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PayPal question?

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aeronca65t

aeronca65t

Great Pumpkin
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I’ve been busy lately, and I’ve been meaning to activate a PayPal account for various uses.
So I went online and read how it works.

I assumed that you could “feed” it with a credit card (the same way many of us “feed” an Eze-Pass toll-booth transponder).

In fact, it seems to work quite differently.

In order to have a PayPal account, you must give them completely unfettered access to your checking account via your PIN code. This would give the consumer very little financial protection against “hacking”, if it happened.

I don’t mind using my credit card on the internet, because it is protected from fraud over $50 USD. And I know this is true because a few years ago, my credit card number was used to buy over $2500 worth of junk all over the world (mostly video games). I was not required to pay anything when that happened (not even the $50). All I had to do was cancel the card and get a new one.

As it is right now, the only way I’d use PayPal is if I had a dedicated checking account with a small amount of money in it (but that seems like a pain).

Am I misunderstanding how PayPal works?
 
Are you sure you read that right?? I have a PayPal account, and it uses my credit card.
 
Same here. I think you can get "verified" with a checking account, but it's not required for regular activity.
 
I will have a PayPal account set up soon, BUT: it ~will~ be a seperate checking acc't. My twisted logic: If there's a dispute of ANY KIND the *account* is locked down. Not just the disputed amount. That's too much control IMO. The hassle of a seperate account is worth the effort. I pay the 'monthlys' from my checking. Not gonna have some ten dollar argument cause me to miss a mortgage payment!
 
I have one just for doing MG business. It is a separate account and not linked to the others in any way.
 
DrEntropy said:
I will have a PayPal account set up soon, BUT: it ~will~ be a seperate checking acc't. My twisted logic: If there's a dispute of ANY KIND the *account* is locked down. Not just the disputed amount. That's too much control IMO. The hassle of a seperate account is worth the effort. I pay the 'monthlys' from my checking. Not gonna have some ten dollar argument cause me to miss a mortgage payment!
Click to expand...

/bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/iagree.gif I have two free checking accounts at a WAMU. One PayPal knows about, the other they don't. As soon as money goes from Paypal to the checking account, I transfer it to the other account and only leave in the minimum balance in the account PayPal sees.
 
OK, thanks guys.
I just looked over it again and was able to add my credit card to my "profile". Not easy to find, but it was there.

But I will tell you that at first, they do not *lead* you that way.
The first thing I saw was a form that asked for my PIN code for my bank account to enable transfers from my checking account. No way!

Another thing I found was an easy form to give them your debit card info. Not doing that either.

I'm not telling the rest of you folks what to do...that's your business. But using a checking account or debit card (which is not a credit card and really the same thing as your checking account) online offers you very little protection if you are hacked.
On the other hand, present financial laws in the USA give us pretty decent protection when using credit cards online.
 
I have a PayPal I use all the time for theAutoist....it either takes money out of itself if there's enough there, or my credit card or a separate checking account I set up for Paypal depending on how I instruct it on each transaction.

It never asks for my PIN from credit card or checking...& I only talk with Paypal via my secure Paypal url directly to it & my account.....<u>never answer a Paypal email!!!!</u>

I also tell it to transfer money from Paypal to that checking account
 
I've never had it ask for a "PIN" number either. They DO ask for an R/T number and account number for transfers, but that isn't required if you use a credit card. I go one step further: I have a virtual credit card number (Discover) dedicated to PayPal - the number won't work except for PayPal transactions.
 
Like several others, I set up a separate checking account just for PayPal and never keep over $100 in it. Never use it for payments though. Always use the credit card instead. I know I never gave them a PIN number for the account because it doesn't even have one. They do require the routing and account numbers though. Never had a problem with them but in the worst case no more than that $100 can be at risk.
 
tony barnhill said:
I only talk with Paypal via my secure Paypal url directly to it & my account.....<u>never answer a Paypal email!!!!</u>
Click to expand...

We have had our paypal account that we set up when we made our 1st e-bay purchase 6 years ago. Its the only way we accept payment for the stuff we sell. (We are not into the business of selling) but I agree with Tony....in the past year we have gotten a lot of spoof e-mails instructing us to click on the following link to access our account....we NEVER DO THIS. We had a scare recently where an e-mail "From paypal" showed a payment of $500 for something we didn't purchase and it instructed us to click on the link to sign in to our PayPal account..if we had we would have been directed somewhere that our sign in name and password would have been stolen and we would have given access to whomever it was. After that, we opened a second checking account, deposited $100, removed our primary account and just use the credit card for major purchases.
 
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