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All For Sale threads must have a pic showing the knife being sold with written date listed, your username & Bladeforums or BFC to prevent photo harvesting from elsewhere - scammers hate this one trick! The rules for The Exchange can be found here. Please read and follow them. Stop using Paypal Friends & Family and follow our best practices to prevent getting ripped off or having a bad deal.
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The BladeForums.com 2024 Traditional Knife is ready to order! See this thread for details: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/bladeforums-2024-traditional-knife.2003187/
Price is$300$250 ea (shipped within CONUS). If you live outside the US, I will contact you after your order for extra shipping charges.
Order here: https://www.bladeforums.com/help/2024-traditional/ - Order as many as you like, we have plenty.
Am I Out Of Line Here?
- Thread starter HammerHill
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PayPal might be able to pretend that when they charge a fee it doesn't influence the final asking price, but basic economics or common sense will tell you that the cost of the fee gets incorporated into the price one way or another.
The basic principle behind that rule is that Paypal doesn't want their clients to be discouraged from using their service based on having to pay a fee to buy something. Therefore it's better business etiquette to factor in the fees out of the public eye.
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I see how that makes sense. I guess I'd rather be transparent about how I'm calculating my final price even if that means admitting that I take the PayPal fee into consideration. And don't get me wrong: I don't mind the fee! In fact it's great because, as a buyer, I get some protection from being scammed; I can get my money back if I never receive the item, for example.
But unfortunately as a seller I can't love PayPal. I don't think they run their business ethically, and they have no incentive to do so because they hold a functional monopoly over online cash transactions. Which is why I'm always happy to take payments by other means.
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It sounds like you want to have your cake and eat it too. You like the protection as a buyer but will skirt the fees as a seller...
You can and are entitled to disagree as much as you want, but it still does not make my comment less true, based on your experience. Paypal's terms are pretty straight forward, if people do not want to follow them that is solely on them. You just have to remember, sometimes you never know who is watching and it speaks to personal character.
You can ask for any payment method you want in whatever currency you want. That is none of my business. We've gone through this enough and enough people have been burned, tricked, and ripped off so that it needed to be said, again. Especially with the newest wave of new people that comes in every Summer. It's not as if I was using hyperbole to get the point across.
Well, to be fair, the OP did ask right? He did start the thread asking the very question. That is who "we are" to judge. We don't need to get into hypotheticals of random dollar amounts, the amount in question speaks for itself already, it was not a $1,000 deal, when it does come to that amount, we can discuss it them. What about a $19,456.99 transaction, what then? See how silly that gets in a hurry?
In the end it's on the individual and integrity. Regardless of your undefined expository deal history here, there, and everywhere, how many times have you been asked personally to help get an issue resolved? I mean, really. How many emails have you gotten, or private messages where people lost out on a few hundred dollars because they used "gift" because they wanted to be a nice guy and they got the shaft as a result? Did you make any head way in getting their items returned or refunded?
It's about providing a safe venue for sales and there is a lot more leniency here than in other places that require compliance with Paypal's ToS. If you sold something and it never arrived, just vanished, and were paid with "Gift", how would you remunerate the loss? It's not about your several hundred spotless transactions, it's about something a bit bigger, the community.
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Who benefits from the protections that the fee ensures, the buyer or the seller?
Vaporstang
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Added one to my ignore list. (Thanks for those links Kelama)
I did sell a $300+ knife once that I clearly stated price was "PayPal Goods (I pay the fees)" in more than one spot. Sure enough the buyer payed PP Goods but added fees. He said he was just used to seeing "net". I did refund the difference...
I did sell a $300+ knife once that I clearly stated price was "PayPal Goods (I pay the fees)" in more than one spot. Sure enough the buyer payed PP Goods but added fees. He said he was just used to seeing "net". I did refund the difference...
That's a tough one. I'd probly just do the calculation myself and make that part of the asking price. Then again if he was saying what he would pay you in messages I don't think I would say "50 dollars plus fees" as an offer. I'd say I'd pay you 50. So I get where he is coming from....in the sense that he was negotiating what he would pay and it sounds like you agreed to it. It's too bad you didn't get someone who said "I'll take it, goods or f&f?"
I'm also of the mindset that I'm doing a fellow knife lover a favor so that makes selling at lower prices more enjoyable.
As a buyer and a seller I try to be simple, reasonable, and up front with all my exchange communication.
Also, I find....its easy and fast when the price I'm asking is what I feel anyone looking for the knife would jump on fast. It's at least a good way to avoid the pm offers that make you wince. Yeah I might be missing out on a couple dollars here or there but it's so much more enjoyable dealing with people who take it for the asking price, and it happens that way every time when you aren't trying too recover nearly all the money you spent.
On the other side of things I love to wait for knives I want at prices that get me a little excited. And I just take it. Everyone is happier! Including the guys who I didn't lowball.
Bottom line it's tough to deal with people who arent at least close to your asking price. Where I come from it's not a cool practice. He or she may have a few other not so cool characteristics that make it a chore to deal with em. Best to avoid and ignore next time.
I'm also of the mindset that I'm doing a fellow knife lover a favor so that makes selling at lower prices more enjoyable.
As a buyer and a seller I try to be simple, reasonable, and up front with all my exchange communication.
Also, I find....its easy and fast when the price I'm asking is what I feel anyone looking for the knife would jump on fast. It's at least a good way to avoid the pm offers that make you wince. Yeah I might be missing out on a couple dollars here or there but it's so much more enjoyable dealing with people who take it for the asking price, and it happens that way every time when you aren't trying too recover nearly all the money you spent.
On the other side of things I love to wait for knives I want at prices that get me a little excited. And I just take it. Everyone is happier! Including the guys who I didn't lowball.
Bottom line it's tough to deal with people who arent at least close to your asking price. Where I come from it's not a cool practice. He or she may have a few other not so cool characteristics that make it a chore to deal with em. Best to avoid and ignore next time.
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It's pretty simple, the seller pays the fees for using PayPal, the buyer gets the protection from PayPal. It's all in the PayPal terms of service.
You said PayPal protection is "great" and in the same post say you'll take payment by "other means" because PayPal charges a fee
You said PayPal protection is "great" and in the same post say you'll take payment by "other means" because PayPal charges a fee
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See what you said?
Paypal service isn't magic. To keep it running they collect a fee for their service. If you use their service you agree to the terms.
Paypal service isn't magic. To keep it running they collect a fee for their service. If you use their service you agree to the terms.
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I personally always put my all in price to account for paypal fees and shipping. If I want to get a certain price net to me I figure out all the possible additional expenses and factor those into my price. If the person ends up wanting to do it a way that saves me money I will knock a few dollars off. But I don't want to make people do math when I could easily do it myself and save the hassle. These days I just assume most people are going to be paying via paypal. Its how most things in my hobbies are done. But by the same token if I were to have an accidental discrepancy I usually don't make a big deal about it if its a small amount. $4 is about my limit. You screw me on a Lincoln and I'm asking questions. But if I found out it was all slight of hand and they knew what they were doing I would be upset. But I just would not deal with them again after that. Making an issue of it if the person is that dishonest to me would make me want to avoid a confrontation because it could cost me more with such a fresh deal.
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It's pretty simple, the seller pays the fees for using PayPal, the buyer gets the protection from PayPal. It's all in the PayPal terms of service.
You said PayPal protection is "great" and in the same post say you'll take payment by "other means" because PayPal charges a fee
No, I am happy that PayPal charges a fee to protect buyers from getting scammed. I don't accept other forms of payment to avoid the fee, I am simply frustrated that there is no real alternative to PayPal, allowing them to operate like a bank without a bank's rules. PayPal freezes assets for trivial reasons while profiting off the interest, hides exorbitant fees in fuzzy 'currency conversions,' and so on. I'm happy to take alternative payments because I want to support alternatives to PayPal.
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Ah I got you, and that is understandable.
Amen! I'd also like to point at that.. we aren't paying PayPal 4%, BUT we also aren't asking for their buyer protection either. They are asking for trouble with friend and family..hell, you are all my friends. It doesn't say best god damn trust you around my kid friend. 
We're knife Buddies right?
We're knife Buddies right?
STAINLESS90
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I do understand your meaning was probably different but this post gave off the mentality that you like it as long as your the one benefiting from it. My main question to clarify would be when you buy something do you pay gift or goods?
Anytime you use a credit card in a store, the credit card company charges that seller a fee, sellers just have to accept it for the convenience to the buyer or they will lose out on a lot of sales. Same thing with Paypal online, the sellers have to accept the fees or refuse to accept Paypal payments and lose sales.
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Truthfully I've done both, but these days I only gift when I have some sort of prior relationship with the seller.
I have no problem covering the fee as a buyer - it makes sense for me to pay that extra 2.9% to make sure I have recourse if something goes south, and I don't expect the seller to eat that cost just for the "privilege" of accepting PayPal.
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Well, except lots of places will pass along that fee by charging the customer extra for making a credit card purchase under a certain amount.
Back when PayPal was literally the only way to pay someone online, it made sense to charge for the privilege. Now that services like Google Wallet and Amazon Payments are just as easy and totally free, there's much less incentive for a seller to pay just to accept an online payment.
Most buyers are happy to cover the fee because they understand that they're getting something for their money, namely purchase protection, which other forms of online payment have yet to do as well as PayPal. Also, as a casual, low-volume seller, it's not like I'm missing out on sales in any meaningful sense of the word - I have one knife 'in stock' and when I sell it I'm almost always losing money!
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STAINLESS90
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I can understand that, I won't speak for others here but I don't expect a seller to eat the fees so when I see a goods price I assume the fee is figured in. That is why people are recommending you use goods and figure in the 3% yourself. The buyer is happy, the seller is happy, and no one can make claims of confusion (false or otherwise). Believe me not many people will walk away from a sale for a $1.75 price difference, many buyers will walk away as soon as they see someone asking for the gift option.
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