Here's what happened:
I went to ebay.com (the US site), NOT ebay.ca and found a camera I wanted to purchase. The seller was in Canada, and although the price of the camera was listed in Canadian dollars, just below it was shown the conversion rate in US dollars. Since all of his listings include Pay Pal and Pay Pal Credit with 6 months pay/ no interest listed as payment options, I assumed Pay Pal Credit would simply do the conversion, even if it involved a small fee, and pay them from my Pay Pal line of credit.
WRONG!
I don't have another credit card with sufficient funds to use at check out.
There was nothing on the listing, or in the Pay Pal terms of conditons I could see on the ebay site, indicating Pay Pal Credit would not pay for purchases in Canada. Why show Pal Pay Credit as an option on the listing if that was not possible for payment across borders?
I called Pay Pal and was bounced between 3 agents; two who did not know why the purchase did not go through, and a third who simply said Pay Pal would not pay for any purchases unless it was listed in US Dollars. (Even though US Dollars were shown at the conversion rate on the listing, payment was requested in Canadian Dollars.)
I can't believe this! I've made ebay purchases from CHINA before without issue, although I admit, those listings were shown only in US dollars.
Is there a workaround for this? Pay Pal says the seller has to request the funds from me in US Dollars with an invoice. I have a hard time believing Canadian ebay sellers don't Pay Pal sell to US customers every day without issue. Can a seller list Pay Pal as an option if Pay Pal won't actually approve the transactions across the border in local funds?
