"The vendor cannot accept payments at this time" What is this about?

[sherri1970wahine]

Hello all,

I had a buyer contact me today saying that they could not purchase an item and that when they tried to complete their purchase, they got the message, "The vendor cannot accept payments at this time." Say what? What in the holy heck does that mean? Didn't Paypal just give themselves a raise recently? Coincidentally (or not) I didn't sell anything all day on the account in question. Does this mean that my account isn't working? All payments are up to date, no problems with the account, feedback all good--so it isn't an issue of me being in trouble with eBay or anything. Anyone else ever had this happen? Do I need to call someone? If so, what department would I even ask for?

This is kind of upsetting, and I have never had this happen before. The only thing I can think of is that I recently changed the shipping on the item in question to include International first class shipping--could that have anything to do with why this is happening? The buyer is in Switzerland, and I OK'd shipping to Europe when I was doing the listing. Is there another place on eBay where I need to check or uncheck a box to allow International shipping? Sorry--I don't know too much about International shipping, but I am trying to learn--First class International seemed to be a good start, but can anyoe think of something I might have done wrong? It's either my error, or eBay just doesn't want me to make any money.....thanks in advance for any advice.

[emerald40]

Do you have any other blocks in place on paypal to not allow foreign currency or non US paypal accounts?

[newnewnewmann]

This has been going on for many years. People blame paypal, ebay, the seller's account, the buyer's account, but the problem persists.

If you do a search of The vendor cannot accept payments at this time,

you will find hundreds of people bewildered at why this happens. They report ebay and paypal just don't know or are no help.

I wish I could help. Someone here must have a solution or it's a glitch?

[fashunu4eeuh]

OP, check your email address used for PayPal on the listing to see if there might be a typo. This happened once to me and it was due to an incorrect email. To check it, I went to the listing, clicked on Revise. When the advanced listing tool page came up, i scrolled down to the place where one inputs their email address associated with PayPal. If you find an error in the email, correct it and then hit the List button to update the change. If you find nothing amiss, just click Cancel to back out of the revision. I hope this helps. Good luck to you.

[sherri1970wahine]

Thanks so much--I went to Paypal and I DID have to add foreign currencies to my list--I only had US on there. I thought Paypal just automatically translated and added foreign currency to your US balance, but I guess not, apparently.

One thing I did notice though--Paypal said that any foreign currency I am paid with will be added to THAT balance--meaning, I assume, a separate balance from my US currency, right? So does that mean I could potentially have a bunch of different balances in Paypal for every separate country? What would I do then--with all those separate balances? Can I just add them to my US balance myself? Or did I read that wrong? Sorry, but this is surprisingly very confusing for me, and one thing I know for sure is that being ignorant of the little details here can easily end in disaster--so I am ultra cautious. Honestly, it is the "little" details here that terrify me.

I have my fingers crossed that this will work, and will definitely update--thanks again!

[sherri1970wahine]

Really? I had never heard of this happening to anyone else before, but I am going to do some research on it later tonight. I really hope it is just my own error....thanks so much for the input. 

[sherri1970wahine]

Thanks so much--I went over the listing about 5 times, and this is one of the first things I checked--I am not the world's best speller--ha! 🙂

[pjcdn2005]

I don’t know why that would happen but I do know that blocking or adding foreign currencies wouldn’t do anything as far as ebay international buyers go. Buyers are required to pay in the same currency as the listing so even if you blocked foreign currencies that  wouldn’t affect payment. 

What would affect international buyers is if you are blocking non US PayPal accounts.  Where is the buyer registered?

[newnewnewmann]

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@sherri1970wahine wrote:

Really? I had never heard of this happening to anyone else before, but I am going to do some research on it later tonight. I really hope it is just my own error....thanks so much for the input. 

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Really!

Search Results

I hope the fix given works!

[emerald40]

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@pjcdn2005 wrote:

I don’t know why that would happen but I do know that blocking or adding foreign currencies wouldn’t do anything as far as ebay international buyers go. Buyers are required to pay in the same currency as the listing so even if you blocked foreign currencies that  wouldn’t affect payment. 

What would affect international buyers is if you are blocking non US PayPal accounts.  Where is the buyer registered?

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Works for me.  Since I added those blocks I had 3 who bid but could not pay me.

[pjcdn2005]

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@emerald40 wrote:

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@pjcdn2005 wrote:

I don’t know why that would happen but I do know that blocking or adding foreign currencies wouldn’t do anything as far as ebay international buyers go. Buyers are required to pay in the same currency as the listing so even if you blocked foreign currencies that  wouldn’t affect payment. 

What would affect international buyers is if you are blocking non US PayPal accounts.  Where is the buyer registered?

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Works for me.  Since I added those blocks I had 3 who bid but could not pay me.

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As I said in my post, blocking non US PP accounts does block international buyers. But the foreign currency block isn’t necessary and doesn’t help you because you will always receive $US for an item listed on .com even if you don’t have that block enabled. That block is likely for sellers with their own site.  

I list on 2 different Ebay sites and in 2 different currencies and regardless of where the buyer is located I receive payment in the currency of  the site the item was listed on.  If you purchased an item I listed on .ca, you would pay the equivalent in $US but I would receive Canadian dollars even though my PP account allows any currency.

It doesn’t ‘hurt’ to have the foreign currency block on but it doesn’t help either so suggesting that people use it just confuses them as to how Ebay works.

[d-k_treasures]

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@pjcdn2005 wrote:

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@emerald40 wrote:

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@pjcdn2005 wrote:

I don’t know why that would happen but I do know that blocking or adding foreign currencies wouldn’t do anything as far as ebay international buyers go. Buyers are required to pay in the same currency as the listing so even if you blocked foreign currencies that  wouldn’t affect payment. 

What would affect international buyers is if you are blocking non US PayPal accounts.  Where is the buyer registered?

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Works for me.  Since I added those blocks I had 3 who bid but could not pay me.

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As I said in my post, blocking non US PP accounts does block international buyers. But the foreign currency block isn’t necessary and doesn’t help you because you will always receive $US for an item listed on .com even if you don’t have that block enabled. That block is likely for sellers with their own site.  

I list on 2 different Ebay sites and in 2 different currencies and regardless of where the buyer is located I receive payment in the currency of  the site the item was listed on.  If you purchased an item I listed on .ca, you would pay the equivalent in $US but I would receive Canadian dollars even though my PP account allows any currency.

It doesn’t ‘hurt’ to have the foreign currency block on but it doesn’t help either so suggesting that people use it just confuses them as to how Ebay works.

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If you don't have that block, you, the seller will be paying the currency conversion fees. When the block is set, the buyer pays, which is what you want - why would you want to also pay for the currency conversion when you are already paying 4.4% to PP for an international payment?

[sherri1970wahine]

Thanks for the response--I did what Emerald said to do, and it did work--the buyer was able to purchase from Switzerland. Could it be that by adding the foreign currencies, I somehow turned off the block (if I had one on)? I didn't see anything on my Paypal account that asked me if I wanted to block foreign currencies. Can you tell me where that block would be please? And you are correct, I am a little confused at this point!

[sherri1970wahine]

Oh my gosh--what is this now? How much does it cost for foreign currency conversion? I didn't see anything on Paypal telling me about this. Now I am getting a little worried that I might have accidentally shot myself in the foot. My margins are slim as it is--I don't want to pay any more in fees, especially if I don't have to.

Thanks so much to all who have responded--I really appreciate it.

[pjcdn2005]

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@d-k_treasures wrote:

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@pjcdn2005 wrote:

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@emerald40 wrote:

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@pjcdn2005 wrote:

I don’t know why that would happen but I do know that blocking or adding foreign currencies wouldn’t do anything as far as ebay international buyers go. Buyers are required to pay in the same currency as the listing so even if you blocked foreign currencies that  wouldn’t affect payment. 

What would affect international buyers is if you are blocking non US PayPal accounts.  Where is the buyer registered?

---

Works for me.  Since I added those blocks I had 3 who bid but could not pay me.

---

As I said in my post, blocking non US PP accounts does block international buyers. But the foreign currency block isn’t necessary and doesn’t help you because you will always receive $US for an item listed on .com even if you don’t have that block enabled. That block is likely for sellers with their own site.  

I list on 2 different Ebay sites and in 2 different currencies and regardless of where the buyer is located I receive payment in the currency of  the site the item was listed on.  If you purchased an item I listed on .ca, you would pay the equivalent in $US but I would receive Canadian dollars even though my PP account allows any currency.

It doesn’t ‘hurt’ to have the foreign currency block on but it doesn’t help either so suggesting that people use it just confuses them as to how Ebay works.

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If you don't have that block, you, the seller will be paying the currency conversion fees. When the block is set, the buyer pays, which is what you want - why would you want to also pay for the currency conversion when you are already paying 4.4% to PP for an international payment?

That doesn't happen. You don't know me but you can believe that I would have noticed had I been paying extra fees for the last 10+ years  Buyers always pay the currency exchange fee if they pay in a different currency than what the listing was done in. That's how it works when you are paying through eBay,  I believe that the send money function in Paypal works differently and I imagine that different retailers do things differently than on ebay do PP has different options.

The area that I think that you are referring to is copied below.  I have the last option checked off because it seemed to be the only one to apply to me yet I have never been asked to accept or deny a payment from any buyer in any country. That is because the money is automatically converted (at the buyer's expense) to the currency that the listing is in.  If you are saying that clicking on the first choice means the seller pays the conversion fees..I don't see that in any of the information.   But as I said earlier, I don't think clicking on any of those choice applies to selling on eBay.  

 Allow payments sent to me in a currency I do not hold:
  Yes, accept and convert them to U.S. Dollars. Additional charges apply.
  No, deny the payments
* Ask Me, decide accepting or denying each individual payment