Asking for the 3% PayPal fee

Originally Posted by Inret

I'm curious as to why people don't just throw amazon giftcards at each other or something. There's no fee if it's an ecard and they go up to amounts far higher than anyone would ever need. Paypal is a terrible, awful service and after the Derek Beando fiasco (among others), it seems like people would shy away from it.

Still, I agree that it's unprofessional, tacky and terrible to ask a 3% fee from both the seller and paypal.

For me, the giftcard idea wouldn't be practical (at least most of the time). For the most part we use the money for bills or stick it in savings until we want another animal or supplies, so unless I had something specific I needed from wherever the gift card was for, it would be more of a hassle. I have thought about setting up the ability to take cards myself but I'm not sure how practical that would be outside of shows since I am not sure how many buyers would be willing to give out their card number via phone or email. I think Google Checkout was mentioned a while back as an alternative to paypal, but I've never really looked into it.

Originally Posted by FireStorm

I have thought about setting up the ability to take cards myself but I'm not sure how practical that would be outside of shows since I am not sure how many buyers would be willing to give out their card number via phone or email.

Just to give you some feedback on that without taking this to far off topic, I will just mention if you want to add that to your payment options you can set that up for free and easy and no monthly fees.

I made a thread about intuits service "Go payments card reader" here
http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/foru...d.php?t=310740

It also gives you the option of processing the cards with a virtual terminal online. Not the website version which charges fees and you have to setup a checkout on your site but just a quick pop-up window to process credit cards online.

http://intuit-gopayment.com/free?cid...120525194205:s

https://merchantcenter.intuit.com/qbms#

https://gopayment.intuit.com/GoPayment/site/login

Worrying about practicality would be gone because it costs nothing to sign up and not much time to invest in signing up. Plus you get the free credit card reader for your phone. You can have the payments sent to your bank account or a prepaid Visa card with your name on it. Of course the fee is a little higher by typing in the credit card vs swiping.

Of course you could just type the credit card number into the phone too.

Anyways, just putting that out there...

Originally Posted by Dennis Hultman

Just to give you some feedback on that without taking this to far off topic, I will just mention if you want to add that to your payment options you can set that up for free and easy and no monthly fees.

I made a thread about intuits service "Go payments card reader" here
http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/foru...d.php?t=310740

It also gives you the option of processing the cards with a virtual terminal online. Not the website version which charges fees and you have to setup a checkout on your site but just a quick pop-up window to process credit cards online.

http://intuit-gopayment.com/free?cid...120525194205:s

https://merchantcenter.intuit.com/qbms#

https://gopayment.intuit.com/GoPayment/site/login

Worrying about practicality would be gone because it costs nothing to sign up and not much time to invest in signing up. Plus you get the free credit card reader for your phone. You can have the payments sent to your bank account or a prepaid Visa card with your name on it. Of course the fee is a little higher by typing in the credit card vs swiping.

Of course you could just type the credit card number into the phone too.

Anyways, just putting that out there...

Thanks for the info. That looks like it might be perfect for me!

The 3% fee is just a part of doing business for a seller. Charging for the paypal fee is the same, IMHO, as charging an electricity fee, feeding fee, and caging fee. All of these expenses should be built into the price. Asking a customer to deliberately forfeit their buyer's protection (what little exists with PayPal) comes across as unprofessional and points to a business that cares more about a few dollars then their customers. Perhaps they don't understand that customer loyalty and having a positive image is priceless.

Dennis, thank you for the info, both here and on the other thread, about the Go reader. I think I'll give it a try.

I've been walking away from purchases because of that 3% for years. I generally inform them that requesting that additional payment is a violation of their user agreement...there have been a few times that I just sent the agreed upon price, and disregarded their request that I cover the fee. The latter approach can actually be kind of fun, because if they refuse to send you your purchase; a claim gets made & they get to explain to PayPal why they are violating the user agreement in that manner. Generally, though, if the person doesn't agree to waive that charge, I simply look elsewhere.

Originally Posted by hhmoore

I've been walking away from purchases because of that 3% for years. I generally inform them that requesting that additional payment is a violation of their user agreement...there have been a few times that I just sent the agreed upon price, and disregarded their request that I cover the fee. The latter approach can actually be kind of fun, because if they refuse to send you your purchase; a claim gets made & they get to explain to PayPal why they are violating the user agreement in that manner. Generally, though, if the person doesn't agree to waive that charge, I simply look elsewhere.

I guess that is one way around it, however not very polite, regardless of whether the seller is breaking the rules or not. You should inform the person politely, then if they still insist on the fee, just walk away. Simple as that. There is no reason to go all the way through filing a claim, if it can be avoided, unless you are that bored and need excitement I guess.

If the person has the money for the animal + shipping, the ball is in their court....
They can IMMEDIATELY refund the entire payment & lose the sale, they can honor the purchase & send the animal, or they can insist that they be sent the extra money.
(I've only followed through with making a claim in that situation one time...and I would do it again if faced with the same conditions.)

What I used to do - if the statement was made in the ad, or initial contact - is just make a lower offer than I would otherwise would have. That covers the 3% on my end, while getting me a better price; and they think they're still getting the extra money.

Ive encountered people asking for the 2.75% credit card fee. What bugs me is that I know they aren't charged that much by the CC processor in the first place.

I scratch the fee collectors off the list and move on.

Originally Posted by chrisga

Ive encountered people asking for the 2.75% credit card fee. What bugs me is that I know they aren't charged that much by the CC processor in the first place.

I scratch the fee collectors off the list and move on.

Yes, you are charged that much when accepting credit cards.
I recently started using Square & that is the fee.

The whole adding in shipping cost brings up a question for me. Would it be possible to pay for the shipping, through the shipping service? To SKIP paypal so that the percentage of money that is charged that 3% fee is less, so the seller loses less money? Its something i would happily do for the seller if it helped.

Just a thought.