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HoddieHoddie
in Site Issues Vote Up0Vote Down
There's a rather large banner on my dashboard asking me to upgrade to PayPal Business/Premier. I've mentioned this before but it's not possible for me to upgrade to a Premier account, the link simply doesn't appear for me. On parts of the PayPal website it says I have a Personal account, on other parts it says I have a Premier account. I have spoken to them about this and it's something to do with being in Belgium but using the PayPal site in English. Is it possible to be able to dismiss this dashboard banner?

Comments

  • 13 Comments sorted by Votes Date Added
  • steendorpsteendorp
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    For the Netherlands it's exactly the same.
  • LawrenceLawrence
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    Have you tried setting up the Paypal for business accounts method to see if it will work for you?
  • HoddieHoddie
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    No because I'm a private seller and for all I know, switching my account to business may have unforeseen implications with the local authorities.
  • LawrenceLawrence
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    I mean have you tried setting up the payment method, for business accounts, to see if it will work for you?
  • HoddieHoddie
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    Oh, sorry, yes I did. When I click the generate API link it tells me I need to upgrade my Personal account into a Premium one, but when I click the link it tells me "You can upgrade your Premium(!) account to a Business account or open a new Business account."
  • LawrenceLawrence
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    Oh, I see, I guess it sounds like you have a standard account, but because of a translation issue, it sometimes calls it a premium account. I will have a think whether to allow dismissing of the message, or some other solution. The problem is, there are many store using this payment method, and it causes a lot of trouble with payments not going through, and then confused customers contacting me unsure what has happened.
  • HoddieHoddie
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    They don't offer any help or support in English here and half the links on the site don't work when you view it in English. It's really tinpot of them considering the size of the company. When you click 'close account' it goes to a 404, and 'upgrade account' is only accessible if you revert the site back to classic. Withdrawing money is about the only thing that works as you'd expect. Switching to French or Dutch actually brings up a lot more stuff so it's not as simple as trying to follow the same link in a different language either.

    I will call them tomorrow and hope they're happy to speak English to me like last time even though it's not officially supported. If PayPal wasn't so widely used I'd have ditched my account yonks ago.

    I am slowly learning Dutch and French but they're so different and it's a struggle for a lad from Yorkshire where even English isn't widely used!
  • HoddieHoddie
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    I didn't get chance to call today but very early this morning I sent them a message via their online form, and amazingly I've just come home to the following reply:

    "You have a personal PayPal account. Premier and personal are one and the same, premier is just the new name we use for it. You don't have to upgrade your personal account to a business account in order to use API.

    What you can do is the following:
    •Log in to your PayPal account.
    •Click on 'Summary'.
    •Scroll down and click on 'Payment preferences'.

    Here you'll find API access and can you update these without having to upgrade to a Business account."

    The only trouble with this reply is that there is no such thing as a 'payment preferences' link on the Summary page, and I can't find where it is on any other page. I have replied requesting the direct URL or correct instructions. It really shouldn't be this difficult considering the size of PayPal. The fact that it's a tech company makes this inexcusable :)
  • LawrenceLawrence
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    That's interesting, I very much look forward to hearing the outcome
  • HoddieHoddie
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    Today's twist:

    "Thank you for contacting PayPal.

    I understand from your e-mail that you have a personal account and you need an API. You have received instructions, but they do not match what you can see in your account.

    I have checked if the API is available to Personal accounts and it turns out that it isn't. I apologise that my colleague has misunderstood and given you different information.

    I would like to ask you to please upgrade your account to a business account. Once this has been done, let us know. We will than change the account to a Premier account. I understand that this may seen very inconvenient.

    Once this has happened you can go to seller preferences. Here you will see the option for the API-access that you can edit."

    I'm not sure it can be any more tinpot.
  • steendorpsteendorp
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    Just performed the upgrade to premium account. Everything is working again and orders get paid by PayPal again. :)
  • HoddieHoddie
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    I've upgraded to Business but cannot now find the link to the Message Centre and their previous messages. It's ridiculous that this isn't just a case of clicking a button or two. Bloody PayPal, I've always hated it.
  • LawrenceLawrence
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    I feel your pain. I have a degree in computer science but regularly have to use google to find out how to do tasks on their website. It's awful.
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