Is Paypal down?

[triber]

I have tried several times to print a Paypal label on 2 different browsers. I've cleared my cache, still won't work. I get to "print label" and then get a message that it isn't working.

[silverpinups]

The simple solution is to "not" use PayPal at all for shipping. I have never used PayPal to print off shipping labels. I do it the old fashioned way, fill out a customs form and go to my local Post Office.

No phone numbers are exchanged unless it is Expedited or Xpresspost... I believe that Tracked Packet-International may require a phone number but only when the Postal clerk is manually inputing it into the system (and not on the package itself).

PayPal may be convenient and save you some money but I prefer not to share my info on-line unless it's absolutely necessary. 

[rose-dee]

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@mjwl2006 wrote:
Most often, apartment complexes will not allow parcels to be left in the lobby. Or hallway. It's against fire code.

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I was actually thinking of bubble mailers that don't fit into the usually rather small apartment mailboxes.  Many apartment buildings have a table in the lobby -- usually somewhere near the mailboxes -- for flyers, junk mail, newspapers and oversize lettermail that won't fit in the boxes.  I wasn't referring to parcels being left on the floor. 

[momcqueen]

There was an announcement on eBay. We have to change the way we navigate to the PayPal page, or lose the associated eBay discount. You don't have to take my word for it, check Announcements. What used to work no longer does.

[winner188]

Recipient phone number is now required to print labels. If you don't have the phone number use your own phone number.

[mrdutch1001]

as long as using 0000000000 works in place of recipient phone number and as long as going directly through PayPal gives me the same discounted rates, I will use these methods. If at same point in the future this no longer works, then I will deal with what is necessary. In the meantime, I am going the easier,more convenient route.

[rose-dee]

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@silverpinups wrote:

The simple solution is to "not" use PayPal at all for shipping. I have never used PayPal to print off shipping labels. I do it the old fashioned way, fill out a customs form and go to my local Post Office.

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I do use parcel services enough that the Paypal discounts are meaningful.  My time (and the gas required to get to and from my rural post office) are considerations for me too.  As far as my own personal information goes, Paypal will have that anyway if I want to continue selling.  I see that part of the equation as a fair trade-off that I'm willing to accept in order to get the convenience and discounts available with Paypal labels. 

What I don't see as a fair trade-off is displaying customer phone numbers without their express consent.  That's my only concern.  So using my own phone number or simply entering "0's", as the earlier poster mentioned, is probably a good enough alternative, as long as it's acceptable to Canada Post.  

[rose-dee]

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@mjwl2006 wrote:
There was an announcement on eBay. We have to change the way we navigate to the PayPal page, or lose the associated eBay discount. You don't have to take my word for it, check Announcements. What used to work no longer does.

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I didn't see that Announcement, which is not unusual as I've been so busy elsewhere lately.  Do you recall how long ago it occurred?  I'll try to check for it and will post the link if I can find it, but an approximate date would be helpful.  

[rose-dee]

Was it this one, from January 16, 2017?  If so, yikes almighty.  So now if the path from eBay doesn't work, or gets broken or freezes, it's just tough luck.  

http://announcements.ebay.ca/2017/01/16/7939/

There is more information on this annoucement page, but I've copied the summary here:

"BEGINNING TOMORROW –START YOUR CANADA POST LABELS ON EBAY

If you’re accustomed to printing your Canada Post shipping labels directly from PayPal, note that beginning tomorrow, you’ll need to start that process from eBay.ca in order to benefit from pre-filled buyer information and from eBay’s discounted Canada Post rates.

If you print your labels directly from within PayPal, you can still print a label using PayPal’s new merchant label platform, but your eBay buyer information will no longer be pre-filled, and you won’t benefit from eBay’s discounted rates on Canada Post services.

If you print your shipping labels by going to eBay first, choosing one or more sold items and selecting the label printing option, you’ll be redirected to PayPal, where you can still complete your label purchase with your buyer’s name, address, and shipping details pre-filled. You’ll also continue to benefit from eBay’s negotiated Canada Post rates, which include 18% off Expedited Parcel within Canada, and 15% off Expedited Parcel and Tracked packet USA."

[Anonymous]

Nice guys eBay/PayPal for forcing us to use the new horrible format (no more Classic) to publish PayPal Shipping labels!!

With the Classic for Expedited to USA with 1kg, it was $19.10, with the new horrible format it is $20.21, an increase of $1.11!!!  Is that their purpose to increase the rates by retiring the Classic??

I prefer Classic as it is my easier.  With the new horrible format, my suite # and "Canada" are missing from the printed label!!  I have to write them on labels each time!!  Someone at PayPal sleeping??  I even have called them so many times but no luck.  It seems that PayPal may be another eBay not doing their jobs or what.  Hope not!!

Now I have to publish PayPal Shipping labels by using the new horrible format all night so over 50 parcels/packages will be shipped tomorrow (Monday).  Glad I don't go to work tomorrow so I can sleep in and at the same time someone (Canada Post post lady) will take them to the post office for us,  We have a drop area that Canada Post post lady take our mail to the post office for us which is huge grateful by all of us, otherwise our parcels/packages would be sitting here for weeks as we don't go out daily or even week.  As for me I go out once or twice a month and that is not good for eBay dealings!!

[ypdc_dennis]

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@rose-dee wrote:

... I had to send a rather large box (41x32x23cm) to the U.S. the other day that weighed 1.9kg.  This was a non-eBay sale, so I knew I'd get no discounts through Paypal anyway, and decided to try Canada Post's EST .  The actual base shipping cost was $56.34 ($Cdn) for Xpresspost.  The SFSB discount was $3.80, which seemed a little paltry to me.  I think that works out to a 6.74% discount.  

Perhaps I'm mistaken in my recall, but I thought someone recently reported that the Xpresspost discounts were higher through CPC's EST system than those offered by Paypal for eBay transactions.  No matter really, since I had no choice anyway.  

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Your EST discount depends on your shipping level with Canada Post. Solutions for Small Business has 4 levels based on annual purchases (to $2500,  to $5000, to $7500 and over $7500)

Discount difference is only for some services and certain weight levels.

One of the discussions:

http://community.ebay.ca/t5/Seller-Central/Canada-Post-shipping-to-the-UK-some-discount-comparisions...

[38e_avenue]

THIS IS A HORRIBLE NEWS!!!! ;-(

I am not able to print labels any more. I even switched to EBAY.CA - still the same error message.

THAT'S A REAL DISASTER.

[38e_avenue]

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@silverpinups wrote:

The simple solution is to "not" use PayPal at all for shipping.

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Sounds like a joke. I can't imagine to fill out 20 labels with all addresses and all content. I don't understand why they removed that from PayPal, what was their purpose? 

[momcqueen]

For me the problem was exclusively related to international labels printed from the Classic view. I had no problem today printing multiple domestic labels. And I was able to print an international one as soon as I switched to the 'new' view and added a telephone number for the buyer form my ebay Sales Record. It was a few extra steps, not armageddon. i encourage you to try this as a workaround until Paypal and/or Canada Post and/or Pitney Bowes figures out what might be going on with the problems we are having. 

[38e_avenue]

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@mjwl2006 wrote:

For me the problem was exclusively related to international labels printed from the Classic view. I had no problem today printing multiple domestic labels. And I was able to print an international one as soon as I switched to the 'new' view and added a telephone number for the buyer form my ebay Sales Record. It was a few extra steps, not armageddon. i encourage you to try this as a workaround until Paypal and/or Canada Post and/or Pitney Bowes figures out what might be going on with the problems we are having. 

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Yes, you are right. Thanks! I switched to the new form and it works. Not Armageddon, buy still much, much more complicated.

The new form doesn't remember the values (length/width/weight/code), all must be added manually. Also the recipient's phone number (000-000-0000 works well) and province (for what?) in the international shipping.

Always the same spring update rule applies: "we will make selling on Ebay more and more difficult every year - stay in touch!" 

[momcqueen]

Oddly, the new form also doesn't give the seller as many choices under Reasons for Export as the old one. Sale of Goods is missing as is the one you should use for Returns/Warranty Merchandise. I also prefer the "Classic Experience' as they call it on the paypal transaction landing page if only because I need more room for text to email the buyer pertinent information on shipment. 

Also, don't forget to go to Paypal from the ebay transaction itself or you won't be getting the value of your ebay postage discount. This change in procedure was announced earlier this year. I was accustomed to logging into paypal directly and I had to make the change. 

[momcqueen]

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@rose-dee wrote:

Was it this one, from January 16, 2017?  If so, yikes almighty.  So now if the path from eBay doesn't work, or gets broken or freezes, it's just tough luck.  

http://announcements.ebay.ca/2017/01/16/7939/

There is more information on this annoucement page, but I've copied the summary here:

"BEGINNING TOMORROW –START YOUR CANADA POST LABELS ON EBAY

If you’re accustomed to printing your Canada Post shipping labels directly from PayPal, note that beginning tomorrow, you’ll need to start that process from eBay.ca in order to benefit from pre-filled buyer information and from eBay’s discounted Canada Post rates.

If you print your labels directly from within PayPal, you can still print a label using PayPal’s new merchant label platform, but your eBay buyer information will no longer be pre-filled, and you won’t benefit from eBay’s discounted rates on Canada Post services.

If you print your shipping labels by going to eBay first, choosing one or more sold items and selecting the label printing option, you’ll be redirected to PayPal, where you can still complete your label purchase with your buyer’s name, address, and shipping details pre-filled. You’ll also continue to benefit from eBay’s negotiated Canada Post rates, which include 18% off Expedited Parcel within Canada, and 15% off Expedited Parcel and Tracked packet USA."

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Yes, that is the Announcement to which I was referring.

No, I don't much like it any more than you do. I preferred to go to paypal directly but I've re-learned my work flow. 

Technically, there are two ways to get to to paypal through ebay. One is to use the drop-down menu from the Waiting for Shipment page like they show in the example. The other is to go to the Print Postage link from inside the Sales Record itself. 

Their way:

An alternative way:

[pjcdn2005]

As mentioned by mrdutch in an earlier post, the same discount is still available when printing a label directly from PayPal.  Despite the announcement nothing has changed yet.

[momcqueen]

I recall another thread about two weeks ago where a different user demonstrated he didn't get the discount he expected when purchasing postage directly from PayPal. But I have not run the tests myself so you may be correct.

[pjcdn2005]

If it is the same thread that I am thinking about I mentioned there as well that I had continued to go directly to PP to print labels and that the discounts had not changed.  What the other seller was saying didn't make sense because I knew for a fact that there was no change so I suspect she was thinking about the price difference between PP shipping and using the CP site to print as that was also discussed in that thread.  I asked her to confirm or deny that but she never replied.

[rosscd57]

Ya I had the same trouble today. I read through this forum - used the new format and used 0's for a phone number and it worked - but I really do not like the updated version. It's like they hide information and you have to go an find it - customs info for a start.

Why they would replace a system that has worked well for years is beyond me - specially with one that is difficult to navigate.

Question for anyone who may know - I used to be able to shrink the size of the label by changing to landscape - but now it does not make any difference. Anyone know if we can make it smaller? Cause the label is HUGE.