Paypal Merchant Services Experiences

Paypal, credit cards

[Turbosho]

Hey all,
I got an interesting paper in the mail from paypal. I already accept paypal express checkout and have authorize/#*$!x for my regular credit card processor. Paypal sent a paper offering .99% processing for 6 months through their Paypal Merchant Services division. They said it can all be done with API and the customer won't know you are using paypal for the payments. After 6 months it would go to 2.2%+ .30 per transaction. For 6 months I could save a decent amount. They say no contracts so I could leave after if the experience wasn't good. Anyone have any dealings with this service?
Thanks,
Turbosho

[paladin]

Turbosho,
While it is easy to work with them technically, I know of a few sites that were using the PayPal API. After a certain period of time PayPal decided to discontinue the API and Virtual Terminal for those merchants with no notice.

In one case the notice (and shut off) went out on a Friday night. Luckily the company had a backup in place, so it took them all of 10 minutes to fix on Saturday morning (still lost about a half day of sales). PayPal also told them they will be keeping all the funds in the account for 6 months as a reserve - ouch!

With a different company, they did not have a backup in place and were not able to do online processing for about a week.

Point is, it may be tempting to save that 1.3% fee, but be mindful of the potential for lost sales (and interest on money held) if they decide to shut down or limit your account.

[Turbosho]

That's why I asked the question. I have heard many stories about paypal putting holds on funds for long periods of time just because, then you get hardly any customer service to help you with it. All of my PayPal experience has been good so I am just trying to figure it out.
THanks

[jwolthuis]

Also with PayPal, the customers' credit card statement clearly identifies the transaction as being associated with PayPal: "PAYPAL*MyStoreName"