Prentice Cotham

Seller charging a "paypal fee"

I thought it was against policy for a seller to specifically pass on a "PayPal Fee" for an ebay auction. He did have it specifically mentioned in his auction to add 4% (nice considering it's only 2.9%) if using PayPal, but I ignored it thinking it was against policy. I never got an answer from ebay. Does anyone have the specific reference in a user agreement?

Scott L

Search Paypal's FAQs, it's in there.

My take: If you see that seller surcharge in future auctions either move on to another auction or pay up. If you simply ignore it and expect the seller to change his/her terms it will just complicate things.

Jeff Ulmer

While PayPal encourages sellers to eat the fee, I don't think they can legally demand it. The 4% is fair, and what I am regularly charged for cross border transactions, in fact it is a little low for some funding sources. By bidding on the auction you agreed to the seller's terms, if you don't like the extra 4%, pay some other way.

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James T

I think Paypal charges a bit more for cross border stuff. So the seller might be covering all his bases if he ships worldwide. But I agree with the above statement. You should have brought it up with eBay first instead of just ignoring it completely. You may have complicated things a bit.

Linda Thompson

Here's the official eBay policy, which forbids such surcharges:

http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/...urcharges.html

Prentice Cotham

I did email ebay many days before the auction ended but I didn't get any email in return. If he demands it then I'll pay it as I did bid on the auction.

Thanks for the link Linda.

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TonyD

i think its weak for ebay to charge paypal fees for auctions on ebay, since they are company one and the same.

some people just bump up the s & h fee to include extra charges like the paypal fee.

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Nils Luehrmann

As Linda mentioned, eBay sellers are not allowed to charge extra for PayPal payments - so not only shouldn't you have to pay, but I think notifying the seller that he is not complying with the rules should cause him to drop the practice all together, or at least wont trouble you for the added fee.

If a seller wants to avoid PayPal fees they can refuse credit card payments. PayPal doesn't charge a seller a transaction fee if they only use a personal account which doesn't accept credit card payments.

In fact, it is even illegal for any retailer to charge a customer more if they pay with a credit card. The way some avoid this is by charging more, but offering a discount (~3%) if the buyer pays by cash or check.

In the electronics business, this is quite common. For instance if a Panasonic dealer places an order for $100,000 worth of electronics and pays by check or wire transfer, they are given a discount of $3,000.

Bottomline: You should not have to pay the fee, even if you did not contact the seller. If the seller is not following the rules as clearly stated by eBay then you are not responsible if the transaction doesn’t go through. In this case, the seller probably doesn’t want to make a fuss as it will only draw attention to his breaking the rules.

I would send him a link that Linda provided and explain to him that you are not responsible for that fee – only he is. That should put a quick end to his demands and allow you to resolve the transaction.


I’ve heard that most eBay sellers inflate their shipping & handling costs in order to compensate for payment fees, but even that is against the rules stated by eBay – although that must be much harder to prove which is why it is such common place.

Sami Kallio

Paypal seems to charge their fee whether it is CC payment or not.