[OPEN-ILS-GENERAL] paypal credit card payment

[David Busby]

In Section 5 on
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=p/gen/terms-outside#receiving_payments

In short:

"No Surcharges. Under Visa, MasterCard, Discover and American Express
regulations and the laws of several states, including California, merchants
may not charge a fee to the buyer for accepting credit card payments "  and
a few more sentences of legal noise that defines a few workarounds (such as
handling-fee on all payments methods, not just paypal)

But notice, that's for merchants and makes no statements about educational,
non-profit or government entities.
It might be time for legal council to review.

/djb



--
David Busby
Edoceo, Inc.
http://edoceo.com/
206.282.6500


On Fri, Apr 5, 2013 at 10:14 AM, Joe <knuevejo at oplin.org> wrote:

>  Perhaps it depends on your entity's legal status?  On paypal's
> government entities site (
> https://www.paypal.com/us/webapps/mpp/government-payments)  it states
> that governments are allowed to charge a fixed transaction fee for all
> transactions, either credit, debit, etc..  I can imagine that paypal would
> prohibit all others from charging a fee.  The text from their site is
> below.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Joe
>
>
> --------------
> Some government entities choose to absorb PayPal transaction fees.
> However, it is possible to recoup some fees from constituents in the form
> of a fixed fee.* Government entities are allowed to charge a convenience
> fee that applies to all forms of online payments, even debit and ACH
> transactions. The fee must be a fixed amount – such as $10 per transaction
> – rather than a percentage fee.
>
> * Different convenience fee rules apply for tax payments.
>  --------------
>
> Joseph Knueven
> Director
> Germantown Public Library
> 51 N. Plum St.
> Germantown, OH 45327
> 937-696-9998x10knuevejo at oplin.org
>
> On 4/5/2013 12:37 PM, David Busby wrote:
>
> Please note that PayPal terms do *not* permit charging a fee for usage.
> That is, you cannot charge Patrons a fee to offset the processing fees that
> PayPal charges you.
>
> /djb
> On 5 Apr 2013 08:29, "Joe" <knuevejo at oplin.org> wrote:
>
>> Good day everybody.
>>
>> I had a quick question about accepting credit cards through paypal for
>> those libraries that do.
>>
>> Do any of you charge a convenience fee to your public for charging fine
>> payments?  Tinkering with a test server, it looks like the entire payment
>> process occurs from within the TPAC when the public pay fines themselves.
>>  I know paypal has a setting where a fee can be automatically added to a
>> balance, but I'm concerned that if we went this route and patrons were
>> paying from within the OPAC that they would never see this fee until after
>> their charges had been made.
>>
>> We are currently on 2.3.1
>>
>> Thank you in advance.
>>
>> Joe
>>
>> --
>> Joseph Knueven
>> Director
>> Germantown Public Library
>> 51 N. Plum St.
>> Germantown, OH 45327
>> 937-855-4001
>> knuevejo at oplin.org
>>
>>
>
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