Comments on: Why PayPal makes it a chore to pay by credit card

By: Ben

Ben — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 07:19:16 +0000

Just log out of paypal, clear your cookies and the credit card payment method will show up.

By: JJ

JJ — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 14:49:09 +0000

That’s strange. I used paypal for years in my business account. Recently I signed up for their credit card. Last time I made a big purchase, I saw that my balance (in the thousands) had not gone down. I realized later that the purchases I was making were going on the card rather than coming from my balance. When I set it up, it defaulted to this.

By: Bill

Bill — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 23:11:04 +0000

When you pay a transaction using Paypal with Credit Card, who gets to keep the transaction fee?

Usually when a merchant receives a payment using a credit card, the credit card company takes 3% off the total. Paypal also takes 3% from the seller for every item sold and paid with Paypal.

Now, when a buyer pays a transaction with a credit card but via Paypal account, does this mean the seller will lose 6% of his total to fees? That sounds a lot. If the seller loses only 3% to fees, who gets it? Paypal or the Credit Card company? Or do they split (1.5% each)?

By: glenn

glenn — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 01:36:19 +0000

Ok i think i know the answer but wanted to check first!!!!
I am purchasing an item from eastern europe which is costing £2500, but want the safest way to do this in case the item never arrives in the worst case scenario! I have been given option of bank transfer, echeque or paypal using bank or debit or credit card but with additional 3.4% fee for this. By the looks of things the paypal option using my cc seems to be the only one which will give me complete protection and ill be able to get my money back if worst case scenario. Will this be the case? And i assume the 3.4% extra fee is correct for paying the seller using this option as i have read they get charged for a business account payment.
Looking forward to confirmation please. Thanks guys.

By: cappidad

cappidad — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 23:52:25 +0000

Thanks for the 2008 eBay column. I just started selling after being a buyer for many years. I had an account balance and then bought something today. But I was stumped going through the usual PayPal payment process; I couldn’t figure out what happened to the CC option for payment, until I did a Google search and found the answer here. So, I did an EFT, then back to my purchase and put it on my credit card/PayPal. Thanks for the info!

By: DIANE

DIANE — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 01:50:42 +0000

you rock!!!!!!!!!
thanks so much for sharing this tip! been trying to figure out all day why i couldnt use my cc on my pp acct..thanks!!!

By: ct

ct — Mon, 30 May 2011 03:07:15 +0000

the problem is they try to run as bank withdral and still charge inflated processing fees so the can pocket the money. Tricky tricky

By: ct

ct — Mon, 30 May 2011 03:04:44 +0000

i hate paypal they trick u every time. I use credit card so the have to pay fees. wish there was another company to take payments

By: Hari

Hari — Mon, 02 May 2011 02:30:24 +0000

I have the same feelings as the author and sick of changing the payment method every time. I just tried to make a payment and didn’t see CC as a payment method so realized that it is because of paypal balance, so had to first initiate a transfer and come back to finish the transaction.

Paypal lets you use a credit card as a default source at least for subscription payments. Recently when I tried to make a payment for woot purchase using paypal, it didn’t even ask me to select the source and completed the purchase with my bank as source, more like Amazon’s 1-click buy. I later realized that this was because woot sets up itself as subscription with paypal, and the last time I bought something from woot was so long ago that I couldn’t recollect anything, and so it was very puzzling. However, with a bit of research, I found that you can go into Profile -> “More Options” -> “My Money” -> “My preapproved payments” (update) -> “Set Available Funding Sources” and uncheck all your bank accounts and Save. You can also set default “Conversion Options” for credit card (whether to use paypal conversion of not). However, if you have a paypal balance, it will still be used first, so you can never be ensured

By: askmrlee

askmrlee — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 22:37:42 +0000

For each purchase I make with a merchant who has setup a PayPal store it usually defaults to PayPal balance funding, which I would rather have than hitting my bank account.

But I don’t find it a hassle to pick which payment I will use and I’m surprised at all the complaints. I don’t hear anyone complaining about selecting Visa vs. MasterCard at Amazon.

Sure you get the bugging message, but is it really that difficult to pick the form of payment for each transaction?