when you had to go in your pocket to pay for domain name registration and web hosting and ISP fees work your but off getting all this to pay for its self.
Now no one wants to work they want free registration free hosting free ISP keep in mind if you want a business and your not paying how can you exspect people to pay to buy from you.
and buyers need to think too if they are not will to pay for our services soon they wont be offered business is about the flow of money for goods and services it not about how much you can get for nothing to near nothing.
posted on October 7, 2000 10:40:43 AM
The idea of losing customers if you don't do some kind of instant payment program is not propaganda. You will lose customers. Especially Christmas customers. Ebay is quite seasonal. Blowing Christmas could cut a year's Ebay income in half.
I'm a buyer. I'm running against a deadline for my purchases. Right now, I'm within 11 days of ending my holiday shopping.
It takes WAY too long waiting around for checks to clear some tiny bank & grill in Armpit, Wyoming. I don't feel like spending a premium to buy money orders, not to mention the annoyance of driving to the post office, parking, walking half a mile, then standing in line behind a guy with plumber butt for twenty minutes. If I wanted to do all that, I could shop at the mall and save money as well as aggravation.
Paypal is comfortably in the lead with respect to registered users. I look for Paypal auctions. I don't have time to register elsewhere, wait for validation and go through all that again. New companies might be okay for next year. Right now, Paypal is it. I doubt seriously that the Chase Manhattan of Europe will founder any time soon.
Sellers would have fewer worries about this if they would obey one of the first rules of business: do not commingle business funds with personal. There's no good reason why a mistake at Paypal should lead to your grocery checks bouncing. That doesn't make good business sense.
Look around -- most small businesses do a substantial business with credit cards. Paypal might be the very best merchant account most small sellers at Ebay will ever qualify for. Do it in a professional way and the errors and mishaps that are natural to giant enterprise will not be devastating. Losing 20-50% of your potential business could be.
posted on October 7, 2000 01:09:57 PM
PAYPAL isnt the only game in town we know that they know that.
The thing is this just dumping paypal and going with a new free service isnt the answer either after all it took a year to build a paypal custumer base.
Not to mention these other services wont be free for to long either they all these new small services are gona jump on the fee band wagon some faster then paypal there the funding just isnt out there to give things away the way it was a year ago.
for the next 4 to 8 months we are going to be hearing this service and that services that was free now sucks and they dare to charge more then paypal and offer less service.
we are going to be hearing many sellers who just drop paypal complaining sales are down more credit card payments are way down buyer are slower sending money orders and checks we are going to here a lot more about bounced checks and loseing money on bank charges.
and for what reason because no one wanted to pay the average .25 to .90 paypal fee for there transactions.
I for one can feel the economy slipping down more every month and this christmas season after the election will tell the tail.
IT took over a year for High gas and energy costs tax incresses insane lawsuits on the Tabbacco industry and microsoft and the like to take its toll but it has finilly started to hit every home and job in the USA.
I work in a factory and here is the fact orders are down even for every day consumer products many which can be consider ressesion proof no orders no work no work no money no jobs.
any one ever heard of owens cornning you know the fiber glass people yesterdays paper business section this huge mega corp that has over 5.8 billion in sales yearly filed chapter 11.
when technology stock like microsoft and intell dell apple start giveing earnings warning every quarter you know there is trouble heading to this online paradise as well.
I think all are far to fast to rock the paypal gravy line were heading for hard times why risk the buyer base we already have its thining out enough daily as it is .
posted on October 7, 2000 01:22:53 PM
According to the American Heritage Dictionary -
Lie:
1. A false statement deliberately presented as being true.
2. Something meant to deceive or give a wrong impression.
Lied, Lying, Lies:
1. To present false information with the intention of deceiving.
I don’t think PayPal lied about always being free by these definitions. I believe that their initial intent was to make enough money on fund floats to be a free service. I do not believe that they had the intent, from the beginning, to charge fees at a later date. I also believe that this flawed business model bit them in the wallet and there was no way to stay in business without charging fees.
This is part of why I don’t get emotional about the great PayPal “lie.” I was extremely skeptical of the fund float business model from the start. I didn’t believe they could make it work. My impression was that there were a bunch of idiots running the company and that it couldn’t possibly survive.
I waited quite awhile before I signed up and I did so only because of the increased numbers of customers requesting to use the service. Since I still didn’t believe that they could make it work in the long run, I made it a practice of withdrawing every payment I received as soon as I could. But I actually feel much better about the longterm survival of the company since they started charging fees. It shows that their management has finally removed their craniums from their behinds. It is apparent that they have finally learned how to read a balance sheet.
There is a lot of hysteria going on in these forums over a single reported case of apparent withdrawals from a banking account. These one-sided reports are being used as further proof that PayPal is a “lying and cheating dog” (an actual quote from an online forum by the way). I will personally wait until I see the reason for the withdrawal before I judge. I refuse to make the automatic assumption that PayPal is “lying again.” There are a number of scenarios for how this could have occurred and by no means are all of them directly due to those “liars at PayPal.”
As for the other reported problems with PayPal (freezing accounts, etc.), I have no doubt that these have occurred. They are clearly indicative of a company that is still learning how to execute their business in a professional manner. They show me that PayPal is still in the learning curve, not that they are some unfeeling corporate pig using their greedy muscle to squash the little guy.
Many of you won’t agree with me, so be it. You are as entitled to your opinion as I am to mine. But I am amazed at the vindictiveness of a significant number of posts. It is alright to feel you have been lied to, it is okay to feel your trust was abused, but isn’t there a line that shouldn’t be crossed? Isn’t it unhealthy to become fixated on this situation? I am not accusing any particular individual. But stand back for a moment and read some of the thread titles and some of the posts in them, whoa, calm down before you give yourself ulcers or a heart attack.
Dr. Beetle
As the Human Torch used to say: Flame On! (Donning my asbestos jammies)
"the average hobbiest selling on ebay would rarely have over $500 in Credit cards transaction in 6 month"
It would be nice to be able to test that theory. 3 $10 payments per week would be $720 in 6 months which put's you over by $220. I wonder what percentage of payments come from balance payments as opposed to credit card payments?
posted on October 7, 2000 06:31:04 PM
I've been a PayPal critic since the Upgrade-or-Lie fiasco, but today after posting what I did earlier about being in the process of closing my account, I have made an even larger shift in my thinking and attitude. I have no more interest in expressing much about my own *opinions* about PayPal nor in trying to any extent to dissuade people from using PayPal. Every one should make up their own minds.
My new attitude: this is MUCH more serious than I could have imagined.
The one thing I will do is strongly encourage PayPal supporters to read two current threads here in the Partners board:
My Paying for PayPal's and X.Com's Error
and
PayPal Lawsuit
Continue to use PayPal, but at least do so in an informed way. Knowledge really is power.
posted on October 7, 2000 06:56:41 PM
"Do it in a professional way and the errors and mishaps that are natural to giant enterprise will not be devastating."
"They are clearly indicative of a company that is still learning how to execute their business in a professional manner."
And you want to PAY this outfit? I'm putting my money where the professionals are.
PayPal/x.com is not a giant enterprise. It has a few hundred employees, hardly bigtime. I'm easing my customers into other credit card payment methods. Yes, they will cost me more money. But they're run by professionals, who already know how to execute their business in a professional manner. Why should I put myself and my customers' at any potential risk? I don't want them blaming me when some really big PayPal fiasco comes along. The potential is too great with this little company.
You really do get what you pay for.
posted on October 7, 2000 07:16:51 PM
I know that as a buyer, I like the use of my credit card. I'm more willing to bid on an auction that takes credit cards.
No matter what Paypal said to begin with, the sellers on ebay have used Paypal over the past few months and the buyers now want to use it for the convenience we're used to.
No writing, mailing or waiting for items.
The thing I WILL NOT DO is sign up for several different services that accept credit cards. I use Billpoint and Paypal. Won't give my information to any more services.
posted on October 7, 2000 09:13:20 PM
Hey, all you business and economics majors out there who think Paypal really intended to make money on the float, explain this:
It costs paypal 2% for every dollar that passes through their hands. The credit card companies charge them for this. If the average transaction sits in a PP account for a week, PP is paying over 100% APR for every dollar they get. In addition they paid millions of referal dollars, millions for verification (at over a buck per account), millions for their servers, programmers, support staff. They have to be tens of millions in the hole. How did they expect to get this back from the float? If they did, they're run by a bunch of idiots. If they knew in advance it wasnt true, they're run by a bunch of liars. Either way, they're not to be trusted.
I didnt care that paypal charged a fee. I dont care if paydirect, payplace, exchangepath etc start charging a fee. But dont lie to us, freeze accounts without so much as an email explaining why, give us the false security of "fraud protection" which doesnt seem to take place, promise us you wont go into our accounts but then you will "reverse payments" made months ago. http://www.ygoodman.com [email protected]
posted on October 7, 2000 09:16:34 PM
I like PayPal overall, but certain things bug me about them: 1) They keep my "balance" too high (I don't need that much $$ in there, and feel it is unsafe); 2) I wish they'd state the buyer's address in THREE LINES so I can cut & paste it for a printed address label easier. I also remember that it literally took their customer service dept. A MONTH to respond to emails several months ago--not happening now but always on my mind.
posted on October 7, 2000 11:01:52 PM
"A fool and his money are soon parted."
I was fine with the idea when paypal announced a business account that would charge fees but offer addditional value. But apparantly very few signed up for it opting for the free personal account. Now Paypal is using the strong arm approach. That's a sign of desperation. The red flags are waving high. Paypal is sinking, and your money could sink right along with them.
So much ruckus has been raised lately because it goes to show that many people are resisting these fees. They never expected them, and see no value by paying them. Small timers normally operate on smaller profit margins. 25¢ could represent another 2-5% taken out of their tiny profits. Profits that they need to put food on the table. Why do you think they went to paypals free service in droves? Most buinesses that could have afforded to already had merchant accounts or signed up with Billpay. What kind of market was paypal expecting when they offered free accounts? It's frightening to trust a company ran by incompetent people who have a poor marketing and business model that is doomed to failure.
posted on October 7, 2000 11:57:21 PM"Don't take this personally, but I believe anyone who signs up with PayPal is a fool."
Hey, no problem... as long as you don't take this personally. I don't believe those that would rather go out to the post office to purchase a money order instead of using a few keystrokes to pay for an auction saving time and money were the brightest bulbs on the tree.
Maybe email payments are bogus... yeah... I don't see any other companies trying to offer the same things, okay, maybe one, or two, or three, or four, or... my goodness you know what? I think email payments are a welcomed option by a lot of folks judging from the actions in the marketplace.
PayPal, PayMe, PayPlace, eMoneyMail, MoneyZap, PayDirect, ExchangePath, etc. etc.
Even the USPS is developing a person to person pay service. You can deny their approach, existence, success, or validity all you want, just don't get in their way, the email payment services are here to stay.
So far the Amish community seems to be the biggest holdout on email payment services.
posted on October 8, 2000 12:14:18 AM
I just read the Lawsuit thread and noticed something that concerned me.
"We received a complaint from another PayPal user regarding merchandise not received or received not-as-described."
I thought they were not getting involved in NOT AS DESCRIBED disputes. Is this another new change? It seems that you cannot believe a word you hear from this company.
