Author Topic: Paypal (Read 5838 times)

w7lwi · « **on:** July 02, 2007, 09:55 »

Over the years I've avoided using Paypal like the plague. Various reasons, such a information security, spam, etc. Now, however, with Snapvillage requiring a Paypal account to even sign up, I may finally have to break down and establish an account. The question then becomes, which specific account?

I've read in different forum threads about some accounts charging for fund transfers and others not. And the Paypal site isn't a whole lot better explaining the differences regarding funds coming to an account, as opposed to funds being paid out. Obviously I'd prefer that funds be transferred to my account with no service fee subtracted. So the question is, for an account intended to be used only for receiving funds from various microstock sites (SS, IS, DT, SV, etc.) which account would be best ... Personal, EBay or Merchant?

Seems like such a simple question, but I'll be damned if I could find a simple answer anywhere.

hatman12 · « **Reply #1 on:** July 02, 2007, 10:06 »

Yep - eBay and PayPal have the same business plan which can be summarised as 'screw everyone......'

Lee Torrens · « **Reply #2 on:** July 02, 2007, 10:29 »

Simple Answer: Personal accounts incur no fees for receiving money. Merchant accounts do. (not sure about eBay accounts)

I have a personal account and haven't ever been charged any fees.

leaf · « **Reply #3 on:** July 02, 2007, 10:42 »

yep lee is right.

the paypal personal account doesn't incur a fee when receiving money. You can however, only receive $$ from other paypal accounts. This is not a problem however with any of the microstock sites. I use a personal account for all of them.

the business account can accept payment from people who want to use a credit card. They also charge a fee for the $$ you receive. So you would only want to use this if you need to accept credit cards (like if you sold things on ebay)

wysiwyg_foto · « **Reply #4 on:** July 02, 2007, 10:59 »

I have a personal account and a merchant account (seperate email addresses). I haven't had to pay fees in either account (yet).

My understanding (for our purposes) is it depends on the level of the payor- payments from Shutterstock or Dreamstime will not incur a fee because of their relationship with Paypal but a smaller site like Canstock will incur a fee.

It's confusing.

Pixart · « **Reply #5 on:** July 02, 2007, 11:42 »

Quote from: leaf on July 02, 2007, 10:42

the business account can accept payment from people who want to use a credit card. They also charge a fee for the $$ you receive. So you would only want to use this if you need to accept credit cards (like if you sold things on ebay)

I use a business account - albeit not very often - and this is how I understand it to work... you collect your agency payments in your Paypal account at no charge - you transfer to your bank account. There is a small fee (is it $2?) if you transfer less than $150, but no fee if you transfer above, so I accumulate until I hit $150. I am in Canada and I thought I read that there is no fee if you are in the U.S. transfering to a U.S. bank.

Not relevant here, but they do charge processing fees if you want to take credit cards. It can add up, but it is definitely A LOT more cost effective for a small business like mine to take Paypal than to set up merchant account and shopping cart.

I sell photobooks and dvd's on my website and the manufacturer processes all the payments - they charge me just a little less than Paypal for transactions. The Paypal price seems pretty fair, I did a graduation in another province - they all paid by Paypal so I paid a ton in credit card fees. I'll have to add it to the price next time. And even if you have another true merchant account, you still pay the per-transaction %, so I'll stick with Paypal for now.

w7lwi · « **Reply #6 on:** July 02, 2007, 11:57 »

Thanks to all for comments and advice. Looks like the personal account is the way to go, for me at least. For all my sales, other than microstock, I work directly with my customers and they pay by check. So for now at least, no point in going with anything other than the personal account. My primary microstock sales are with SS, DT and IS, so these should be no problem. I'm also at BS, CS, LO and StockXpert; but, sales there are so low that it doesn't matter one way or the other. I'll probably end up dropping these sites later this year, if things don't begin to turn around, and concentrate on the ones that work for the type of images I produce. Probably try out SV just to see what happens. You never can tell.

Thanks again

a.k.a.-tom · « **Reply #7 on:** July 02, 2007, 14:52 »

Quote from: w7lwi on July 02, 2007, 09:55

Seems like such a simple question, but I'll be damned if I could find a simple answer anywhere.

wylwi --- thanks for asking!!! I too have not bothered with Paypal, but now must since I'd like to give the folks at corbis a chance to send me money (LOL wishful thinking).
I read the Paypal site and didn't understand a darned thing on it... appreciate you breeching the subject here.

-tom

w7lwi · « **Reply #8 on:** July 02, 2007, 20:19 »

Quote from: a.k.a.-tom on July 02, 2007, 14:52

Quote from: w7lwi on July 02, 2007, 09:55

Seems like such a simple question, but I'll be damned if I could find a simple answer anywhere.

W7LWI --- thanks for asking!!! I too have not bothered with Paypal, but now must since I'd like to give the folks at corbis a chance to send me money (LOL wishful thinking).
I read the Paypal site and didn't understand a darned thing on it... appreciate you breeching the subject here. -tom

You know, when others have asked questions in the past on other forums, and apologized first for asking such a "stupid" question, I'd respond by saying there's no such thing as a stupid question, only a stupid answer. When this thing about Paypal came up, I thought "God what a dork. I've been in this business for years and don't know a thing about this. What a stupid question." Maybe I should start listening to myself. If two of us had the same concern, maybe it wasn't such a stupid question after all.

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Author Topic: Paypal (Read 5838 times)

w7lwi

hatman12

Lee Torrens

leaf

wysiwyg_foto

Pixart

w7lwi

a.k.a.-tom

w7lwi

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