is paypal the cheapest way?

[lola123]

Hello

We mainly sell face-face, but want to build up our online business. For small businesses with not many sales, is paypal the cheapest option? I know they dont make a monthly charge, just on the money received.

thanks

[traxor]

It depends how much you're going to sell, for small quantities, PayPal will be the cheapest to use but you could also look at Google Checkout. If you sell in large quantities, you should look at setting up a gateway and set it up with your bank etc, there will be monthly fees, but it'll work out cheaper.

[Wendy.Rule]

I guess the easiest way to look at it is that Paypal is the most convenient. As Traxor says, if you are looking at high volumes then move to your own gateway and merchant account - more effort to set up but much cheaper and you can make the payment pages display as your service not a third party. There are a few threads around that show that paypal are not always the easiest to deal with as there is a period to release funds etc so you need to be sure this also fits your requirements.
Hope your new distribution goes well.
Wendy

[KidsBeeHappy]

Are these large value B2B sales? or small value B2C sales.
Paypal works best for the latter.

[fashionjewelryforeveryone]

I would say that Paypal is cheaper for Large volumes contrary to what is mentioned above. You could sign up for their Virtual Terminal service which is very handy and the monthly fees is quite less. You dont need a separate gateway account, since Paypal will handle everything for you. In addition they have a good Seller protection service. Also, if you sell high volumes then their Comission/fees infact goes down which will help your bottomline.

Thanks.

[KidsBeeHappy]

I would say that Paypal is cheaper for Large volumes contrary to what is mentioned above.
Thanks.

I meant small values not small volumes. Paypal take a (higher)% + 20p, so if your transaction is for £4k, then that's a lot of fees. Whereas if its for £40 then it's not so bad.

[fashionjewelryforeveryone]

I meant small values not small volumes. Paypal take a (higher)% + 20p, so if your transaction is for £4k, then that's a lot of fees. Whereas if its for £40 then it's not so bad.

Thanks for the clarification.

[buyfromtheuk]

Hi, I use paypal, I have no problem atttacting customers to sign up to the paid adverts but most pull out when they hit paypal to pay. I am not sure if its the fear of paying or the fear of payapl. Anyone else had this problem?

[fashionjewelryforeveryone]

Yes we have this issue too, since we upgraded to Paypal Pro and Virtual terminal service for a small fees you get Credit Card processing capabilities too. Which helps in increasing your sales as you have more ways for clients to pay for their order.

Thanks.

[upnorthal]

An issue I have with Paypal is that their registered office is in Luxemburg.

You may want to search the name on Goolge and make your own informed decision.

Should the **** ever hit the fan, I don't fancy my chances of issuing legal proceedings against a company based in another country.

[Private Detective London]

I think paypal is a good option for testing the water as far as eCommerce goes. You can then judge if further investment in the online opperations of your website/business is worthwhile

[fashionjewelryforeveryone]

I dont think that should deter one to not use a processing company.

Thanks.

[Peartree]

PayPal is not the cheapest by far!

Take a look a Nochex - Have used them for a while and they know what they are taking about!

Best bit about it all is that you can negotiate your transaction rates after a while!

[Stuart B]

Hi I have used PayPal for about 3 years and have had no problems with them, there is a small wait for your money usually about 5-6 days. Using payPal your customers have the choice of paying with credit or debit cards or using their PayPal account if they have one. Your customers should not have any fear of paying through them they are of course very secure. I have not had any problems that way, one site payments are about £50.00- $100.00 but the other one payments go up to around £700.00 and my customers do not seem to have a problem with it.
Personally I would reccomend PayPal.

[upnorthal]

I suspect Paypal are perfectly acceptable for a small concern.

However, I can't imagine why any company with serious turnover would consider using them as their primary payment processor.

Just search on Google and read some of the stories where entire balances in the thousands have been 'frozen' by them.

The problem is, Paypal are not based in the UK and they are not accountable to the UK courts.


I dont think that should deter one to not use a processing company.

Thanks.