# Talk with me about PayPal please ...



## motdaugrnds (Jul 3, 2002)

I'm looking over the PayPal site for information about how to use it with my little store. My store is very small and will never get larger, just smaller as things sell off. I first thought I only had about 30 items, now I believe it is more like 50 items.

I will be selling items only via paypal, western union or personal check. What I'm finding on the PayPal site is that I can set up a "buy now" button and that fits well with what I want.

I do want to be able to take what is paid for items via paypal out of that paypal account and use that money; and I believe I need some sort of a business paypal account to do this, though not sure what kind. 

I found where PayPal says something about "add-on" services like: 
...Recurring Billing: $0 setup + $10 monthly (no additional cost per transaction)
...Advanced Fraud Protection: $0 setup + $10 monthly + $.05 per transaction.
...Buyer Authentication: $0 setup + $10 monthly + $.10 per transaction

Those do sound like something needed, though not sure.

I would appreciate knowing how others have set up their account with paypal and what the pros and cons were. (All this is very new to me.)


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## John_Canada (Aug 17, 2013)

You can use just a basic account to collect money from people and link it to your bank account to transfer money into your bank. It is the easiest paypal option. The other option is a business account or I think its called verified account (they change their terms a lot) and bill in other ways including recurring and credit cards. To make it even more confusing there is Payflow which lets you appear as tho you can access credit card payments from your site but it needs a shopping cart system to make it work usually. Very complex in my opinion and no one has figured out how to sell and protect digital items with this yet (believe me I looked for my clients!). I've used the basic account for about 7 years now and never had an issue selling ebooks, selling ebay and collecting payments from web clients then just transferring to my bank account or leaving some in to pay for webhosting, domains and such. The other option is your bank likely offers email payments you might look into. We used to use it to collect rent from students and their absent parents.


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## motdaugrnds (Jul 3, 2002)

John, that "basic account" sounds like what would suffice for my small store. I already have paypal linked to my bank.

Paypal has quite a few options and I'm not clear on what that "basic account" is. Is it the "standard business" account? (In reading over their site, I find information that I interpret to mean, if I don't have a "business" account, I cannot take the money people would pay int paypal for one of my items out of that paypal account; but would need to use it from there. In other words, I could not transfer it from paypal to my bank for use.) Is the "basic account" you use a "business 'standard' account"?


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## John_Canada (Aug 17, 2013)

Hmmm thats a good question and I dont know if it's because my accounts were grandfathered in but I have "Premier Verified Account" that I believe is a personal account.

One other thing I remember is because I am in Canada, a person cannot pay for my ebooks with CC, only Paypal. Just to show you the link I use is at the bottom of this page: http://howtorentyourhousenow.com/

<I used the Merchant Services Tab to create the button> I have never had to pay for my account just I think a 2.9% fee when collecting money.


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## Librum (Dec 17, 2003)

John_Canada said:


> Very complex in my opinion and no one has figured out how to sell and protect digital items with this yet (believe me I looked for my clients!).


Create button. On page three of the button setup you have the 'return to page', put the link to the hidden ebook there. Be inventive with the names so as to not have a 'pattern'. 'Hidden' in the sense that the directory(s) are htaccess protected with a dummy index file in them also to prevent directory listing.


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## MJsLady (Aug 16, 2006)

What I always advise folks to do with paypal. Set up first a separate bank account not tied to your living expenses. Why? Because if some one decides to do a charge back paypal will take their money even if it has cleared already.

As for those add ons, unless you are going to run a business that has to charge folks say monthly for items, you won't need recurring billing.
I personally only use the basic account, they get enough from me in fees from that as it is.


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## motdaugrnds (Jul 3, 2002)

Thanks for the information. This, plus some great help from another friend, has encouraged me to dive in and play around with those button types. I did find I could NOT use the same button with all my items; that each needed its own (with ID and cost of item). PayPal sets up its own coding for each button. 

Doing this I was able to create all my buttons and get them on my pages without problems...and fairly quickly.


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## JLMissouri (Dec 12, 2012)

I use Paypal Daily and have had few problems with them. I setup my account a long time ago, and it seems lots of things have changed. I think I have a business account, I chose the cheapest account for the common types of payments I get. I have a PayPal Debit card that uses funds from my balance just like a bank debit card. It makes getting money out very easy as I can get cash back with a purchase for no fees. You can also get a paper check from Paypal as well as funds deposited into your checking account. 

I looked into a merchant account when my business grew, but PayPal was very competetive, and I was used to the way it worked so I didn't switch. For a small business I don't think there is a better way to get paid online, of course cash is king in person.


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