I have a paywall using checkout in front of a website that provides services to the community at large. Recently, multiple users have communicated that they are no longer seeing the Guest Checkout option when they go to purchase a subscription. I know these are individuals or businesses without PayPal (many would be described as "old school.") This is impacting their ability to do their job and my ability to provide a service. When I contacted PayPal, I was told that PayPal is customizing the checkout experience based on their internal criteria and also because they have determined that some of these individuals should have a PayPal account going forward. The Guest Checkout page has the following blurb: Buyers don’t always have the option to make their purchases without using or creating a PayPal account. This option is presented based on several risk factors, including but not limited to the buyer's PayPal purchase history, PayPal cookies stored on the buyer's computer, the buyer's location, and/or a credit assessment. In my opinion, this is not right. I had to help a very elderly gentleman who could not understand why he didn't have a guest button, and I had no answer other then "PayPal thinks you should have an account." He cannot create one, he will not be creating one. This issue is increasing. I have a workaround where we "request" money, but that is also not working all the time now. Users are now starting to mail checks, which is one of the reasons we implemented a paywall in the first place, to remove manual handling of money. Is anyone experiencing this? Do you know any valid workarounds? At this point, we are now looking for a new payment service to replace PayPal because we cannot offer a consistent checkout experience to everyone. While the fees from our usage may not bother them to lose, I just wanted to say I think this is not the way to go when offering an electronic payment service.
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