paypal personal payment

i don't know if this applies as a vendor but i didn't know where else to put it. I also hope i'm not breaking any rules to post this issue, at least i don't think i am, but if so then i will remove it promptly.

probably like most of you that buy and sell on the classified here, you will use paypal personal payment option and send money as a gift to save paypal charges.

well today i go a couple of emails from paypal asking me if these payments really where gifts or if they were online purchases.. i'm not sure if it's an automatic message or if they were screening my comments in each payment, but it worries me.

now i know i'm taking a risk by using the gift option, but i don't know if paypal has any authority to suspend my account if they do believe i am using this option for purchases. i'm probably being paranoid, but it's bothering me..

It was a gift and no one is allowed to say otherwise except for you. If I pay someone using a gift option, I take the risk that that person does not send me the stuff. Paypal will not take up a fraud claim.

Basically if I want fraud protection I will send money as non-gift, but there is no way I am going to pay Paypal 3% of every transaction I make.

yes i understand this.. the reason i'm worried is because my payment comments are pretty obvious and it's probably why they were screened aside from my other purchases.

i've had some bad times with paypal. like in 2001 when they froze my account for suspected fraud and one time for deducting money because of a ebay buyer who was a fraud. there was obviously a lawsuit because of what paypal did back then but i don't see why they wouldn't try to pull something else..

Hrm, I haven't been using Paypal quite as much as maybe you have. Additionally, if I was using it for legitimate business, I would probably not be using the gift option because if I did that many transactions through them I would kind of feel obligated as they would be part of my business.

Here's what you do: make a secondary personal account for personal/gift transactions using a throwaway email account like yahoo or hotmail. That way even if they do go psycho and disable the account you just need to make a new one

I've had a separate eBay Premier account and a personal account for ages because they didn't used to charge fees for personal accounts unless it was CC-funded. For non-CC personal/'gift' payments just ask the person to PM you their address and not mention the item when sending the payment.

Yes, I nejoy 'gaming the system' in case you couldn't tell As far as I'm concerned Paypal gets no special consideration since they hold funds for at least 3 days and sometimes up to 6-10 days when in reality the transfers are always 'instant.' I understand they need to make money to run their business but holding funds on top of charging fees just does not sit well with me.