How do I stop buyers seeing my personal information when I send them an invoice?

[PayPal_Jamie]

If you are selling and you don’t want your personal information to show on invoices you send to your buyers you can switch to a business account (which is free). You can update/change your business info. Tools> Invoicing > Settings > Business Information. This will change what customers see when they receive the invoice.

Jamie

[PayPal_david]

Hi again Distraught,

You wouldn't be able to change your name without having the relevant documentation to do so. For example, a deed poll or marriage certificate showing that your name has legally changed.

Thankfully, you have been able to resolve the issues that you were experiencing. By upgrading to a business account and changing your business name, your buyers will only see your business name and not your personal name.

Please let me know if you need any assistance in the future .

David.

[bluebelephant]

Hi there, I am having this problem too...

I thought I had set up both my business PayPal accounts with a business name etc, but one do have to put in a personal name too, regardless of whether the account is personal or business. To my horror, I discovered today that one of my customers had googled my name and found me on LinkedIn. How??? If my personal name is not meant to be visible on a business account, then how did they find me? I really don't want my private name visible and thought I had done everything possible to avoid this. I have checked all invoice-set-ups too and there is no details of my private name on there, only the business name. So how does this still happen???????

Please help PayPal, this is just ridiculous.

[Gordonjamesinc]

David, what about what this last person asked? You are saying that if its a business account, the personal contact name will never be seen by the buyer, correct? But is Paypal sharing details of the account as he is suggesting, where on another website I might see my name listed as the owner of the company? Is that what Paypal does? It appears they did that with him on the Linkedin site. Please reply asap. Thanks

[koroshino]

Not surprised to see no reponse to this. 

I am also in the same situation. I use paypal to receive donations on my twitch account. Luckly one of my followers and tipped me the other day was kind enough to let me know my personal informaton was sent to him when he tipped me. 

This needs to be able to be hid. It's not a buisness it's just a personal account but you should have the capability to hide that info when someone deposites money into your account.

Especially in this day and age...

Come on Paypal, if this doesnt get fixed, I will be forced to use another payment service.

[BangRrang]

I agree, I also use twtich as I know a lot of streamers are moving to another service. I would like Pay Pal to address this situation, if not I would also have to move. I do not want the donation giver to see my personal information. Please somebody respond to this as either "we are working on this" or "We just can't do it for legal reasons" ? 

[itsdaisy]

Read the whole discussion. All you have to do is upgrade your account to a business account (it's free), and add your business name. This works for twitch or any other online payments. Just make sure to walk through all of the settings, invoice settings, privacy settings, etc. to make sure there is no "business contact person" (which would be your real identity) and your address and phone, etc. are disabled from invoices. I just finished setting mine up.

EDIT: The bigger problem could be that you need to make sure you don't use the "Donate" button for PayPal on your twitch channel. This is designed for nonprofit organizations. Unless you are a registered nonprofit organization, you should not use their donate button. Use a third party designed for twitch streamers and enable Paypal as a payment method there.

[Lana135]

Hi everybody,

I followed this conversation with interest. However, implementation of some advices is easier said than done.

In short: the German PayPal-branch (which seems to be covering most of the German-speaking Europe) just let me know that it would be ¨illegal¨ (whatever country's legislation is being meant, I am not in Germany by the way:-) to NOT show company's contact person's FULL NAME apart from the name of the company. Take it or leave it, they say. You are to show who you are, they say. Otherwise you are fraud, they say:-))).

Not that I don't like my name in any way, but I don't particularly like the idea of it being on every single invoice issued by my company. The Germans have a solution for that - pass the account to somebody else, they say. Then this another person who does not mind their name appearing on all the company bills will take over your activities. Which is sweet, however... very spooky.

Why on earth one would want the full name of the company representative on each company bill? Or, even better: why one would want only one person's name/surname being appearing on those bills? Can it be that, for instance, some other department requires another name on those papers, and it would not be possible on PayPal, at least according to our friendly German PayPal specialists.

What is then in reality? Can one or not substitute one's own name with something else? Or is it actually so that one has to be ¨transparent¨ and show one's own name on bills which may not require the mention of it, and which can affect marketing efforts in a certain way?

Which reminds me - customization of email invoices (adding some information, some actually important contacts, or just changing the theme visually) is also a no-go on PayPal?

Seems to be quite a rigid system after all...

Regards,

Lana

[Suki3utts]

I agree with most of these responces.

I think there should be a "hide" or some sort of button that would not send are full names. If at all the first and or only last name.

My buyers do not need to know my full name. I feel like that is evasive to my privacy. If ever an ocation should arise that they would need my full name i think that could be done through legal actions.

You should not need to upgrade to a buisness when you are not a buisness your a personal seller. As well as im sure there are tax forms and what not you would be required to feel out on account you are considering yourself a " buisness" instead of a simple seller.

I do not suggest at all changing your name or changing your address only because i did this once myself and paypal gave me the run around. Suddenly needing a ID fax as well as proof i was at my current address. It was a big inconveniance and even after i sent that it took them days to put it in there system. Actually i had to call them and then they fixed it.

Please fix this soon! I do not wish for my sellers to see my full name. That's private.

If they ever needed it they can request it through legal matters.

[chevko]

Really. Most of the time if you're using a basic account and you're using it to donate money or recieve a donation (because a friend or stranger online wanted to chip in to help you with a bill), there's absolutely no reason that they should know both first and last name. Or should we be looking into gofundme or one of the several others to assist us with such things? There really is no reason strangers online should have to know our names on, at least, basic accounts.

Not to mention it's incredibly creepy to be forced into that. Why can't we use a pseudonym or something to help protect our privacy?

[BriLove]

So, it turns out that Business information can be customized. I was super angry when I thought that Paypal was forcing us to disclose our personal info to complete strangers!! But, if you switch to a business account (totally free, and actually very simple to navigate) when managing or creating invoices, you can update/change your business info. Tools> Invoicing > Settings > Business Information. This will change what customers see when they receive the invoice. You can even choose not to display any additional info at all!

Hope this helps.