Here's the situation. I listed a Gold Coin on EBay. A buyer purchased the Gold Coin with a send to location in Florida. I packaged the item and sent to address on the EBay label. I then go to my PayPal account and notice that the money received was less than expected. PayPal did not deduct 2.9% from the purchase price, but 4.4%. I phoned PayPal to verify. They confirmed that the 4.4% fee was because it was an "international" funded transaction. So for this item, it was sent to a US Domestic address BUT funded with non US funds. I wanted to know from PayPal whether there was a way for me to determine before the transaction was completed whether the funds were coming from an International source. PayPal said NO. The only way to know is 'after' the transaction is completed. This is a problem. I should be able to make the determination if I want to accept foreign money and from where that money is coming from. In addition, PayPal's new policy that if a seller returns an item, all fees are kept by PayPal. This means that for this transaction whereas I would not like to accept funds from a foreign source, if I were to cancel and 'refund' the buyer after noticing the 4.4% deduction of fees, I would not be able to get that 4.4% back from PayPal. This means to me that PayPal is being complicit with making it easier for Money Laundering Schemes to occur because they are 1) unable to provide source of funds before the transaction, 2) after the transaction, they keep the fees EVEN IF, I refuse to accept money from a foreign source upon learning that the source of funds is foreign. IF they keep fees from a foreign transaction that COULD BE money laundering or possibly funding terrorist activity, then they are benefiting from such financial activity. I post this now because I am unable this weekend to talk with anyone in Corporate concerning these issues. As a consumer I should have the right to know in full disclosure where funds are coming from in order to complete transactions. The origin of those funds, from what country, by what mechanism, including bank name, should be available to the consumer in order to make decisions on whether those funds should be accepted. PayPal should refund any fee related to foreign transactions if the seller doesn't want to accept funds from a foreign source even if the ship to address is a Domestic one.
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