Alternative to PayPal for Web Professionals - a quick survey

Hello folks,

Just wanted to fire some questions at the web designers, developers, illustrators, all web freelancers, to hear your thoughts on an issue which is rife at the moment.

Now, as a lot of you know, PayPal can be a nightmare to work with when it comes to working with clients through the dispute process, the fact that seller protection doesn't cover intangible goods and the fact that if a dispute does come up the PayPal team aren't the easiest people to work with. Yet PayPal is still the #1 choice for web professionals.

If you are involved in selling a service to clients and use PayPal or simmilar gateways for payment processing, please take a moment to give your answers to the following questions:

• If PayPal offered a more personal level of support to give unbiased, human perspective on disputes (such as a client asking for a refund on a deposit for reasons that aren't your making), would you use the service? And if so, how much more than the current 3.4% fee would you be willing to pay for such a service?
• What is your average project payout?
• If PayPal could operate on a basis more like escrow - where funds are provided by the client and held in safe hands until the end of the project when they are given to the freelancer as long as the work is proven to be done in line with the project brief - would you prefer to use a service like this? Would you pay a greater percentage fee than the 3.4% PayPal charge?
• What payment methods (other than credit / debit card) would you like to be able to accept digitally, if PayPal could offer them?

Any time you spend answering these questions would be of great help for a project working to provide you, web professionals, with a suitable alternative to PayPal.

Kind regards,

The primary issue with paypal is that people seem to expect them to act as some sort of legal mediator in stead of drawing up a real contract. Paypal has a claims process, but it is not meant to be the first and only way to fight scammers off.

And most of the time when people talk about paypal support burning them, they mean that the mediator did not see things their way. They expect paypal to act as some sort of court for free, without even being given all the facts.

The bottom line is that if you want to guarantee a project or item, get it in writing and only make paypal the payment gateway. If something comes up, take them to a court of law.

Without millions, possibly billions, how could you outgrow PayPal.

Thanks for your views Village Genius, but the problem with PayPal is that it is not designed for the sale of intangible goods. It's designed mainly to work alongside eBay sales of posted goods.

Vizon, I'm simply firing some questions about, the viability of an option is being explored. It would help me a great deal if people could post their thoughts on the questions I've posed rather than try to shoot me down without a note.

Thanks!

The only issues I have with Paypal are that their fees are too high. There's no way I'd switch to a service that charges even more.

Originally Posted by Garyrae The only issues I have with Paypal are that their fees are too high. There's no way I'd switch to a service that charges even more.

I agree. That, and if PayPal didn't sell to eBay (or whatever happened there), I'm sure things would have been fine. Digital goods would have most likely still be "covered", in terms of claims. Well, I THINK. If MoneyBookers was more user friendly for transactions and worked nicely along side with PayPal, that would be great too. As far as I know, you're not able to send money from PayPal to MoneyBookers?

Or, maybe I'm behind on things and need updated on their policy and features...? Haha. I haven't used MoneyBookers at all yet, but registered with them probably a couple years ago. Just didn't bother with them, because they seem more complex. But next in line for me to use, other than PayPal, would be MoneyBookers most likely.

Edit: I also HATE the dang wait time from transferring from PayPal to bank too! Err. And my credit is shot to crap also, so getting a bank debit or any other card is out of the question. >_<

Paypal is good!

Its one of the easiest payment method you can use, its online integration is awesome and thts the reason for its popularity.

Its secure too! I personally havnt have had ny problem with such scammer trying to rip me off.*thnk god*

I too sometimes dont like there high service charges for big ammounts ..and surely higher charges would be very nice

Regards

Paypal is best.I am using from last 2 years without any problem

I find Moneybrookers much better. Generally does the same things, but faster and works not only with an US bank + cards, so I can withdraw directly to my company's bank account in a currency which is not USD, converted on the fly.

Amazingly the transfers get twice faster than PayPal > Visa (one in Euro at least)

If you need an escrow, perhaps https://www.escrow.com would do the job.

alertpay is the right alternative.