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When sending money through PayPal for items purchased here on Dakka, do you guys typically select the "I'm paying for goods and services" or the "I'm sending money to family or friends" option? If you select the first option, how do you go about compensating the seller? I've always wondered what the general rule was for this.

Never select the gift option - it leaves you with much less buyer protection.

As for who covers the fees, well, if I am buying something from someone via PayPal, then I pay using the 'goods and services' option and I expect them to cover the fees as the seller - they can either add a small sum onto the transaction value to cover it or live with it; its a downside to using PayPal.

I prefer payment by bank transfer for the most part. As the value of the payment goes up PayPal starts to get really inefficient. I always have clients cover fees (generally by adding to the transaction value) if they wat to pay by PayPal. It can be over a hundred quid on big jobs. It's a fair amount of money to have to factor in.

filbert and winterdyne, thanks for the input. I always wondered how it went and I appreciate the info!

zatazuken wrote:
When sending money through PayPal for items purchased here on Dakka, do you guys typically select the "I'm paying for goods and services" or the "I'm sending money to family or friends" option? If you select the first option, how do you go about compensating the seller? I've always wondered what the general rule was for this.

Once I did gift because the trader requested it = never saw the goods and could not make a claim against them on PP.

So now I always go goods/services.

Should be noted, most clients have had at least one successful transaction through PayPal before paying bank transfer or so on.

ALWAYS KNOW WHO YOU ARE SENDING MONEY TO.
ALWAYS GET ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF PAYMENT, AND WHAT IT WAS FOR.

Also, ensure you have a physical address (not PO number), ideally a valid email address (owned domain or ISP, not gmail), that sort of thing. The more 'real' information you are given the less likely you are to be screwed. Business/company registration numbers are a good one. In the uk incidentally it is now a legal requirement to publish a limited company registration number on all associated documentation (from letterheads to emails to websites).... Not very enforced, but it's supposed to be there.

 filbert wrote:
Never select the gift option - it leaves you with much less buyer protection.

As for who covers the fees, well, if I am buying something from someone via PayPal, then I pay using the 'goods and services' option and I expect them to cover the fees as the seller - they can either add a small sum onto the transaction value to cover it or live with it; its a downside to using PayPal.

Second this. Goods and services any day of the week.

Never use gift, unless of course, it's a gift.
Asking to be paid as a gift is tantamount to screaming "I'm a scammer" in my view.

I prefer to request a Paypal invoice, and then pay that. I'm also always happy to send out a Paypal invoice to someone buying stuff from me. That way everything is fair and square, and I'm not just sending a bunch of money to a random email address.