Using Paypal/etsy at fairs to process credit cards

Jeanne Steck June 2, 2011 at 6:17am

I have done this a few times. The customer logs into their own paypal account to transfer $ to mine. I've used my laptop or the customer's phone. Once you get the hang of it it doesn't take too long. I don't have a merchant account with paypal and not everyone has a paypal account, so that was a problem for me. I lost at least 2 sales last weekend because of that. I've since signed on with go pay and will have to key in charges till I get a smart phone. Unless my daughter will let me borrow her blackberry. - Not likely!

Megan Horan June 1, 2011 at 5:35pm

My concern would be the amount of time it may take to log on, have them sign in, enter the numbers, you enter the amount, etc. Also, will your laptop battery survive for the whole day?

Not that I have anything high-tech myself. I use Propay and have for many years. I have a knuckle buster that I use to imprint the cards and enter the info when I get home. What may work better is to get some credit card slips from an office supply store and imprint the cards on the spot. When you have some down time, you can enter the info into Paypal. Just a suggestion. Good luck!

Ann Marie Crosmun June 1, 2011 at 2:11pm

Erin-my husband just signed us up for Squareup.com He thinks that that might be better than our current system (knuckle buster, then calling them in once we get home). We've been with our old system for a lot of years (with only one bounced credit card). We are keeping our old system, but, we are going to try out this new one the week after next (the 18th). We'll let you know how it goes..........

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Using Paypal/etsy at fairs to process credit cards

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