I, too, am VERY UNHAPPY that the Plug-In/Secure Card service is being discontinued. To my way of thinking, the PayPal Plug-In/Secure Card was an ingenious win-win marketing tool... I had a secure and convenient way to use PayPal at websites that did not offer the PayPal option, and the company had increasing business from me. When the topic of PayPal came up at the "water cooler" and my colleagues would say they didn't use PayPal because they had heard about PayPal accounts being fraudulently breached, I went out of my way to tell them about the Secure Card feature and how easy and smart it was to generate a one-time, one-amount credit card. Not only did the Secure Card allow me to use PayPal to pay to an unlimited number of vendors, but it also provided another layer of protection between my bank account and the vendor, which I highly valued. Plus, the knowledge that my Secure Card payment would automatically come from my bank account so I wouldn't be hit with a high credit card balance each month was awesome. In my case, the loss of the Plug-In/Secure Card function will SIGNIFICANTLY REDUCE my use of PayPal. I have plenty of credit cards and can see no advantage to getting another one. As I review my options, except for eBay (which I use very little), I can see no reason to even keep (or recommend opening) an account with PayPal. I will have to go back to using my existing credit card. PayPal's suggestion that I get a PayPal credit card, create a Money Market Fund, and then deposit money from my bank into it, is a clumsy "fixit" that goes beyond the ridiculous. This "concentrate on new products" explanation is nothing but spin, and insulting to the customers. The obvious reason why PayPal is discontinuing the Secure Card feature is to gain more vendors. As long as PayPal customers can generate a payment to a non-participating website, the vendor has no incentive to pay the hefty fee to PayPal to participate directly. However, I think this bully tactic will backfire because the number of customers who will drastically reduce their use of PayPal may just override any new revenue PayPal will gain from new vendor fees. Talk about moving backwards... PayPal may just end up a puny, small thinking company, useful only to eBay customers. Maybe PayPal will realize what a blunder it has made and bring back the Plug-In/Secure Card feature "by popular demand." Companies who forgo customer service in favor of profit stunt their growth.
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