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PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49

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Re: PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49

#21

Post by sebazzz »

tpxl wrote: post #8
dessant wrote: post #7

PayPal is awful for small transactions, I regularily get donations for my projects that are literally 0 USD, because all of it is eaten away by PayPal fees, and even for a 5 USD donation you end up losing around 15% of the transaction amount. Do you know of any other service that is suitable for microtransactions, besides cryptocurrencies?

As far as donations go, Patreon and Ko-fi should have a lot lower fees.

Patreon is not necessarily an alternative because supporting someone is more of a subscription kind of transaction, and not a one-off thing.

Re: PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49

#22

Post by evandijk70 »

londons_explore wrote: post #20
brnt wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All this, and all that other Silicon Valley financial infra, because direct bank tranfers are (presumably?) not known or difficult or impossible. From my northwestern European perspective, it's weird this straightforward solution that we've had since, well, the fifties? is overlooked.

Address books in phones don't store people's Bank details, making it a pain to pay someone. Many people don't have their own bank details memorized either. Being able to send money to someone just knowing their phone number is the real value-add.

I can send anyone a 'payment' request from banking app on my phone over whatsapp, which they can very easily pay through their banking app.

Re: PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49

#23

Post by saurik »

dessant wrote: post #7

PayPal is awful for small transactions, I regularily get donations for my projects that are literally 0 USD, because all of it is eaten away by PayPal fees, and even for a 5 USD donation you end up losing around 15% of the transaction amount. Do you know of any other service that is suitable for microtransactions, besides cryptocurrencies?

I don't know if they support it for accounts that are receiving contributions instead of payments (and I have no clue what is going on now with this new change today: I need to research this), but PayPal has also offered a "micropayments" tier that costs 5%+$0.05 instead of the 2.9%+$0.30, which is much better for small transactions. You had to activate it with customer support, though.

Re: PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49

#24

Post by muixoozie »

Urgo wrote: post #11

This was actually announced in a easy to miss email with the subject "Upcoming change to your account" sent on June 30 2021. It did get a little press that day but on the fee increase day I saw little reporting. These changes went into effect on August 2nd 2021. Here is a PDF that has a breakdown showing all the changes that happened that day [1] To PayPal's credit, this was their first rate increase in a very long t…

Is this in anyway related to EBay cutting them out and passing their savings to themselves?

Re: PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49

#26

Post by ajkdhcb2 »

brnt wrote: post #12
londons_explore wrote: post #6

It amazes me that despite not really modifying the core PayPal service for 10+ years, they are still a market leader. Parts of their business don't have much network effect, and competitors could totally rebuild the tech and eat away at the market share... Yet somehow that hasn't happened.

All this, and all that other Silicon Valley financial infra, because direct bank tranfers are (presumably?) not known or difficult or impossible. From my northwestern European perspective, it's weird this straightforward solution that we've had since, well, the fifties? is overlooked.

Fraud. Hacked bank accounts. Chargebacks. The brutality of banking customer service. These are all good reasons. PayPal does have a dispute system for 'buyer/seller protection'.

Re: PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49

#27

Post by saurik »

londons_explore wrote: post #6

It amazes me that despite not really modifying the core PayPal service for 10+ years, they are still a market leader. Parts of their business don't have much network effect, and competitors could totally rebuild the tech and eat away at the market share... Yet somehow that hasn't happened.

As someone who was using PayPal during all of the 2010s, they actually changed a lot. It is also worth noting that--until today, meaning they have lost he high ground and it arguably doesn't matter anymore as sane companies will chase the lowest price for a service that is a direct cut of revenue--they were always cheaper than Stripe (with bulk rates that kicked in sooner and micropayments pricing options), had a fully functional product (it was amazing how Stripe was getting people without offering auth/capture), and a safer mechanism for notification buffering. PayPal supported being a fully backend credit card processor in addition to their "express checkout" flow, and frankly did everything Stripe did better... except have complex documentation and no real help to do your integration. If anything I would claim that it was this documentation that bit them. (Hell: one chance they made was to build out an entire REST-API version of their service with OAuth and a bunch of other stuff in a direct attempt to compete with Stripe, but that wasn't actually the issue: they just look not cool and have documentation that felt daunting.)

Re: PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49

#29

Post by systemvoltage »

I run a SMB with $1.2M in transactions per year through various online storefronts. Paypal/Stripe are the most common forms of payment, but to my surprise the split is 70%(Paypal), 30%(Stripe including Apple/GPay/Alipay). We see a consistent behavior that perhaps incidates Paypal is far easier to use than Stripe. I feel like the slightest friction in the choice between payment options and it will win. Paypal offers the easiest way to pay, perhaps even easier than Apple Pay. It is one click on the popup window. With Apple Pay, you gotta double click this awkward button on the side, then Face ID that doesn't work with the mask, followed by entering the PIN - the whole thing takes too long. It also doesn't work on most browsers and desktop computers (perhaps Apple Pay works on macOS with Safari). I thought about this a lot and tried to go through the details of the friction that leads to better conversion. Stripe has a better developer experience but it doesn't help the customer.

Stripe desparately needs a customer-facing account that can manage cards and payment methods. If it were my guess, Stripe is already working on this.

Re: PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49

#30

Post by fredophile »

systemvoltage wrote: post #29

I run a SMB with $1.2M in transactions per year through various online storefronts. Paypal/Stripe are the most common forms of payment, but to my surprise the split is 70%(Paypal), 30%(Stripe including Apple/GPay/Alipay). We see a consistent behavior that perhaps incidates Paypal is far easier to use than Stripe. I feel like the slightest friction in the choice between payment options and it will win. Paypal offers t…

As a customer there are a few reasons I might prefer PayPal.

First, they have my credit card info and shipping address already. Using their checkout means I don't need to fill all that info in.

I may not trust some random website I only plan to buy from once with my credit card info.

There are times when I can get money back from PayPal purchases on some of my credit cards. Right now I can get 5% back on one of them until the end of December. That means if paypal is an option I'm going to us it.

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