For quick transfers I can use Revolut. For buying something I can use card. For easy payment integration with Web apps there are countless tools.
So I am wondering what use cases PayPal still serves, use cases which aren't already better covered by better means. Why pay heavy commissions to PayPal?
He gave me a UPS tracking number which belonged to a package that was delivered to another city, another person, was part 1 of a 3 package delivery and weighted 28kg, pretty heavy weight headset. The only match was the zip code everything else had nothing to do with me.
So I complained to Paypal, gave them all the data that showed that the tracking number wasn't from the right package and still PayPal let the seller keep the money.
However, if you do a lot of mailing, you'll discover some zip codes that cross state lines (because some remote area is actually served by a post office across the state line).
Or some area where several towns & cities map to a single "preferred" name that the USPS uses (example: Centennial, CO).
Zip codes are for the convenience of USPS and to make their life easier. The edge cases are very fuzzy & fractal.
We have even cities that share a zip code but are in different federal states.
Works even with merchants that don't support PayPal. Everyone supports good old card numbers.
Source: I use a card as my funding source.
It took my company three years of litigations and finally PayPal did in fact return our money.
Yep. Therefore, we also use PayPal a lot to transfer money to a friend when we're at some place that is cash only and someone doesn't have cash on them. No need to type an IBAN and wait for a day.
Also, it's a great backup solution for online purchases if I don't want to share my credit card details or things don't work. For example, many vendors borked the 3d visa verification process so PayPal often was the only realistic option.
The delay can be skipped in many cases via the IBAN instant payment option. Requires both banks to be participating in the program and trust each other (the delay will happen if additional checks are needed, for example if the transction gets flagged for manual inspection, eg if you write "funny" purpose text, etc)
Source: I work in finance.
1) they offer services for free or for a low cost (compared to "normal" banks)
2) when these services work, they do work
3) when - for whatever reasons - these services do not work their assistance/support is either not-existing or unreachable, and when (if) you manage to contact them they provide no solutions/fixes and more likely than not you end up with your account frozen or closed (with no actual idea of the reasons why it was frozen/closed)
Surely there must be something (in EU) that complicates matters (anti-money laundering Laws/limits to transfers/National and EU Authorities/whatever) but right now it seems to me like none of them is actually reliable (if it is used as secundary or tertiary card/means of payment they are fine but I wouldn't trust any of them as "primary".
BTW - just for the record - right now N26 has been ordered to suspend making new accounts in Italy by the Bank of Italy (since March 2022) assertedly due to not full compliance with anti-money laundering checks:
I've never been in a situation where a next-day SEPA transfer wasn't good enough though.
This is incredibly annoying and unhelpful, but there's no other option.
PayPal offers all that in a neatly packaged solution. It's no surprise users would choose that instead of 3+ different services that serve different purposes
But I still find them useful for long therm subscriptions to provider. That why when I need to change the card I don't need to login to (and remember) all websites where I have an ongoing payment plan
Could you (or anyone else) comment on these?
I think the most popular indeed are PayPal and Stripe, whereas any others (like Paddle) are more niche or some others (Alipay) are just more regional.