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Comment by jonknee | Hacker News Reader

The payment side is powered by Google Checkout, so the fee structure smacks Apple around all over the place. The most expensive tier (under $3000 in monthly sales) is 2.9% + $0.30. The cheapest is 1.9% + $0.30.

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> The payment side is powered by Google Checkout, so the fee structure smacks Apple around all over the place.

Except for the part where as a vendor it's only available in half a dozen countries or so, and several major countries can not pay via Checkout either (does Checkout work at all from canada yet?), and where the customer service is non-existent (a Google constant).

Whereas PayPal and iOS App Store customer service are famously excellent?

App Store customer service IS excellent in my experience.

Excellent AND working from countless countries. Payment is one proble Apple has actually solved.

Let's check:

Google Checkout,

- Not present at all in a number of countries

- Impossible to sell from an even higher number of countries

- No customer support at all

Paypal

+ present virtually everywhere

- customer service generally considered frustrating, becomes terrible when dealing with their fraud detection

iOS AppStore

+ present in more than a hundred countries (though some parts e.g. iAd may not be available everywhere)

± customer service generally regarded as good, except when dealing with the approval process (and even that area shows progress)

>-No customer support at all

Hi, may we help? :) We also do have forums that are actively monitored.

Also if anyone is interested, checkout is present in these countries: http://goo.gl/I49QQ

Except that Google's forums don't help when Google locked five figures from you on a spiky day, continues to accept money with no way to withdraw, provides no telephone support, and offers only an (apparently overloaded) email support. (Eventually I got my account unlocked and funds released... six months later.)

Coincidentally, I've never had such a problem with Paypal. (My gripes with them generally revolve around the glacially slow history search.)

Can you sue them for interests, if not damages?

That was two years ago and it's not worth the effort. It's better just to explain the moral of my story when Paypal vs. Google Checkout debates occur: Paypal at least has a phone line.

I say this every couple of months but no one believes me: Paypal has gotten religion on business support. Fraud sucks for everybody, but they really are making AB effort on it.

I got my account auto locked when an apartment move, sales spike (Valentine's day), and large withdraw all hit at once this week. It took one call and two minutes on thhe phone to resolve. "Sorry Mr. McKenzie, we just saw an unknown individual try moving a lot of money in and out of your account and wanted to make sure it was you. You're good to go."

I'm glad they're working well for you, but I'm not working on rumours - I just spent over a week and about a dozen phone calls trying to fix a mistake they made. Eventually they did accept that the mistake was at their end, but until that point their service was appalling. To their credit, though, they did seem to take a lot of notice of the feedback form I submitted.

in contrast to what competition is offering, yes.

>Half a dozen countries? Please see the countries mentioned in this support document: http://goo.gl/I49QQ

Canada is definitely supported for users.

>Where the customer service is non-existent: Hi. Any specific problem we can help with?

Brazil?

>>Where the customer service is non-existent: Hi. Any specific problem we can help with?

In my experience, "Customer Service" can mean one or both of the following: 1. Actual help to resolve real problems 2. A human voice on the phone to walk you through resetting your computer (or otherwise generally offering moral support)

I find that most folks get nervous when #2 is not available, even if they would never use it or it would be unlikely to solve any of their actual problems.

The big G does not even pretend, and I think that is possibly to their detriment.

But if your charging within your Android application " the transaction fee for in-app purchases is the same as the transaction fee for application purchases (30%). " (http://developer.android.com/guide/market/billing/index.html)

Considering OnePass was just announced and isn't shipping yet, I don't think we can know yet if it will be billed the same as Android's existing in app purchasing.

Agreed, but i read that "One Pass offers payments in mobile apps (i.e. in Android apps)" Maybe there will be a differently tiered charging system depending on the content (news content vs application specifc content like a new level for a game).

OnePass appears to be limited to the publishing industry, so there would be no new levels for a game.

The fee for One Pass is to be 10%. (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-12489318)

They need to add other payment options then CreditCards to Google Checkout. Nobody uses CreditCards in Europe and it's kinda stupid that I can't even buy Apps on the Marketplace and have see if the vendor support direct purchase form their website via PayPal or something.

What payment options would you suggest? Apple only accepts credit / debit cards too (well and gift cards which are also primarily purchased with credit cards).

Bank wire transfers, that's what everybody here does including Apple, Amazon etc.

Interesting. What country is this?

Belgium, maybe. They use bank transfers a lot (definitely not France, where bank transfers are very rare but debit cards are everywhere)

Okay I realize I shouldn't have said 'Europe', because it seems to differ quite a bit from country to country. I myself are from Germany and while its relativly easy to get a credit card from your bank, only a small minority owns one. The plastic cards, that we get from our banks are called EC-cards (for "eletronic cash") and are completly different than credit cards. They are tied to your bank account, work just like debit cards, and you can pay at every store with them. At online shops you would usually just enter your bank account number and it's directly withdrawn. So the additional monthly fee of owning a credit card is not worth it for the majority of people.

> Nobody uses CreditCards in Europe

I'm a European and I use a credit card. And I'm pretty sure it's a billion dollar industry in my country alone.

If not credit cards, then what do Europeans use?

Sane wire transfers, direct debit, and a multitude of other things. Credit cards are on the rise though.

On the other hand, even debit cards are usually called credit cards, at least in france (either that or "carte bleue" which is the french standard for these things).

In France at least, credit card are far more often used than wired transfer etc.

> Nobody uses CreditCards in Europe

WTF are you talking about?

Credit Cards are a part of everyday in Europe just like everywhere else. And yes, I live in Europe too.

They're talking about debit cards - I know in the UK and Germany many people do not own credit cards, certainly in the young twenties sector in the UK debit cards are the norm.

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