Our charity has used the Paypal Giving Fund for many years, allowing us to receive donations, proceeds of eBay sales, and to appear as a selectable charity on Humble Bundle. Earlier this year we received multiple emails and a letter from them informing us that henceforwards we would require a Charity Paypal account to continue using the service.
Ordinarily this wouldn't be a problem, but in order for Paypal to recognise our account as a charity one they require us to link it to our Bank Account. Our financial policy requires dual authorisation on any payments made from the bank account, and our Treasurer raised the concern that linking to Paypal would allow a single user to make payments via Paypal, bypassing the need for a second authorisation. After contacting Paypal I was informed that there was no way to place limits on the Paypal account so that it would require two people to make any payments.
This was very disappointing for us, and it appears that we will be unable to use Paypal or the Paypal Giving Fund going forwards. Many charities require dual authorisation as part of their financial policies, not least because most trust funds will need evidence that a charity has a dual authorisation system in place before making any grants to them. With Paypal Giving Fund now requiring Charity Paypal accounts I imagine that this problem will hit a lot of charities this year.
We sincerely hope that Paypal will be able to set up a dual authorisation service so that we will be able to use it in future.
