Comment PayPal royally screws over international customers (Score 1) 237
Its actually much worse than this for international customers.
If a paypal user uses the paypal features for ebay auction, a paypal button to pay the seller will appear on the auction page. If the auction is in a currency other than US dollars, the buyer will follow the link to pay the seller, and being confronted with no warning, put in the, say, Australian dollar amount. Of course, paypal uses US dollars, which are worth a lot more. The buyer may be someone who has never used paypal before!
Withdrawing funds to an international account will cost you about 5% again! Add in the 2.9% receiving fee and you're paying about 8% in fees. But paypal don't inform you of this charge, you only find out the amount when you go to withdraw the funds. The measly help text below is their attempt at an explanation. Paypal would apparently be surprised to learn that my credit card gives me the flat interbank rate on all transactions, no matter how small.
Why is the foreign exchange rate different from what I see in the newspaper?
Foreign exchange rates displayed and used for your International Transaction will differ from the rates that you may see in the newspaper, on the Internet, or on television. Published foreign exchange rates are often the interbank rates, which banks charge each other for transactions valued at U.S. $1,000,000.00 or more.
Well, paypal, when you withdrew US$1 when I signed up, I was only charged the interbank rate. Please Explain?
If a paypal user uses the paypal features for ebay auction, a paypal button to pay the seller will appear on the auction page. If the auction is in a currency other than US dollars, the buyer will follow the link to pay the seller, and being confronted with no warning, put in the, say, Australian dollar amount. Of course, paypal uses US dollars, which are worth a lot more. The buyer may be someone who has never used paypal before!
Withdrawing funds to an international account will cost you about 5% again! Add in the 2.9% receiving fee and you're paying about 8% in fees. But paypal don't inform you of this charge, you only find out the amount when you go to withdraw the funds. The measly help text below is their attempt at an explanation. Paypal would apparently be surprised to learn that my credit card gives me the flat interbank rate on all transactions, no matter how small.
Why is the foreign exchange rate different from what I see in the newspaper?
Foreign exchange rates displayed and used for your International Transaction will differ from the rates that you may see in the newspaper, on the Internet, or on television. Published foreign exchange rates are often the interbank rates, which banks charge each other for transactions valued at U.S. $1,000,000.00 or more.
Well, paypal, when you withdrew US$1 when I signed up, I was only charged the interbank rate. Please Explain?
