This article was published on November 2, 2009

Has Paypal finally found a way to cater to web services?


Has Paypal finally found a way to cater to web services?

Picture 4This week Paypal organizes its first developers conference for their new PayPal X Platform. It takes place on November 3 & 4 in San Francisco. We will be there.

Although Paypal is the most popular online payment platform today, it is not well suited for the growing number of online services that charge a monthly fee.

The current solution that Paypal provides is fairly limited. Basic functionality, like changing the service fee directly from the service upgrade page, is just not there. Every time a customer wants to upgrade or downgrade they need to re-enter credit card information.

Another problem is the lack of seller protection. If you can’t provide a shipping tracking id, any customer can ask for a refund. Even months after the service is paid for and provided. Last month when I found myself in this exact position all paypal did was suggest I’d take my claim to small claims court. For $ 50? I don’t think so.

Hopefully this will change with their new platform.

We will be attending most of the business development sessions at the PayPal X Platform conferences  (and have planned  a few inteviews with Paypal executives) to find out if the payments service is finally suited for your standard freemium based services.

Get the TNW newsletter

Get the most important tech news in your inbox each week.

Also tagged with