PAYPAL

Paypal is still the largest internet bank , accepted by the majority of merchants , and used for parting with cash on the net by over 80% of web shoppers . So any business worth their salt should join , or risk loosing custom .

Paypal standard is the easiest to implement if you have a few products to sell (you can create Paypal BUY NOW BUTTONS free of charge using the Paypal merchants tab at the top of the page after loggingon to your merchant account) . Any business can therefore be selling from their shopping website within a few minutes .

Most shopping carts eg: Roman Carts Actinet Shopfactory 1&1 EShops (and the free ones Ecommerce Agoracart etc.) will definitely support Paypal standard and some support the new PRO version of Paypal .

Benefits to the shopowner are considerable:

1. Brand - including the words "Paypal accepted" can have a huge impact - some shoppers infact search for these terms as they are specifically to use their Paypal accounts to puchase goods .

2. Fees - there are no monthly fees , you only pay a very competitve percentage per transaction , and it its FREE to offer payment by Paypal.

3. Paypal now allows even none members to pay by credit card

4. All the major credit and debit cards are accepted - Barcalycard Visa Egg cards Mastercards Solo and the main debit cards

5. You can offer your visitors gift vouchers (easy to set up and the vouchers never expire)

6. Chargeback protection - for confirmed and eligible accounts

7. Buyer protection (subject to Paypal terms)For Ebay sellers Paypal is a 'must have' payment provider

Paypal Pro was introduced in UK in 2006 (following success with US merchants) , and allows merchants to accept credit cards from their site seamlessly - it looks to the shopper that they are never leaving the merchant site (and of course is managed by secure Paypal servers for the same highest level of security).

We use Paypal pro on our Ad9 store , it is a very good (and cheaper) alternative to some of the other merchant banking accounts - like Worldpay and Netbanx / Protx , their transaction fees are less , they do what it says on the tin and they are reliable , they should be the first choice for many businesses

Some Things To Be Aware Of
As a Paypal retailer we will use this section to share our experiences

1. Confirmed Customers With No House Number !
You can be sure if there is a loophole some customer will find it - we recently added on our checkout pages in prominent writing that customers need to confirmed with Paypal if they are paying by paypal , this we thought would be a watertight safe situation for accepting Paypal payments , as confirmed members of Paypal afford us the sellers guarantee protecting us from possible chargebacks, and gives us more confidence in the delivery address.

The Problem - A customer from the Scottish Highlands buys from our store and uses a confirmed address - but - and here is the funny thing - he did not include a house number - so it was just a road with a post code . OK - I thought , as long as he is the only person on that road then there can't be a problem - after all Paypal have confirmed his address! So i double checked by googling the post code - and way hey - there is a campsite with that post code as well , i let Paypal know the situation but they were unconcerned and included in a canned email that i have nothing to be concerned as i am seller protected - that may be so , but if i send and item and it gets delivered to a tent it is my cost surely ... The outcome i did not send the item.