I was thinking of starting a paypal account,lots of venders here seem to use it instead of credit cards.Can I just link my card to the account??Do they charge you to have the account for personal purchases.What are your experinces with paypal???Is this a bad idea?Can anyone school me on this.Jaymann

I review my PayPal profile each time I make a purchase to ensure I have the correct debit/credit card associated with the individual purchase. I have never had a problem with PayPal. The one time I got a blatently misrepresented 914 part (from eBay not from here) I worked with PayPal and they returned my money promptly.

Others may have horror stories, but I've never had a problem.

As for fees, take a look at the PayPal site. It describes the fees in detail.

Eric Read

Yes a lot of vendors here accept Pay Pal. It's realativly pain less, you could use your checking account , debit card , cerdit card , etc. They usually require a primary funding account and a secondary account. The vendor never sees your account info , as well as anybody that you send money to with this method.It doesn't cost you ( the sender ) anything , it's free to you , the vendor pays fees to use this method, it's safer than using your credit card over any kind of transmission method, telephone , internet , mail,e-mail,etc.You get an email conferming payment which you can print out for records if you choose, also you can check your history of payments and send to's . Take the dive !!!!

Jack / Jaxdream

they don't charge to send $, but the receiving end gets it. i guess it's not THAT much but i just went up again recently. all in all it is really handy buying stuff on line. i think ebay has made it manditory haven't they?

mike

Known internationally as PAY FOUL, they basically control your account and can debit as they wish, and the 3% Fee gets charged with any money receipt. There is no interest paid and it is tied directly to your bank account so that they can debit that too. Money transfers take some time so they can make the extra interest on the time the money is not in your account, and if there is ever a question, they hold your money and or debit your account and then you have to prove to them (via e mail, there is no one to speak with) that you deserve reimbursement. It is much better to use your credit card. In the case of the credit card, YOU are always right, they cannot drain your bank account and there are bonus points that can be accumulated.
Ebay wants everyone to pay for their auctions via pay pal so they can collect the extra 3%. When we put in our auctions "most forms of payment are gladly accepted including your personal check" They made us take it down, saying that it was not a secure form of payment. What is wrong with accepting a man / woman's personal check?

as a buyer it's good far outweighs the bad. as a seller, it depends on how much you are receiving.

I had an incident where my paypal account was hacked about 5 years ago, and they did take several thousand from my account... BUT, 1 phone call to paypal and paypal had my money back the same day and made sure no more transactions were attempted... which is more than I can say for my bank at the time... who chose to leave my account open, and allow all of the paypal transactions through, even after the fact that we had I identified the fraudulent charges. I changed banks, but kept paypal.

oh yeah... forgot to mention. definately set up a separate bank acct. to hook up to the p.p. acct. for a couple reasons. if some one gets in it (it happens) and paypal can lock you out and pull funds if they feel justified... i.e. claims or ?

mike

I'll use Paypal only to pay when there is no alternative. It's linked to my Amex, there is no way they are getting bank info. The also scan all messages for keywords and will shut you down for anything raffle or firearm related.

Since I really only use PayPal to purchase items, I do not have PayPal linked to my bank account.

When I do sell something using PayPal, I only link my bank account after the transaction has been completed, and only long enough to transfer the money to my bank. I immediatly remove the bank link after.

I just don't want any chance of someone hacking into my PayPal account and having access to my bank accounts.

Eric

I have used pay pal for auctions off of GunBrokers .com for a while , no problems yet. YMMV...

Jack / Jaxdream

It costs vendors so they don't like it much but it's fabulous for buyers. Ten years now, no problems whatsoever. I paid for my kid's college education, transferring money to them every month via PayPal, deposited directly into their accounts. It was a heck of a lot more secure than sending checks, easier for them, and it never cost me a cent.

I have had PayPal for many years and only had one "hack" that was caught before any money could be transferred. PayPal was very helpful then and the one time when I had problems getting a refund from a deadbeat seller.

For me as a seller, the % you have to pay is about the same as if you went to your bank and set up your own merchant account to take credit cards - without the monthly fees.

You can also get a PayPal debit card connected to your account so you have easy access to the money to use at the grocery store, gas station, etc.

It's a useful tool. Sometimes the right one for the job, sometimes not.

Don't hook your personal bank account to PP. I have one just for PP and it's only necessary to have a bank account if you plan on receiving money. Sending money only doesn't require a bank account.

There is a catch with having a bank account listed: When you buy something, the money will come out of the bank account if you don't specify a credit card.

The risk is that if you buy more than the balance in your account, you can get an overdraft. This has happened twice to me and both times the bank was gracious enough to waive the charges. Overdraft as I just mentioned may vary from bank to bank.

Bottom line though is it is simple and relatively secure to buy/sell parts easily with PP. If you're a seller, you suck up the 3% or add it in to the price of the part before selling. Almost everything I buy/sell here goes through PP.

My Son just got ripped off from some fake PAYPAL bullshit .looked just like the real thing ...I told him that i didnt think it was a good idea and there were a couple red flags that popped up in my mind..but he`s almost 18 and way smarter then I am so it cost him almost 200 bones ..so maybe next time he will listen to dear old Dad


so watch out for the fake PAYPAL its out there

Just be careful of those fake emails saying you need to log into your paypal account. They are very convincing. Never click on a link in an email that has anything to do with your money, credit cards, bank accounts etc.

this is not just paypal. this is also how my account got hacked, the email installed a keylogger... nuff said. just never click any link in any email, and use something like firefox or chrome that will verify that you are where the address says you are.

The problem is that to your almost-18 year old, you're just too stupid right now. Once he turns 20-25 you will become a lot smarter.

Very usefull.I use it all the time. Never had any trouble. Very usefull to send money abroad.

For money abroad it beats the heck out of a those $50 bank wire transfer fees, that's for sure.

Man i hope so ...cause I dont know Jack right now

what % do they "skim" from you when you receive from over sea? i sold to israel and they slammed me... way more than the usual

Well I use Citicard......whenever I make a purchase on line....the citicard automaticaly comes on the screen when you come to the payment section of the purchase. It fills in all the information and creates a "virtual" account number and fills in the credit card information. This is a different credit card number created for this transaction only...it is used once and discarded. The number, if stolen can't be used......I love it and have been buying on line with no worries.....The transaction appears on my credit card bill just like as if i used my "actual" card numver.