Goodbye paypal!

+1 infection

Paypal not my pal never was!!

Czarivey:  Thanks for the pre-paid credit card idea.  Brilliant.  I despise Ebay insisting on Paypal.  I recently purchased an item and the seller & I agreed I could send him a money order.  It was close to $500.  Everything went perfect and no bank or credit card info was given.  Ebay keeps hounding me to pay 3 weeks later.  Give me the chuckles...
-John

Totally agree with OP and many others.
In my ten years´ career in selling on eBay with 100 % score of over eight hundred transactions I just sold a vintage audio item decades old. My ad is adequate, with photos and everything. Buyer who hardly can write proper English never asked any further details like higher resolution pics before sale´s end. Well I thought everything´s is just fine for him but once he received the item he started to complain about "big damages" on the item. Actually they are little scratches/marks, quite normal with vintage gear. The item is fully operational, but he seems give a darn about it. And actually even many if not most of the biggest flaws ARE visible in my ad. Furthermore, he asked me to fund his "fixing" for 200 - 350 €. Naturally I refused but told him to send the item back and then give him a full refund after I have received it. He refused to send back and eventually opened a case. This automatically freezed my PayPal account with app. 2000 € in it.

eBay and PayPal always take buyer´s side. PayPal can and is actually very eager to freeze your funds whenever they will and for whatever reason that suits for them. just like that. Hardly normal procedure in banking and business. Anyway, seller can´t do anything about.
PayPal is fool proof for dishonest buyers and all kind of morons. Sad but true.

Another good practice is to have multiple paypal accounts. Since you can get multiple prepaid cards, you can open multiple accounts. Once funds accepted, move them away ASAP with "send to friends and family" option.
If there's a trouble with paypal transaction and paypal will try to hold on to your funds, they're not there. They can also set your account negative -- in this case you can easily send them to go suck their own sausage deep-throat and use one available to receive funds if sell anything. 

Remember they can uck seller HARD, but you can as well in response.