The second segment of the Top Sellers Summit in Chiang Mai, Thailand, on Monday night was presented by the SE Asia PayPal team. It mainly focussed on changes to the PayPal site interface for merchants, and the disputes and claims procedures.

Based on a question to the attendees, and the response from Amy of PayPal, I was the “guinea pig” in Northern Thailand for the new interface, which will be rolling to all users in March.  It had actually arrived on my account on the morning of the summit, and having arrived without warning, it had caused me a momentary anxiety that I’d been redirected to a phishing site.

That said, I actually like the new interface, despite it’s over-reliance on flash technology slowing down account management – but that’s due to the distance between the servers and me, users in other countries might not be affected by this.

Topics in the presentation were, like the earlier eBay topics, already covered in depth on BuildaSkill with a few nuggets thrown in for interest …

The team advised us of a new service from PayPal available at https://business.paypal.com where merchants can find and download full details of account reports, disputes, claims, and chargebacks.  The interface at this new service matches up with the new interface of the main account site, and has heavy integration into sellers’ eBay accounts.  From within the eBay account far more information will be visible, but input to the PayPal resolution centre will only be available from inside the PayPal account when logged in.

Staying with the dispute side of things, Amy explained a little about chargeback rates and how they affect PayPal accounts.  In particular she explained when they cause a seller’s account to be placed on hold or suspension.  It seems the relevant data comes from the chargeback rate permitted by credit card companies, and if this goes over 1% of transactions the account is suspended.

The example given was that a $10 chargeback on an annual account volume of $10,000 is a 1% rate.  I know.  Don’t ask me.  This looks like “eBay maths” undergoing transference to PayPal, and I did not hear, or understand, the explanation due to a hubbub of babble erupting on our table as soon as that formula was displayed on screen.  I think PayPal will need to issue some formal announcements and explanation of this, better yet snail mail literature to account holders in their own language, together with contact information for advisors.

Some good news for SE Asian sellers, and Thailand based sellers were specifically called out for receiving this, is a localised revision of the disputes process times and deadlines.  It’s a little complex but refers specifically to delivery times minima and proof of online tracking and delivery.

PayPal recognise that not all post offices in the world provide online tracking even for their more expensive “tracked” services.  As an aside, my own records show that ThaiPost input package details less than 1% of the time.  From this, PayPal are unable to verify almost every despatch or delivery and it causes severe issues with the Seller Protection Policy, causing transference of dispute from buyer and seller to PayPal and seller.  They don’t want this extra workload and so various exemptions have been worked into the system – please contact PayPal Support if you need further information on this, it seems the kinks are still being worked out and the goalposts are on rollers.  Amy advised that the PayPal support number is +65 6510 4650.

The formal presentation also covered the differences of Seller Protection Policy (SPP) coverage in the various eBay main western marketplaces.  UK & USA now have unlimited coverage, whereas AU is restricted to $20,000.  However as Ed blogged when the AU program was modified last year, the Australian SPP requires only Proof of Despatch, whereas the others require (online) Proof of Delivery – very different degrees of cost and workload for merchants and the post offices.

All this talk of disputes and burdens of proof led into the presentation by international courier DHL and their fully trackable online system etc.  I’ll write more about that tomorrow.

The after-presentation 1-on-1 time that I managed to snaffle with Amy was a little limited (my own fault) but the major discussion related to a problem that affects largely multi-country cross-border sellers.

What I positioned to Amy was the following four, seemingly disparate, current conditions -

• At eBay Live 2007, Bill Cobb and Rajiv Gupta (respectively then President of eBay North America and President of PayPal) clearly and unequivocally promised the introduction of multi-currency invoicing on both eBay and PayPal for multiple-country sales billing to single customers as a single transaction.  They stated it would be available before the end of that year, and was greeted with huge cheers in both the auditorium, and around the world.  It has still not arrived.
• The current iteration of the PayPal Seller Protection Policy prohibits the shipping of multiple transactions’ products in one package.  That is, if a buyer pays for multiple items in separate transactions, from the same or multiple sites, the seller will not be covered against disputes or claims if those multiple transactions are shipped in a single package – such as when the buyer demands combined and discounted shipping costs.
• eBay North America has introduced the Paperless Payments Policy, but neither PayPal nor eBay are able to combine sales from multiple eBay sites (disclosure – I’ve not had opportunity to try combining US and Canadian transactions where both are listed in USD, nor European sales where all transactions are listed in Euros, but assume the same restriction as multiple currencies apply).
• Additionally, eBay has marched a relentless path for over two years whereby internationalism of the sites has increasingly been cut.  Facilities for cross-border visibility have steadily been reduced and the push has been towards sellers increasing there duplication of listings onto multiple sites instead of running them all from a single preferred home site.  Apart from the effect on fees (at both eBay and PayPal) this further drives a wedge into aims for cross-border / multi currency invoicing.

I positioned with Amy (and later with Bau of PayPal Singapore) that the above four conditions cause sellers to seek non-PayPal payment routes whereby they can combine all currencies into a single currency payment with discounted shipping, thereby improving the “Buyer Experience”.  By taking this combination outside of the eBay / PayPal sphere of influence, it also made it easier to offer a single price in any currency comfortable to the buyer (or the seller).

They are also contrary to the current eBay paradigm of protecting the “Buyer Experience”, simplifying onsite pricing, and providing cheapest shipping costs to the buyers.  I got the impression from both the PayPal staff, and from the eBay staff there, that the conjunction of the above had never been considered – they didn’t state that, it was just my impression from their reactions.

My stated aim of the discussion was that it was long overdue for eBay and PayPal to deliver on Bill and Rajiv’s public promise of two years ago.

I advised that most sellers would likely be comfortable with the combined currencies being billed in the buyer’s home currency on PayPal, provided they were not getting hit for two sets of 2.5% PayPal currency conversion fees (at the point of invoice conversion, and then later for conversion to withdraw to bank).  I also positioned that such a facility was desperately required to revitalise cross-border trade and stop the rot in eBay financials displayed in their Q4-2008 results.

Initially both PayPal staffers tried to combat that last point with comments about the general economy, until I mentioned the Q4-08 financials and performance of sites like Amazon, Bonanzle, and eBid, which stopped them in their tracks.  (Don’t BS the BS-er, or better yet, don’t BS the Gaz).  Once I’d steered them to understanding the core point of what I was positioning, both Amy & Bau agreed to escalate the topic and report back to me.

More good news for Singapore sellers - my discussions with Bau also questioned when sellers would be able to pay their eBay seller fees with PayPal in the same way that western sites’ sellers can do.  At first she was a little confused pointing out that there is now a facility for one-off fee payments in place and I had to point out that it is for payment by cheque or credit card only – no PayPal option.

I also explained the economics of cards charging fees for cross-border payments, and that there was a double dip with any fees that PayPal had levied for currency conversion and withdrawal to bank, prior to the funds being in the bank for paying eBay seller fees via the card.  She quickly grasped where I was coming from, and the cash-flow punishing effect of a single automated hit on the bank account seven days after invoice calculation.  Bau implied that on-site seller fee payments via PayPal was being worked on and that it might become available soon.

I recommend all SG registered sellers keep up the pressure in the forums and via TSAMs, LiveHelp and general Customer Support – don’t let this topic fade away.

My final recommendation to PayPal SE Asia regarded the availability of “Merchant Offers” on other PayPal sites.  It has still not been implemented on the SE Asia sites, and Bau revealed that it could be available as early as March (next month), although she was not certain of this.

That was a lot of ground covered in two, 5-minute, 1-on-1 sessions, and neither staffer took written notes, therefore I hope they either have good memories, or find their way to BuildaSkill for some “memory-joggers”.

Tomorrow, I’ve a brief report on the DHL segment (including my take on what I saw as a major gaffe, and an as yet unannounced major special offer for SE Asia sellers) – it’ll be a lot shorter than the eBay and PayPal segment reports.

On Friday, I’ve also got a report on the new Global MerchantRun service for cross-border, multi-country sellers, and on Auctiva opening operations in Asia.

If you have any questions or comments on the PayPal segment reported above, please post a comment.

Gaz