It’s all over. You have until May 12. Or is it June 12? With PayPal, you never know.
A little while ago, you learned that PayPal would cease processing for adult transactions outside of Ebay’s mature audiences auction section. Now PayPal states they will no longer process for any adult transactions in or outside of Ebay.
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"The sad part is that the loss of this e-money service will hurt a lot of small resource providers and individual adult webmasters." |
Granted the adult Internet does not depend wholly on the services of PayPal. Most paysites and sponsors have merchant accounts or use IPSPs. The adult net will go on without PayPal.
The sad part is that the loss of this e-money service will hurt a lot of small resource providers and individual adult webmasters. PayPal is cool. It crosses borders. It’s easy for surfers as well as adult Internet professionals. PayPal is used by all kinds of web travelers and is probably the most popular form of e-money in existence. PayPal is perfect for a small business that wants to trade worldwide.
A webmaster in England can put money in a PayPal account and then pay for a template from a designer in Canada with the e-money. A person can deposit money in a PayPal account with a credit card or check or even money order. No interest charges and no credit check is necessary to have a PayPal account. PayPal was the third option for many in the online porn field. Now a whole bunch of adult professionals have to scramble for another option.
Many will find that option in either IPSPs or merchant accounts. Still others will turn to programs that mimic PayPal. Some will be lucky enough to find a situation where a bigger company takes them into the fold. Then there will be those with nowhere to turn. They will lose out. The most hapless circumstance of PayPal’s departure is its impact on surfer trust. Adult webmasters who sold to the public through PayPal could depend on the fact that most of were familiar with the company.
The majority of their customers already had accounts with PayPal. Now they have to start back at square one to get all these people to switch to another e-money service.
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Is it fair that PayPal is quitting adult?
Well, after all they did provide specified end dates. They said they’ll no longer process for adult outside of the Ebay Mature audience section after May 12. They said they’d no longer process for adult period after June 12. Either way they gave two months notice. Bitch all you want but PayPal has never really been clear on their adult policies. When Ebay bought them out, the writing appeared on the wall. When VISA started their recent reconfiguration of third-party payment processors, many said PayPal would end up on the chopping block. PayPal tried to operate outside of the regulations of an IPSP. Adult professionals have been negatively buzzing about PayPal for quite a while now.
Fair or not, if you read the articles and the message boards, you were warned.
The last time I wrote about this, I gave some links to services comparable to PayPal. Those links were:
I found some more places that offer an e-money service like PayPal. They are:
Yahoo Pay Direct
(http://paydirect.yahoo.com)
Yahoo is a trusted name. Yahoo is a brand name. You’ll have a better chance of getting your customers to switch if you use a reliable name like Yahoo.
Storm Pay
(https://www.stormpay.com/stormpay/index.php)
This Dominican company provides the service probably most like PayPal. This company is mentioned quite often by adult webmasters who recommend a PayPal alternative.
Neteller
(https://www.neteller.com/neteller/home.cfm)
You have to write them or call them to find out about merchant account particulars/costs but the cool part is this is a Canadian company.
In closing, let me offer a couple of words of caution. You may have heard others who tell you to keep doing business as usual until the last minute before PayPal cuts you off. You may have read advice that shows you how to dodge around the whole "adult" thing in order to keep using PayPal. My strong recommendation is to find something else and leave PayPal alone. They have enough trouble considering the US Attorney General’s office is accusing them of violating the Patriot Act and demanding nine months of gambling earnings as a settlement from Ebay.
Secondly, if you find a reliable alternative to PayPal, use it but be wary. Don’t get caught hanging if your next e-money processor goes belly up or bails on adult content. The desire for porn is the only constant in this industry. Everything else is always subject to change.