More expensive than AMEX: why we stopped accepting Paypal on our e-commerce store

More expensive than AMEX: why we stopped accepting Paypal on our e-commerce store

When we started Qore Performance®, one of our foundational tenets was to always make it easy to accept payments. We have products you want, you have money we want, so let’s make a fair deal and get back to getting after it.

Because of this, we checked all the boxes for “payments accepted” - Visa, Mastercard, AmEx, Discover, Diner’s Club, Western Union, first borns, Shopify Payments, PayPal, Amazon Payments, Euros, Pounds, good old USD - you have it, we took it.

As time has gone on, though, we have seen middlemen take advantage of and exploit businesses and consumers alike with this mindset. From onerous and ever-expanding terms of service, to nonrefundable fees, to elaborate account verification procedures, payment processors are becoming roadblocks to commerce, rather than enablers.

Almost all parties have their flaws. Shopify Payments is probably the best of them, charging a reasonable but nonrefundable fee and requiring third party apps to accept cryptocurrency.  Historically, Shopify has charged a 2.6% + $0.30 per transaction.

shopify merchant credit card processing rates and fees

Since we started the company in 2015, Paypal’s Checkout Fee was competitive at 2.9% + $0.30 for Domestic transactions and their login was straightforward, making for a pleasant customer experience. Recently, they announced they would be increasing their processing fees to an astronomical level (3.39% + $0.49) in early May, amongst other drawbacks. This is a screenshot from our PayPal account taken 11APR 2022 showing the current, lower rates, before the rate increase takes effect in May 2022:

paypal merchant rates are going up and this is why we stopped accepting paypal at our e-commerce store

We don’t have any interest in passing that on to our customers, and the terms of service set by PayPal do not allow us to do otherwise. Coinbase, which we use to accept cryptocurrency, is susceptible to government monitoring and intervention. Amazon Payments (last we checked) did refund transaction fees for returns and canceled orders, but using their services for our product line isn’t something we can support after their internal politburo stole from us (not bitter, just honest).

This has led to considerable internal discussion and thought. Despite the possibility that it will be more difficult in the immediate term for some customers to transact, we have decided to offer only the lowest fee option for all payment types and mechanisms starting May 1, 2022. At the time of this writing (10APR 2022), that does not include PayPal. That is right: as of 01MAY 2022, Qore Performance, Inc. will stop accepting Paypal. We feel this is the best way to provide maximum value to our customers, and minimize the upward pressure to raise prices on our products, while still offering the widest array of payment options, preserving value and flexibility.

A lot of this is invisible to you, but we will continue to work tirelessly to give you the most value for your dollar possible, while at the same time shedding light on where your payment is going along the way.

Important note: we will resume accepting PayPal should they choose to reverse course on their policies and fees.


1 comment


  • W. Flatt

    Paypal is doing this because they’re “woke”. I could explain why a company that goes hard-left would wish to punish everyone who’s not, but that’s political as well as TL;DR. Suffice it to say that the maxim “Get Woke, Go Broke” will eventually catch up to PayPal. You’re seeing this already with other hard-left virtue signalers like Twitter (Saved by Elon Musk’s hostile takeover) and Facebook/Meta (Losing stock value so fast, Zuckerberg may have to go get an actual job soon).

    Thanks for transparency and honesty; we who value your products will keep coming back! Capitalism rocks!


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