PayPal friends and family(again)

General Yo-Yo
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This has been mentioned like an ‘annual topic; I know. It I am just bringing it up again because I have noticed an ‘uptick’ in the suggested use in BST posts recently.

We are obviously a community’. But that being said; most of the people on this forum are not friends. Most of us may be on friendly terms with one another. But we are not necessarily friends.

Many guys know each other more by screen names than real names. And just as many have limited knowledge of the age of others or even what they look like or exactly where they live.

PayPal friends and family option is to move Money to others. NO GOODS AND SERVICES; period.

If you save anybody a few bucks by using f&f; you have Zero recourse if you end up on the scammer end of a deal. If you get jammed and you cry to PayPal. They will immediately know one specific thing about you. That you are just plain Stupid. No second guess.

Paypal charges fees for a reason. They are a Business; not a non profit organization.

Taking the position that ‘PayPal makes enough money off me’ is pure lunacy. When you use a service; you pay for that service. You can’t go into McDonald’s a few weeks in a row and then next time you go you want free food because they have already made enough money off you.

The PayPal fees are part of the transaction. You simply calculate them into the deal.

Say…you want to sell a yo-yo. You want $100 to pocket when the deal finalized. So; you calculate shipping(approximately $10; priority and insured for value) and PayPal fees(say… about $3 on a hundred). So asking price is $113; including shipping and fees. <> simple😉 > make adjustments accordingly for various price points.

PayPal Goods and Services is cheap insurance to help you get either the yo-yo or your money back.

In deals with actual friends or family; then the correct option is up to you.

I think there should be a forum rule against posting a BST and stating friends and family only.

Anybody that skips the PayPal fees with some weak cop out excuse deserves just what might go wrong. No mercy here.

PayPal G and S is not just a fee. It is Insurance that will help you save money on Kleenex.

Period …

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Agree 100%. I would even go the further step and say posts that specify friends and family or buyer pays the fees should be deleted by the mods.

I understand a lot of young people have their first private seller e-commerce experience on BST, and they need to be warned about risks of F&F. However, if someone chooses to gamble their money over a 3% fee…if you get scammed, don’t post whining about it. Post “I was dumb enough to let x scam my because I payed F&F. Don’t trust X”

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On the bass forum I visit we sell and trade a lot of high-end basses - some like $10k+. For the past decade, it’s been a standing (and enforced) rule that suggesting F&F in a listing will have the post deleted, and asking for it in a DM will get you banned. It’s just unreasonable to ask or assume that others leave themselves exposed, regardless of the value of the item. The BST culture should implicitly take the stance which offers its users the highest degree of trust.

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don’t step over dollars for pennies. g&s ensures a business transaction doesn’t sour personal relationships

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Absolutely. It’s even against PayPal’s terms of service to charge people more to use G&S. So every time someone here asks you to pay G&S fees or lists higher prices for G&S, they’re breaking PayPal’s terms of service. They are risking having their PayPal account suspended over a 3% fee.

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Technically this is true, but they also say that handling fees are acceptable as long as they don’t function as a surcharge (good luck enforcing that) and don’t exceed the G&S fee. So basically, idk why this clause is even included. Personally I think this is a little too heavy-handed, anyway

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I think it’s perfectly reasonable. They want to get paid for their service, and they want buyers to have some assurance they’re not just being ripped off; how is that “heavy handed”?

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Also, you can charge handling fees, but not contingent upon someone not using G&S. So, it’s perfectly reasonable to include that clause.

Please stop making me defend a corporate giant, it makes me feel dirty.

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It’s not the fees that are the problem, but telling someone they can’t pass-thru the cost of doing business is a bit of an overreach
And to be clear, I’m not speaking specifically about yo-yos. I’m not worried about $3. But to make that some sort of “official” policy is not cool. You make your money, and let me make mine how I see fit. If my prices are too high as a result of me adding a surcharge and buyers go elsewhere, then I go out of business.

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But they’re not doing that at all. You can pass-thru all the costs you want, you just can’t make it contingent upon whether someone pays you via G&S, which is reasonable, otherwise you’re telling people they can get a discount if they neglect to protect themselves.

F&F is essentially a FREE service they provide for Friends and Family, and if you’re using that for Business, you’re essentially abusing their free service, which isn’t free for them. They’re a multi-billion company, so I’m actually ok with that, but I still think it’s not right to charge people, especially somewhere like here, more for G&S, as you’re taking advantage of people’s trust.

If someone does YOU the solid of paying F&F, that’s fine, but you shouldn’t pressure or require it of them.

3% isn’t a high rate for payment processing, especially considering how many payment options are available through PayPal. If you don’t like it, there’s plenty other payment processors to choose from, most of whom charge a whole lot more per transaction unless you’re dealing with serious volume.

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As a seller I price for a G&S transaction. That is how I want to be paid - it is easier when PayPal handles the shipping label. If someone were to pay F&F, i actually don’t like it. Also, if they were to ask for a discount for F&F, I would say no.

As for it being OK for someone to cheat a huge company…at what point does a company become big enough that cheating them is OK? How about an individual? When does stealing become acceptable?

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Agreed with both of these.

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wholeheartedly concur

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I think that’s a great question, and I think anyone who says the answer is easy isn’t being entirely honest.

Is it ok at the point where it won’t hurt the other party? If you agreed to abide by certain terms, then in general I would say no. If you were strong-armed into a set of terms, or if they have a monopoly, or if you’re struggling to feed your kids… At that point I think it’s beyond the scope of a yo-yo forum :grinning:

Personally I try to live by the “golden rule”—not the one where the person with all the gold makes the rules, but the original “golden rule”. Where that gets fuzzy, that’s where ethical questions tend to get difficult. I try to avoid such situations, and that includes paying the 3% G&S fee :sweat_smile:

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All I’ll say is when you agree to abide by the rules, you are giving your word. In my world a person’s word says a lot about them. Not one of us have to use pay pal or the bst. We all have options, maybe those options aren’t as convenient, but there are options.

Each to their own.

I’m done here.

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I think making G&S mandatory makes sense, and as a buyer it would be convenient to not have to ask if G&S is included.

As a seller I price to cover G&S and toss people my PayPaldotMe URL, which automatically processes as G&S.

I just don’t get why people don’t use it by default/are against it. Tbh I scroll right past any listing that says “F&F only” even if I desperately want the yoyo. So they just missed out on making a sale to save 3%.

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Does anyone know of any cases where people in the yoing community have abused G&S?
I’ve been selling stuff on ebay using paypal for well over 10 years and it’s always something I’m really scared of…but after selling hundreds of things, it’s never happened…knock on wood.

But the thought that someone could claim that they never recieved what I sold them, or claim that it was broken upon arrival or something similar…then file a complaint with paypal about it…scares me. I’d be out both the item I sold and the money.

Could this fear be part of why people want to use F&F only?

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For the never receiving it part if you use tracking that should take care of that. That is your proof they received it. As for receiving broken I believe they have to provide proof such as pictures

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I mean if its not what the buyer thought they were getting than they should have every right to use G/S to return the product and get a refund. That doesnt seem like abusing at all to me.

If they didnt return the product/have done it multiple times in a short span than maybe, but ive never seen it go this far.

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I just saw a bst that said something like they would take G&S only from someone will positive feedback, for just this reason. (I don’t know if that is a legitimate fear or not, just saying it’s there.)

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