Paypal is the undoubtedly biggest name in online payment processing

10-second breakdown:

Consumers know and love Paypal as a convenient, globally accepted digital wallet but there’s a lot more to it than meets the eye. As a business owner, Paypal is a solid payment solutions provider for all size volumes. With an almost instant setup and endless integrations Paypal is the most flexible processor available.

The good:

Paypal is at the head of the class as far as brand trust. Almost everyone has a paypal account and the ability to accept paypal payments can greatly help a business. Paypal has been around for years but are moving forward with advanced mobile payments and bitcoin acceptance.

Paypal doesn’t deal in contracts. All of there service’s are on a month to month basis and have to termination fees. Since a lot of Paypal’s services go together to help run your business, it’s easy to try different ones as you go. As you grows so can your services, Paypal can help you scale your business.

Paypal perhaps has more integrations than any other processor. They make it easy to take payment on your website, in store, or on a mobile device. You can not only collect payments, but Paypal will even help you send invoices with customizable templates.

The bad:

Paypal has frequently placed user funds on hold if there is any sort of fraud suspected. Even when the issue is straightened out your money can still be frozen for almost a month.

With so many Paypal services it can be overwhelming to figure out which one’s you need. Total cost and fees can be tricky to figure out as well.

How it works:

Everyone has heard about or used Paypal, founded all the way back in 1998, they went on to literally revolutionize the way the world handles payments online. Acting as a digital wallet for consumers, Paypal has slowly built up trust and has come to be highly respected for its convenience – they made it just a little too easy to spend your hard earned money.

Accepting Paypal payments on your e-commerce site is obvious, but with so many competitors already fighting over who gets to process your card transactions, why go with Paypal for your primary mode of card acceptance?

It’s a good question, keeping in mind that no single processor is right for everyone, a lot of businesses choose Paypal for its ease of use, clear pricing and additional features. Paypal isn’t just for online payments either, they offer POS systems and mobile swipers to take payments in person, so even if you have a brick and mortar business, Paypal might be able to help your company save some money.

If you’ve ever used Paypal to make a purchase, you already have quite a head start on the payment processing side. It’s set up the same way in a similar color scheme. While payment processing gateways don’t normally require a degree in computer programming to navigate, many are clunky and hard to understand. Born on the web, PayPal is a shining example of what it should be like. You don’t want to spend forever tweaking your gateway, you want to get a report and get back to what matters, your business. With Paypal’s software, you can do that. A number of compliments were directed at the ease-of-use from brick and mortar companies that don’t enjoy spending all day at the computer. Tech savvy or not, you’ll be able to figure out everything you need.

If you can’t figure something out, no need to sweat it, Paypal has extensive support options. Their phone support has received its fair share of complaints, but Paypal offers a world class knowledgebase, active community forum and quick answers section so it’s never difficult to find what you need. Paypal has one of the most massive user bases out there, so if you google a question you have chances are someone else has already asked it. They are also readily available on FaceBook and Twitter, with their own Paypal Support Twitter account ‘AskPaypal.’

There is one big weakness with Paypal, it’s very quick to hold funds or even terminate accounts if they suspect any measure of fraud. It acts first asks questions later, which in theory would be great but an overzealous trigger finger has led to many business owners complaining online because their very income has been held up.

With that said, it’s not a unique problem to Paypal. There are several other competitors that offer a lower barrier to entry, you don’t need any track record to get started. That’s great, but inherently has way more risk involved, so Paypal and the others are all quick to act if they smell something suspicious.

So what are Paypal’s rates? You’re in luck, Paypal lists them all right there on their merchant pricing page. For domestic online payments, they charge you 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction which includes interchange. International fees are a little more expensive at 3.9% and a per transaction fee you need to negotiate.

There is a ‘Pro’ version if you want more options. Pro has the same pricing but costs $30 a month. For the additional fee, customers don’t need to redirect to Paypal’s site to check out, they can do it right from your site.

POS pricing is a little cheaper. It’s 2.7% of your transaction if the card was swiped or 3.5% + 15¢ if it was keyed in.

Paypal also offers pretty hefty discounts to nonprofits and businesses that run on ‘microtransactions’ – transactions less than $10.

They are very straightforward about all rates, even if those rates tend to be a little higher than the competition. If you decide to go with Paypal, you’ll know exactly what it costs – an unfortunately rare trait in the industry.

On the plus side, Paypal has very few fees that you need to worry about. There are literally no contracts to sign, so you could be up and running in literally minutes. In addition, there’s no monthly fee unless you go with the Pro account, and no PCI compliance fee because Paypal hosts the payment page, so they’re at risk.

With brand recognition like no other, trust and loyalty from consumers everywhere, Paypal is a great card processor that can help boost the credibility of your website to wary customers.

For complete rankings of all credit card processors, go here.

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