Offering payment choices makes your listing more appealing, and most sellers offer more than one option. However, not all payment methods provide the same value to inspire buyer confidence. It’s important to consider the buyer’s perspective when selecting typical payment options.

Buyers’ questions about payment methods include:

• Is it traceable and is there proof of payment?

• Is it fast and convenient?

• How secure is it?

• What is the liability coverage in case something goes wrong?

For a comparison of payment methods from a buyer’s perspective, see About Payment Methods.

Tip: Save time specifying payment methods by using eBay Checkout. You can set payment preferences for all of your listings using My eBay.

Payment methods used by eBay sellers include:

PayPal - PayPal is the fast, easy, and secure way to pay on eBay. When you list your item with PayPal as a payment method, your buyers can securely pay you online with a credit card or checking account. Buyers pay from the item listing page and payment is deposited directly into your seller account. When you use PayPal, you don’t need to wait for checks to arrive in the mail, to be processed, or to deal with processing buyer credit cards. PayPal also helps protect you against fraud. For more information, see Selling with PayPal.

Merchant account credit card - You can set up eBay Checkout to take credit card payments and require buyers to provide their credit card information. If the buyer is using a credit card, contact the card issuer and verify that the name on the card matches both the shipping information and contact information. If you have any doubt about the identity of the buyer, you should contact the credit card company to validate payment before shipping the item. If you have a commercial business that accepts credit cards from customers (not just through eBay), using eBay Checkout, you can select the cards you accept.

Note: To keep eBay a safe place for both buyers and sellers, sellers who register after January 17, 2007 are required to offer either PayPal or a merchant account credit card as an accepted payment method for their items.

Other methods of payment include personal checks, cashiers checks, and money orders. These methods are traceable to a particular mailing address, but most sellers wait for the funds to clear before they ship the item to the buyer. The advantage of these methods is that there is no additional fee to the seller.

Escrow - For high-priced items, eBay recommends eBay's approved escrow service, http://www.escrow.com/. For more information, see Using an Escrow Service.

Cash - eBay does not recommend cash or cash wire transfers as a payment method. The lack of transaction protections, and traceability represent major risks with little to no remedy for transaction problems (see Sending Payments: Benefits and Risks).

Important: You should never accept overpayments from buyers for items where the buyer is asking to be reimbursed for overpayment. These requests could be part of a counterfeit cashier's check scheme (see Receiving Payments).