Are PayPal's new terms and conditions a ripoff?

endotherm on 10/05/2012 - 14:28

I just received notification of a change in PayPals terms and conditions. I checked them out at https://www.paypal-australia.com.au/fees-policy-update after the email warns: "The latest changes to our policies may affect you if you perform transactions involving currency conversions…"

There seem to be a lot of fixed charges, fees, percentages and conditional conversions going on, so much so that I have no idea what it all means. Is this just a small increase on something that already exists, or is it a wholesale reaming of customers? From what I understand it is penalising you for using your own money in the form of a debit card, or doing a chargeback (not too sure what that is) or getting a refund.

Anyone can enlighten me on the impact of these changes?

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Comments

  • speedracer on 10/05/2012 - 21:17
    +2

    I have no idea, but good work for taking time to actually read the t&c.

  • CuteBirdy on 10/05/2012 - 22:38
    +1

    When Paypal sends you unfriendly terms and conditions without summarising them, you can be sure they are bad changes. I can't be stuffed reading them through, waiting for people to start complaining about new fees.

  • Postulative on 11/05/2012 - 10:09

    Yes, they are a rip off.

    Paypal will be charging (this is from memory, so may be slightly wrong) 3.5% for USD conversion and 4% for all other currencies.

    They are also charging fees per transaction, but I think these are charged to the merchant and I have no idea how much the increase is.

    They do have examples of how the new fees will work, but don't provide a summary of new vs. old. Not happy, Paypal.

  • Darkstyles on 11/05/2012 - 15:33
    +2

    Yes they are, so now it goes like this:

    Your credit card - whatever transaction fee it has —> paypal puts 2.4% fee for using credit card transaction —> then paypal puts 3.5% (USD) conversion fee —> which has paypals extremely shitty conversion rate (so another percent lets say).

    RIPOFF! We need a new transaction company (or just use Sagepay and the like). People need to shift off using paypal now!

  • Geewhizz on 16/05/2012 - 07:10

    All I know is I paid about $1 more on a transaction of around $30 yesterday than for a similarly priced one for the same US retailer last week.

  • [Deactivated] on 17/05/2012 - 03:09

    I have a friend in the USA I owe money to. I've always used Paypal in the past. But with these new fees… Is there a better method of me repaying them? (I do not have a USA bank account.)

    • Trance N Dance on 18/05/2012 - 00:10
      +1

      Wire the money from your Australian bank account into his/her's. You'll need your friend's bank account SWIFT code.

      • [Deactivated] on 19/05/2012 - 01:33

        Thanks - I'll ask them about that next time I'm in a branch.

  • altomic on 18/05/2012 - 20:34

    paypal is sucktacular on their fee range.

    I'm sick of their extremely crappy conversion rates.

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