How would I set up a system in which people can pay me using their credit card? I know paypal offers that service, but their regular services kept letting people back out of their payments. Also, would I haveto pay taxes? If so, then how would they be deducted? Thanks.

There was a post about this 2 days ago. You can find it here. This gist of the post was that your answer is in the The Business of Game Development forum FAQ.

[EDIT] As for taxes, these are usually (as far as my experience goes) handled by the customs officials of whatever country the product is being sent to, you simply need to have the package declare what its contents are.

[edited by - Michalson on May 14, 2002 6:00:41 PM]

PayPal is your best be for accepting credit card payments. Otherwise you can dish out a whole lot of money for a third party interface like ClearCommere or CyberSource, pay for a dedicated line to a bank, and pay a fee for each transaction you process through the interface. This method can get quite pricey. Maybe there are other third party host who work like PayPal, but I don''t know of any.

I''d advise everyone to check out http://www.paypalsucks.com before depending on them for your business. There are a lot of allegations you probably should be aware of.

I wouldn''t go so far as to say "PayPal sucks". But I do think you would do better than to make PayPal your primary payment method. It just comes with too much overhead and baggage.

We support PayPal as "yet another payment option", but that''s about it. Some people use it. Some don''t.


DavidRM
Samu Games

Paypal is good because it has the lowest commision cost, which may be the most important factor for you.

The downside of paypal is the problems several people have had with having accounts frozen on them indefinitely. To protect you money, the best thing to do is move the money out of paypal and into your back account (via electronic transfer) at regular intervals. This way if your account ever does get locked, you dont risk losing any/much money. However, if they do lock your account for a month or more, that is how long you will not be able to accept orders. If you decide to switch to another service, it will still take you time to set up an account, convert over your web site, and interface with their system, so you may still end up being down for a few days.

Another downside with paypal is that it isnt quite so easy for a person who doesnt already have a paypal account to order from you. First they need to set up an account. Sure, they still enter the same info (name, address, CC info, etc) so it really isnt any extra work, but the idea that you are establishing an account with them caries an extra burden. That person knows paypal will be keeping their personal info, they will be getting emails from paypal, the will be obligated to adhere to a set of policies, etc. Its not as simple as "I give you my info, you give me the product, have a good life".

quote: Original post by hello2k1
their regular services kept letting people back out of their payments.

By the way, what do you mean by this?

[edited by - LordKronos on May 15, 2002 4:07:14 PM]

That you can accept payment from someone, they pay you through paypal, you send the stuff, and then they withdraw their payment. Unfortunately Paypal is very open to abuse on both sides (buyer and seller).

I meant that if people complained, they would get their money back with no arguement from me.. I'd just be ignored. Check www.paypalsucks.com, they have pretty much all the problems I have listed.

Is there any way I could get the bank to handle this?

Edit: One more thing. I'm going to be reaceiving payments for a service.. there is no delivery required. How would I handle taxes like that? I really don't feel like getting audited in the future.

[edited by - hello2k1 on May 15, 2002 4:21:02 PM]

hello2k1: Income is income. It''s taxed normally. I would recommend finding yourself an account to help you track cashflow and pay your estimated taxes.

DavidRM
Samu Games