Paypal - Still not entirely sure about fees, help anyone please?

jumeriah64

Hi there, like lots of us I use Paypal a lot but honestly speaking I don't really understand the fees.

I mainly use for ebay and purchase & works well. Best I understand the seller pays the fees for moving money.

But if I transfer money (say to a family member but not necessarily)...do I pay a fee to do that...say £100 transfered as a service or suchlike?

And if I do this does the family member pay a fee to receive it?

Or is the fee only charges if you take funds out of Paypal.

I tried to test this and moved a sum of money to my daughter and it appeared to arrive with zero deductions. But when she took it our of her paypal, a fee (I think about 3%) seemed to be taken from her end.

The funding source for my paypal is amex. I think that makes a difference but not entirely sure.

Apologies new to posting so maay / may not be in the right place. Appreciate any guidance from anyone. many thanks

mgdavid

as you rightly say, an ebay purchase paid for by Paypal incurs a transaction charge which is charged to the seller.
If you are buying something *not* through ebay but use Paypal to pay, then again the seller pays a transaction charge.
However if you use Paypal to transfer money to someone, and choose the 'Friends or family' option then it is fee-free in most cases.
This is clearly stated on the payment input screen, you just need to read it before typing the address & amount and hitting enter.
"No fee if you use your PayPal balance, bank account or debit card to send money to friends and family within the UK." If you don't already have funds in Paypal then your Amex is probably causing the issue here, as it's not a bank account or debit card.
TBH I've always thought it a waste of time using Paypal if there's insufficient funds in it to cover the gift or payment I want to make. Far easier to just do an online bank transfer in that situation.
Withdrawing funds from Paypal to a registered bank account is free.

jumeriah64

Hi mgdavid, many thanks for taking the time to reply with the useful data and apologies for my slow response.

Yes I use Amex to feed my paypal expenditure. The main (well only) reason is that we get 1.5 air miles per pound we spend and this is very lucrative in planning holidays. That's great for spend e.g. ebay and the like. But I was looking for a way to maximise that potential by moving money around...within family, buy/sell transactions.

I thought I'd deluded myself somewhat and I think you have proved that's the case. Back to the drawing board :-)

Now if I could find a way to keep x thousand pound moving from person to person with minimal fees, I could be flying J class two or three times a year .... happy days.

Many thanks for the information and taking the time