"Buyer pays fees"

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Tiercel

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So many classified ads "buyer pays paypal fees" - "add 5% if paying by goods/services" - "price not including PP". 

Even though it says right here in PP ToS: 4.6 No Surcharges. You agree that you will not impose a surcharge or any other fee for accepting PayPal as a payment method. You may charge a handling fee in connection with the sale of goods or services, as long as the handling fee does not operate as a surcharge and is not higher than the handling fee you charge for non-PayPal transactions.

So this seems almost exclusive to the airsoft world from what I've seen, where has this ridiculous idea come from? Why has it gained such a foothold and why are we still letting people get away with it? I've never been asked to pay the paypal fees myself when buying stuff from anywhere else, so why here?

If youre one of the people doing this, why? You do realise that paypal are very keen on freezing peoples accounts and keeping the money for themselves? So if someone were to screenshot you asking  them to pay fees and send it to PP they'd likely seize your account for breach of TOS? If you want more money, then just include it in your asking price?

 
agreed, Just add the 3.4% to the price, then you get the amount you want

What winds me up is you go to buy something from a total stranger and they give you their details and just say "Just send it via Friends and Family so i dont get charged the fee"

No Dickhead, that fee is there to protect me, you are neither my friend or family

 
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Tons of small/niche companies add a surcharge for PayPal and I see no issue with it frankly. I do have a problem with people who aren't upfront about it, and this extends to the classifieds.

Never known any of the companies I've worked with to have an account locked or a charge reversed because of this. It is no secret that PayPal heavily sides with buyers over sellers, and - although many of us are accustomed to using it (to the point that we won't risk sending money any other way) it's worth recognising that the reason that 3.4% comes out of the sellers end is because of the near monopoly PayPal has on online transactions. So you spend with them because they're quicker than throwing card details in? Nope. Do you use PayPal because it's more secure than other services like Worldpay or Stripe? Nope. Do you use PayPal because you know that you might have a chance of disputing a charge if your stuff doesn't turn up? Yes.

I like using PayPal as much as the next guy, but I always expect to pay fees if they don't say otherwise. It's me paying for that protection - it's insurance. I F&F for people I trust or for items below ~£10.

 
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Yup really does my swede in ! You see something and you think “ just what I want !”

THEN you see plus fees and postage ! FFS ?I don’t know how much it’ll cost to deliver ! Are you paying a ridiculous amount to be hand delivered by a courier or have you given a couple of flagons of white lightning too that tramp on a bike to drop it off eventually  ??? ?‍♂️

One price , covers everything end off . 

 
The root cause is that people spunk out "4 sail" adverts as a stream of consciousness from their point of view as a seller rather than a buyer.

This applies to airsoft classifieds, Gumtree and to a lesser extent eBay private sales.

All I want to see is:

What is it?

How do I get it?  Post, or collection only?

How much will I be paying, either PayPal for post, or cash in hand for collection?

I don't care how much of that money is going in fees or postage.  I don't need a life story.  Just what, how, and how much.

You wouldn't think that would be hard to provide, but everyone wants to spin a narrative.  There was this one time, at band camp...

 
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proffrink said:
Tons of small/niche companies add a surcharge for PayPal and I see no issue with it frankly. I do have a problem with people who aren't upfront about it, and this extends to the classifieds.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...


A surcharge I have no problem with, its on par with card handling fees for <£5 or whatever it is now (Though didnt the EU make them illegal recently?). Which are annoying but understandable for small companies. However as stated in the ToS "You may charge a handling fee in connection with the sale of goods or services, as long as the handling fee does not operate as a surcharge and is not higher than the handling fee you charge for non-PayPal transactions".  Seeing as everyone selling here doesnt charge extra for bank transfers or cash on collection, then its an unfair charge and against the ToS. 3.4% of all your income being lost to paypal is a big hit for small retailers whos livelihood depends on it. But for private sellers its just a moneygrab.

 
But I've gone on to explain why I think PayPal is different to BACS, PayPal's F&F etc. in the rest of what I wrote.

PayPal provides significant insurance against fraud that you don't get with BACS, but 3.4% (+20p, I might add) is a lot of money, and a lot more than their competitors who offer similar dispute resolution (Stripe, as an example). That 3.4% (or part of it) in theory is to pay for that chap who might end up having to review your case.

Again no issue with people levying the charge so long as they're upfront about it. Then I can make a decision myself. Personally I include it - along with postage - in my prices for the sake of ease, but I've got no issue with people saying 'you pay the fees if you want to use PayPal'.

 
I always list prices that include everything that I can think of. I get that it can appease people by not including them but personally nothing pisses me off more than seeing a juicy price but then having it hit by a huge +500% postage fee or whatnot.

 
Well actually I disagree, I post all my listings with collection only, or +P&P because I want people to collect and not have the hassle of posting, firstly when they collect, they can test before they leave so they don’t come back saying it doesn’t work, secondly, you get a good idea of what the person is like, and you may even make a new friend!

Trouble is people have got to lazy, they want everything done for them, it’s easy to just send money and it arrive at your house. But it’s safer, and better to go collect and actually see what the seller is like so you get an inclin to how the gun has been looked after.

 
Id always collect a gun if its local to me, but if its more than an hour drive away? Forget it.  I once drove from Plymouth to Manchester to collect an M249, and it still turned out to be a total lemon except Id wasted 6 hours of my life driving there and about £40 of petrol. 

 
I sell a lot. Sometimes I’ll include fees, sometimes I won’t, often I’ll take offers.

Sometimes I’ll include postage, sometimes I won’t.

I have no problem with discounting bundles, and pick up is always OK.

Generally, cheap stuff will include everything and expensive stuff won’t, as I find buyers want more discounts or more options the more they spend, which is fair enough.

There are also a plethora of shipping options available, depending what the buyer and I agree.

I certainly won’t change the varied way I buy & sell unless a site/forum dictates.

rdb

 
What Tiercel said , I not going to drive from Swansea to Liverpool to buy a £150 Gun , I just do some research on the seller , if I don’t like the look of them or can’t find anything about them on the forums then I just let it pass no matter how good a bargain it may be .

 
It was discussed as a forum rule previously, and isnt peculiar to airsoft, it happens everywhere and a solution was found by mothers who are fond of traditional terry cloth nappies

https://airsoft-forums.uk/topic/41707-paypal-fees/?tab=comments#comment-309821

http://www.clothnappytree.com/ppcalculator/

It’s common for sellers to ask that the buyer covers fees, but in doing so if they are not fully up front then it’s just messing people about.

In the retail world etc fees are taken into account in pricing, even where there isn’t or hasn’t been an explicit surcharge a company has to pay for card payment facilities - as part of their banking or for those with low turnover probably as a percentage of each transaction.

Asking to add 4%, 3.4% etc gives the wrong amount as the fee will be deducted from the total paid

If you’ve agreed on the amount the buyer is to receive then (for the standard 3.4%) then you need to work out “3.4 per 103.4”, with the final amount received being 96.6% of the transaction —— divide by 96.6

eg 

£100 to pay

if you add 3.4% then it’s £103.40 and PayPal will deduct £3.52

The seller gets £99.88

Adding 5% makes £105, PayPal take £3.57 and they get £101.43

Divide the required amount by 0.966

To receive the nearest to £100 the payment needs to be £1.04

http://www.clothnappytree.com/ppcalculator/

 
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Being a noob in the past the "buyer pays fees" has confused the hell out of me. I didnt know what the fee was (thankfully this thread has cleared that up) so I had no idea how much to put on and didnt want to pay F&F as mentioned above the seller was neither my friend or family and I had slight doubts, so not knowing how much to add to the total, and not wanting to ask the seller, I didnt buy!

Now...

If the seller had just put a fiver/or the fee total on the amount or in the P&P as mentioned above I wouldnt have doubted anything and just paid for it. I would much prefer sales anywhere to just list the amount you have to pay regardless of costs, surcharges and fees to the seller! The person selling should work out how much they want and adjust their prices accordingly. 

I want to buy an item, not have a bloody math test!!

 
We added some 'guidance' to the classifieds rules thread, but the rules themselves are a big wall of text that - let's be honest - not everyone bothers reading (much less the 'Transaction Advice').

It may well be worth a separate 'How to Buy Safely' notice being added in its place (the link to the rules is really just there right now because they recently changed) with questions like this on PayPal answered.




 
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If someone wants to offer collection or post then yeah, P&P is extra and I'm fine with that but if they want paying by PayPal then sorry, you need to work out how much you actually want and charge that. If you lose out because of paypal fees on YOUR transaction that is NOT MY PROBLEM.

 
The thing about a seller saying "Buyer pays fees" is that it doesn't really mean that at all.  It means "Buyer puts in the effort to work out how much they actually have to pay me in order to put £X in my pocket, because I'm too lazy to be bothered doing it myself."

And, you know, maybe they'll get around to posting the item after they get the funds, or maybe they wo - ooh, squirrel!

 
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