4 ms·

Stripe is a pain in the ass as a buyer, so I really hope they won't be able to acquire competitors and become a de facto monopoly. For example, when you're tra

Stripe is a pain in the ass as a buyer, so I really hope they won't be able to acquire competitors and become a de facto monopoly. For example, when you're traveling abroad and can't buy a service online with your card, you can be 95% sure that Stripe is the payment processor.

okthrowman283 8mo ago
Maybe true but I’ve never had a worse experience than I have with PayPal, truly an awful company
- piker 8mo ago
  Well for an expats, it's really a gamechanger not having to play three card monte selecting the correct card to use for each transaction. You would be surprised how many transactions are (accidentally?) geofenced based on where your card is issued from, and Paypal pretty much solves these.
  - aitchnyu 8mo ago
    I'm an Indian with a few US subscriptions and Paypal was indispensable for years. When they set a KYC deadline involving some dude in a video call suddenly asking me to produce my Aadhar (national ID), I then discovered those services work with my debit cards perfectly. BTW autonomous charging of arbitrary amounts is not allowed in India, AFAIK.
- dataflow 8mo ago
  I know everyone here hates PayPal but I don't recall hearing anyone I know IRL complaining about it, for whatever that's worth.
  - deleted 8mo ago
    [deleted]
  - xtracto 8mo ago
    As a buyer PayPal saved me after being scammed. It was a breeze to claim my money back, once I filed a police report. Stripe and other normal card processors make it impossible. And before someone says to "charge back" with my bank, my card is from a country where that is almost impossible. In fact I think maybe only in the US that's actually practical, because in Germany I don't remember "charge backs" being a thing when i lived there.
    - pm90 8mo ago
      Ive had the opposite experience with paypal being completely obnoxious and refusing to halt a fraudulent transaction (ultimately my bank made them).
  - omnimus 8mo ago
    Might work for some countries (like US). But if you are from country with their own currency PayPal will only allow payout to account with that native currency. You get payed in USD you can't payout to USD account if your nation uses different currency. And of course they will also exchange that USD to your currency with their exchange rate that's 5-8% above services like Wise. Basically you either keep money in your Paypal and use it there or pay their cut. It's simply usury.
  - swarnie 8mo ago
    Is it because no one you know IRL uses paypay? It hasn't been relevant in a lot of countries since Ebay was popular in the mid 2000s. A free/standard current account will do physical/online payments, cash withdrawal, currency conversion, spending abroad ect ect.
  - ErroneousBosh 8mo ago
    It's just a payment processor, one which only appears to be used for eBay. There's not a lot to complain about. Stick in your card details, shitty old 1990s computers and synthesizers and car parts arrive at your door. Hard to get it wrong, really.
    - sgerenser 8mo ago
      PayPal hasn’t had any connection with eBay in years.
      - ErroneousBosh 8mo ago
        But it's what eBay uses for its card payment gateway. I'm not sure what else you'd use Paypal for.
  - stevekemp 8mo ago
    I think the people who complained about paypal stopped using it. Back in the day I had a paypal account, as did many friends, solely because it was the only supported payment method on Ebay. After a few bad experiences I cancelled/closed my paypal account, and I know I'm not alone in that. These days the sight of a paypal payment form is an immediate tab-close. I've no wish to use them, support them, or go near them ever again.
    - linhns 8mo ago
      I'm surprised by how bad and costly Paypal is. After switching to Revolut, happily dumped my PayPal account.
- pjmlp 8mo ago
  Well here in DACH space, it is one of the US providers that works best, then again maybe we should move away from them.
chillfox 8mo ago
Yeah, but PayPal is an even bigger pain.
greggsy 8mo ago
Except in Australia, where it barely had 30% saturation, compared to Square’s 60%?
hsbauauvhabzb 8mo ago
Stripe is also sending me emails with an unsubscribe button that requires me to authenticate. So they’re a pain as a user as well.
p0w3n3d 8mo ago
Similar same happened to me, but in my country. I got a virtual stripe card to pay for the conference I was supposed to attend to and the fixing of problems took like five business days
nodesocket 8mo ago
You clearly didn’t have to use Authorize.net before Stripe came along. It was unspeakably bad.

okthrowman283 8mo ago

Maybe true but I’ve never had a worse experience than I have with PayPal, truly an awful company

piker 8mo ago
Well for an expats, it's really a gamechanger not having to play three card monte selecting the correct card to use for each transaction. You would be surprised how many transactions are (accidentally?) geofenced based on where your card is issued from, and Paypal pretty much solves these.
- aitchnyu 8mo ago
  I'm an Indian with a few US subscriptions and Paypal was indispensable for years. When they set a KYC deadline involving some dude in a video call suddenly asking me to produce my Aadhar (national ID), I then discovered those services work with my debit cards perfectly. BTW autonomous charging of arbitrary amounts is not allowed in India, AFAIK.
dataflow 8mo ago
I know everyone here hates PayPal but I don't recall hearing anyone I know IRL complaining about it, for whatever that's worth.
- deleted 8mo ago
  [deleted]
- xtracto 8mo ago
  As a buyer PayPal saved me after being scammed. It was a breeze to claim my money back, once I filed a police report. Stripe and other normal card processors make it impossible. And before someone says to "charge back" with my bank, my card is from a country where that is almost impossible. In fact I think maybe only in the US that's actually practical, because in Germany I don't remember "charge backs" being a thing when i lived there.
  - pm90 8mo ago
    Ive had the opposite experience with paypal being completely obnoxious and refusing to halt a fraudulent transaction (ultimately my bank made them).
- omnimus 8mo ago
  Might work for some countries (like US). But if you are from country with their own currency PayPal will only allow payout to account with that native currency. You get payed in USD you can't payout to USD account if your nation uses different currency. And of course they will also exchange that USD to your currency with their exchange rate that's 5-8% above services like Wise. Basically you either keep money in your Paypal and use it there or pay their cut. It's simply usury.
- swarnie 8mo ago
  Is it because no one you know IRL uses paypay? It hasn't been relevant in a lot of countries since Ebay was popular in the mid 2000s. A free/standard current account will do physical/online payments, cash withdrawal, currency conversion, spending abroad ect ect.
- ErroneousBosh 8mo ago
  It's just a payment processor, one which only appears to be used for eBay. There's not a lot to complain about. Stick in your card details, shitty old 1990s computers and synthesizers and car parts arrive at your door. Hard to get it wrong, really.
  - sgerenser 8mo ago
    PayPal hasn’t had any connection with eBay in years.
    - ErroneousBosh 8mo ago
      But it's what eBay uses for its card payment gateway. I'm not sure what else you'd use Paypal for.
- stevekemp 8mo ago
  I think the people who complained about paypal stopped using it. Back in the day I had a paypal account, as did many friends, solely because it was the only supported payment method on Ebay. After a few bad experiences I cancelled/closed my paypal account, and I know I'm not alone in that. These days the sight of a paypal payment form is an immediate tab-close. I've no wish to use them, support them, or go near them ever again.
  - linhns 8mo ago
    I'm surprised by how bad and costly Paypal is. After switching to Revolut, happily dumped my PayPal account.
pjmlp 8mo ago
Well here in DACH space, it is one of the US providers that works best, then again maybe we should move away from them.

chillfox 8mo ago

Yeah, but PayPal is an even bigger pain.

greggsy 8mo ago

Except in Australia, where it barely had 30% saturation, compared to Square’s 60%?

hsbauauvhabzb 8mo ago

Stripe is also sending me emails with an unsubscribe button that requires me to authenticate. So they’re a pain as a user as well.

p0w3n3d 8mo ago

Similar same happened to me, but in my country. I got a virtual stripe card to pay for the conference I was supposed to attend to and the fixing of problems took like five business days

nodesocket 8mo ago

You clearly didn’t have to use Authorize.net before Stripe came along. It was unspeakably bad.