Frustrated eBayer!!

David,

Getting irritated won't help you. Just give you an ulcer. A lot of people don't read the payment terms before bidding. After they bid and then see it their stuck and so are you. The best way to handle this is to first, in the description, and in red, put your sorry but you don't accept credit cards. If they still make an error send them an email advising them how they can correct the payment. This has always worked well for me. Just a suggestion.

catman

 

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I'm definately gonna have to make some changes on the way I sell things on eBay. But ya know, I don't know how much more clearer I can make my instructions. I think I managed to get rid of the PayPal logos. Now there is a logo I can use that doesn't have the credit card logos on it. Maybe then if they don't see a credit card logo then just maybe they won't use one. PayPal has the html code to cut and paste then I can add my own instructions along with it.

David

 

Since Ebay aquired PayPal and integrated them into the Payment Methods Accepted box, they made it a No-No to place any linked "Pay now with PayPal" type logo in the auction body itself (For obvious reasons, it leads to people making the transaction outside of Ebay). I'd suggest just leaving the PayPal logos out and state that you accept PayPal payments via Bank Funds transfer in the body of your auction and in the Seller's instructions, also including the email address you accept payment at, so the buyer can still make an immediate payment without any question as to whether they're sending to the 'correct' address or not.

 

wow... I failed to notice that I would need to upgrade my paypal account to take credit cards.

what sort of racket is that? that's ridiculous.

I hope none of my sales ends with a credit card payment! hehe...

 

Good advice, but the problem with displaying your email address for the Ebay world to see is the folks that are hunting email addresses to send their SPAM. My first Ebay ID included part of my Email address (name only), and I received hundreds of SPAM's each week offering wonderful things to help me with my Ebay sales and other things. After I changed my ID, these have mostly disappeared.

Another alternative is to remove all the PAYPAL reference/logos and provide your regular payment info in text on the auction page, then email clear payment instructions to the winning buyer. Potential bidders can ASK SELLER A QUESTION before the end of the auction if they have payment concerns.

 

The pink postal Canada money orders are fine and can even be cashed at your local post office.

 

We have included our paypal email address in the payment instructions of our auctions from the beginning. There has never been a problem. You can always put your pp email address in the payment instructions, remove the logos, and state clearly that you will accept pp payments through accounts only. Many sellers have done this and it has not been a problem.

 

You know... I may be ebay naive, but it has always seemed to me that people like to get things worked out. I have always been the buyer on ebay (until just recently), and all of my transactions have been pretty smooth. I hope they continue that way... as long as the buyer doesn't feel like s/he has been misled, you know, everything else can be worked out - including a reversal of the transaction, as long as both parties agree to stay civil about it.

 

There's no 'racket' to it. You expect them to process credit cards, which they pay for, for you for free? Just like you would with any processor or merchant account, you have to pay the 2.9% that PayPal charges (Which isn't horribly bad, considering that there is no deposit, no obligation, and no monthly fees incurred with PayPal).

 

ah, that is not how it sounded - that isn't bad a'tal.

 

It costs money to accept credit card payments. When a merchant accepts them, the credit card company will charge something like 1.5% to 2% of the charged amount, I believe.

When you accept credit cards through PayPal, they pay the charges and pass it on (and add a little bit more which is their "juice").

I've found that accepting credit cards through PayPal brings out more bids and results in a sale price higher than the added charges. In other words, if it costs 3% of the bid in PayPal fees, more often than not giving that option to buyers results in a hammer price more than 3% higher.

 

I had just drafted this up for my eBay auctions. What do you think?

United States Bidders

Auction Terms
Forms of Payment Accepted
1) Money Orders
2) PayPal is the preferred method of payment. Please note that I can only accept PayPal via bank account transfers or existing funds only. No Credit Cards or eChecks are permitted.
3)After close of auction, I will send you an invoice with money order and PayPal information to complete your purchase.
4) If you have any questions, please contact me.

Canada Bidders

Auction Terms
Forms of Payment Accepted
1) PayPal via bank account transfers or existing funds only. No Credit Cards or eChecks are permitted.
2) After close of auction, I will send you an invoice with the PayPal information to complete your purchase.
3) If you have any questions, please contact me.

David

 

Looks fine.

 

I got a response from PayPal in regards to some questions I had and I'd like to share it with you.

"If you have a Personal Account and you receive a payment that asks you to
'accept' or 'deny', that payment would be funded by a credit card. If you
'accept' the payment, you would be upgraded to a Premier Account. All
payments coming into a Premier Account are charged a fee, no matter the
funding source.

If you click on 'deny', the payment would go back to the buyer and you
would want to send them an email asking them to resend their payment from
their bank account or PayPal balance."

David

 

I'm sorry to hear of your misfortune. Your best bet would be to contact PayPal and see if they can revert your account back to a personal one. I think the PayPal site should make things more clearly. I had to really dig to get the information I needed.

David

 

Thanks again nds76, I poked around the Paypal site and here's what I got:

Can I downgrade my account?

If you downgrade your account, you will lose access to all of PayPal's Premium Features, including:

The ability to accept credit card payments

Access to our Customer Service hotline, open 7-days-a-week, from 4:00 AM PST to 10:00 PM PST

Coverage under PayPal's Seller Protection Policy

The ability to create PayPal Shopping Cart buttons

Instant access to the funds in your PayPal account with the PayPal ATM/Debit Card

Now I may be taking this thread too far off of subject, if so, I apologize to the mods. But my question becomes "would you give up 1.9 - 2.9% + $0.30 of every transaction for these features?"

The only feature that I would really miss is the ATM/Debit card, but I could always transfer funds to my bank account and withdraw them from there. (I don't use the card often enough to justify up to 3%)

I am not a coin dealer, I just sell extra coins and odds and ends on ebay to support my collecting habit.

 

The credit/debit card is very helpful. Did you know that you can go to your bank and get a cash advance (which acts as a credit transaction) to deposit directly into your bank account and get the 1.5 percent cash back into your PP account. This definitely helps towards paying the fees on transactions. Keep in mind that the highest amount that can be withdrawn as a cash advance is $400 per day, but that's still $6 back into you PP account. It can add up fast.

Also, transfers between bank accounts and pp accounts take 3-4 business days. That is a long time to have funds tied up in limbo.

 

I rarely purchase anything on Ebay, and this is one of the reasons (another is that you would never get me off it, but that's another story ).

If I want to buy or sell anything, I have a friend who will do it for me. All I do is reimburse him for what he paid.

 

But once a seller accepts a credit card payment, from that time on he pays that 2.9% fee on all payments to his account no matter what the source of the funds is.

But bank account transfers are done by eCheck.