Sunday, February 17, 2013

Square vs. Paypal

My brain is on overdrive lately.  In fact, last night I had to take some time and just sit and do nothing.  Really, nothing.  I needed some time to just deeply relax.

 I did sneak in a few chapters of Danielle LaPorte's Firestarter Sessions.

This morning I woke up feeling great and ready to share about my Square.

My Square

My "Square" arrived, which is a mobile credit card reader.  I had already downloaded the app. on my Iphone and was very excited to get started until I set up my online Paypal account (jewelry page) and noticed that they also have jumped on the mobile card reader bandwagon and are in fierce competition with Square.  

So, I did a little comparison and found...

Both work with iphone or android.  Both allow point-of-sale swiping of the 4 major credit cards and link right to your account.  Both send you free readers in the mail.  Here are the sites to review for yourself:

Square: Square Site

Paypal: Paypal site
(Paypal has a comparison breakdown of 3 mobile reader applications)



After the bit of research, I've decided to go with Paypal, even though I just ordered my Square, and here's why:
It's cheaper:  Paypal is  2.7% per transaction vs. Square's 2.75%
Square charges more (3.5%=.15 cents per transaction) if you have to manually enter the card too-I couldn't find info. on Paypal's policy on manual entries.  
Square does have the option of a flat $275.00 per month fee if you have a lot of transactions.
It's faster: Deposits are made on the same day of sale.  
It accepts more forms of payment: You can accept paypal and checks in addition to the 4 major credit cards
It helps with billing and tracking: You can send invoices and track cash payments with the Paypal app. 
More than one person can use it: You can have multiple user accounts so if you have more than one person selling for you, each person can link to the account at the same time.  
Loyalty: I have a history of using paypal and I like them

So, now I need to add "Order Paypal reader" to my list of things to do this week.  I'm on vacation and intend to get things really rolling so stop back and see!

3 comments:

Robin said...

wow thanks for all that info..that is really great now I know I will go through paypal..I just saw and found you from magically mixed and commented on your gorgeous work..!Nice to meet you..!

Kelly D said...

Thanks Robin, I thought I responded to this a while back but it doesn't look like it posted. I love your site as well, it seems we share a love of vibrant color!

Merchant Services said...

Thank for the side by side comparison! i was wondering how your experience with PayPal's customer service has been?