[Milsurplus] Ebay

[WA5CAB at cs.com]

Ben,

You may be confusing buyers and sellers.  If a seller lists PayPal (or 
anything else) as a payment option, then they can't refuse to accept any of 
them.  But AFAIK, that has been a rule since the beginning.  eBay USA stopped 
just short of requiring all sellers to accept PayPal.  What they actually did 
was to outlaw any mention of any paper payments (through the mail) such as 
checks or money orders.  It is still possible to sell on eBay and not accept 
PayPal if you are able to accept at least one form of credit card payment, 
generally Visa and/or MasterCard as a minimum.  I know of a couple of sellers 
who did this.  However, I never could understand their rationale.  PayPal's 
discount rate is slightly better than most merchant accounts.  And PayPal's 
known tendency to side with the buyer is no different than Visa, MasterCard 
or Amex.

eBay also stopped just short of making it a rule that a seller could not 
accept any form of paper payment.  I've asked two or three times how many MO's 
we could accept per month or year and never got anything but a run-around 
answer.  But we take in two or three most months and mark the item as paid on 
eBay and have not had any repercussions so far.  What eBay USA actually did 
was (a) force sellers to remove from all listings any mention of paper 
payments as an option, (b) added a rule that a seller couldn't tell a buyer 
after the auction or sale that they had to use a payment method not listed in 
the ad, and (c) added "The buyer requests a payment method that I don't 
accept" as one of the acceptable reasons for canceling a sale. 

In a message dated 3/10/2010 2:45:07 PM Central Standard Time, 
Military1944 at aol.com writes: 
> In a message dated 10/03/2010 20:35:10 GMT Standard Time, w8au at sssnet.com 
>  
> writes:
> 
> >I  buy something now and again but refuse to use Pay Pal as
> >I got stiffed  real good by that mode of payment.
> 
> Some have the mistaken impression  that PayPal payment is required.
> Not so.  If the seller will take an  MO or similar, that can be
> done.  You might get an Ebay reminder to  "pay," but that can
> be ignored.  No  repercussions...
> 
> w8au
> 
> 
> 
> ---------------------------------
> 
> I thought Ebay required Paypal as a payment option ? 
> 
> If its presented as an option then you can't refuse to take  it. Certainly 
> 
> that's the case with Ebay.UK
> 
> Ben.
> 

Robert & Susan Downs - Houston
wa5cab dot com (Web Store)
MVPA 9480