We Don't Need No Stinking Paypal !

For those of you who hate Paypal (as I do), Hightekbikes offers several alternatives for payment. All of them are better than Paypal.

Standard Credit Card Processing through http://www.authorize.net
Wepay http://www.wepay.com Set up exactly like paypal.
Stripe http://www.stripe.com Another huge company used all over the world.
Bitcoin http://www.coinbase.com Located in California

I believe we are the first electric bike related company to accept Bitcoins.

I would urge other dealers to join us and free yourself from Paypal. Use one of the superior (and secure) alternatives.

While I can agree paypal charges to much in fees they did save me over a grand when devries tried to screw the board with a bad group buy.

So in some situations I can stomach the fees because in my experience in the past they came thru for me.

A member on this board used PayPal against me and got my merchandise I sent him (clyte 4065), recieved his money back and kept everything. I have never been so angry at an Internet problem in my life. On top of it he acted like I was the bad guy. I can't wait for karma to come kick him in his worthless ass! I pity a man the sells his pride for pennies on the dollar.

Your right PayPal sucks balls!!!

Tom

When my family and I decided to jump off of the government funded bandwagon to try and participate in the Electric Revolution PayPal was the entity that made it possible.

We went from effectively consumers...
To...

Globally connected entrepreneurs

Think about that:
Webstore integration
World wide connectivity
Instant access to cash
reasonable-ish fees
The ability to do "trust transfers" between "un-trusted nodes"
Friend transfers
Auto printing of shipping labels

Dude.... before PayPal... I was a consumer
After PayPal

I feel like I could do anything.

Start a business right now

Dont clown on PayPal.
Just use other methods.

-methods

I use PayPal whenever I can and that has been plenty over the many years it has been around. Got my money back twice cuz things did not arrive so I am several hundred dollars thankful for them. The 3% I paid to sell things was not that big of a deal. Nobody ever lied about the receipt or shape of the goods I sent so it has only been positive for me. Albeit a bit slow to recover funds from the dirty no goods. If PayPal is not available I usually will not purchase from that seller.

I have been burned... maybe once or twice out of thousands of transactions on using PayPal. In the one instance I can think of a guy sold me a ballast that I could not get working. PayPal just resolved the situation - BAM - minimal fuss for me as the customer.

Generally speaking... I think that resolutions should lean toward the customer. It does not take long for PayPal to identify those customers who intend to abuse. Anyone who tries to abuse the system... we sent people to their house at night :| We drill holes in the exterior walls of their house, run long 14g copper wires to different spots, then hook them up to remote control servos and motors such that every time they do something rude.... we can make it sound like they have rats in their walls :wink:

Seriously tho...
As someone who acted in the role of Seller for many transactions... I can say that if you do your absolute best to provide good customer service you will be treated fairly by PayPal. I dont think I can think of a single instance where I felt like I got burned by PayPal. They even invited me in once and paid me $150 to sit in the lobby for a couple hours.

Constructive Criticism... Well... When you add PayPal fees, Ebay Fees, Taxes, Shipping.... come on guys... you do realize that you are taking too large of a rake right? If you continue to be that greedy the game will just move to another card house. If we are playing 3-6.... then take 1, 2. Taking 10% or 20%... not sustainable by any imaginable path. It is only flying now because online selling is still in the wild west stage. Now that it has been cooking for over a decade the greedy frock tax collectors are getting out their fishing poles and trying to target the wrong people

Side Tangent: Companies do business to the tune of millions and hundreds of millions of dollars and pay no taxes. Why? Because they can afford lawyers. A small guy tries to start a business... as part of a zero tariff incentive... to push the national effort to go green (or now blue)....and gets attacked by short-sighted nerds who cant count zeros.

Why the frock would the State of California spend more money to hassle little-tiny-fish-me than I even brought in?? That's one to scratch your head over. I have a 2x4 with the names of about 24,650 companies that are crooked as hell. How about the state stays focused on them - eh? :x

-methods

Gotta agree with Methods here. My wife and I have sold many thousands of items on eBay, and bought quite a few as well. We use Paypal for the vast majority of these exchanges, and a good many others as well. We have 100% positive feedback over more than a decade of using those systems. I don't think Paypal has ever burned us. One or two buyers have tried to screw us via Paypal, but they were unsuccessful. Yes, the fees have gotten a bit ridiculous over the years....it's a lot harder to make money on eBay today than it was a decade ago, and this is a big part of why. Things on eBay have been getting incrementally worse for sellers for many years now. Feedback on eBay used to mean a lot more as well, but I digress.

I have zero sympathy for eBay buyers who get surprised by shipping costs. Read the damn listing BEFORE you buy, or ask the seller if it's not already clear. Don't deal with sellers with any more than a few per cent negative feedback. I don't like sellers who charge huge shipping fees, but anyone who gets surprised by this has nobody to blame but themselves. It ain't rocket science, or even EV science for that matter.

We have a Paypal credit/debit card we can use to spend our PP balance. The bonus cash back we get by using that effectively cuts our PP fees in half--not a bad deal. PP's buyer protections can also have considerable value, as others have noted. Try getting that kind of responsiveness from a shipper that smashes your package to bits.

I love PayPal too. So convenient and actually good competition to Visa/Master/Discover/Amex on price. The only thing I dislike about PayPal is their report offerings. As a person that reconciles the merchant accounts for a large eCommerce corporation, I deal with their crappy reporting on a daily basis. But otherwise, they are doing a good service and I don't see them disappearing any time soon.

I like and use paypal a lot. Their fees are reasonable, not much higher than what a credit card company charges a small retailer.

ebay is a different matter. Those pigs charge 12% and they get that on the shipping too. Even though I'm a "top seller" I still give them over $3K/yr. I guess I shouldn't bitch too much as they are the only game in town that will market my stuff world wide.

I thought Bitcoin is illegal due to Ponzi scheme, tax evasion, money launding, scams, ect...