topic Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment? in Selling

Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

everard6920 — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 00:05:07 GMT

I've never had this before.

Went to issue a buyer a partial refund for postage via Paypal (which I do whenever someone doesn't wait for an invoice and overpays on postage), and it says "Note: you can only issue a full refund for this payment". Checked my other recent payments (before and after this one) and they all allowed me to do partial refunds. And no, the payment is not an e-cheque.

Called Paypal, and they advised me to send the buyer a personal payment for the difference. Said it'd "take days" to do it the other way.

Anyone else had this problem? I've never encountered it before - I've always been able to issue partial refunds with no problem, and I'm hoping that this isn't some new thing they're implementing.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

go-tazz — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 00:58:52 GMT

@everard6920 wrote:
I've never had this before.

Went to issue a buyer a partial refund for postage via Paypal (which I do whenever someone doesn't wait for an invoice and overpays on postage), and it says "Note: you can only issue a full refund for this payment". Checked my other recent payments (before and after this one) and they all allowed me to do partial refunds. And no, the payment is not an e-cheque.

Called Paypal, and they advised me to send the buyer a personal payment for the difference. Said it'd "take days" to do it the other way.

Off course they would as that way they don't have to re-imburse their FVF on the refund.

Anyone else had this problem? I've never encountered it before - I've always been able to issue partial refunds with no problem, and I'm hoping that this isn't some new thing they're implementing.

I've never had that before,(I've always being able to do partial refunds and that's how it should be),

They have to also re-imburse their part of the FVF on the payment as they are not entitled to it.

If it happens on one of my transaction I will inform them that I want to do it the way it's always been done

so that I'm not out of pocket,(however small that amount may be)

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

pancaket52 — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 01:05:46 GMT

Hi - I also reimburse my customers for combined postage when they pay for the full amount.

But, I have usually reimbursed through 'Pay Anyone' in Paypal.

It allows you to put in the reason for the refund so the customer knows what it is and is just as fast.

I must have done partial refunds at one time and I don't really know why I stopped ( unless I thought I might get a defect from ebay or something).

Anyway it's just as easy and just as trackable as a 'Partial Refund' was.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

dave4110 — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 01:11:21 GMT

But this means you'll pay the PayPal fee twice, once for the eBay purchase, then again when you do the Pay Anyone transfer to the buyer correct?

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

pennyforum14 — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 01:23:08 GMT

No, because you are making the payment, you don't pay any fees, and if you tick the "friends and family" box there are no fees deducted from the transaction for the receiver either. But you also won't see an adjustment giving you back the appropriate proportion of the original fees.

Also, despite the fact that you can put in a note to say it is a partial refund for postage overcharge, it is still a spearate transaction and not in any way tied to the original one, so if the buyer chose to claim the postage refund was not received it is quite possible that Paypal would not recognise the second payment as belonging to the original transaction. (I asked this question once of Paypal support and they were unable to confirm that they would recognise the refund if it was done separately).

I always do partial refunds through the original transaction and have never seen a message such as the OP describes.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

harley_babes_hoard — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 01:32:57 GMT

When you send a payment to someone you only need yo write in the notes refund for eBay item number such and such then the PayPal transaction number then it is tied to the purchase.

if I am only refunding a few bucks from a transaction then I use the refund button, however if I am refunding quite a lot, like half, I will not use it as its possible to still get a defect.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

pennyforum14 — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 01:35:37 GMT

Yes, I know Harley, but Paypal are sticklers on detail, such as insisting items purchased immediately after each other but paid for separately are shipped separately, and when I asked if the note you describe would be sufficient evidence of a partial refund, they ummed and ahhed and wouldn't commit.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

everard6920 — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 01:37:19 GMT

@pennyforum14 wrote:
No, because you are making the payment, you don't pay any fees, and if you tick the "friends and family" box there are no fees deducted from the transaction for the receiver either. But you also won't see an adjustment giving you back the appropriate proportion of the original fees.

Also, despite the fact that you can put in a note to say it is a partial refund for postage overcharge, it is still a spearate transaction and not in any way tied to the original one, so if the buyer chose to claim the postage refund was not received it is quite possible that Paypal would not recognise the second payment as belonging to the original transaction. (I asked this question once of Paypal support and they were unable to confirm that they would recognise the refund if it was done separately).

I always do partial refunds through the original transaction and have never seen a message such as the OP describes.

Yes, I asked the Paypal representative why, and he said it was "probably" a glitch.

I'm not sure, but I think it may be because I printed a postage label and then tried to refund? I almost always do it the other way around. That's the only difference between this transaction and all of the others.

I went ahead and send a personal payment to the buyer, despite the fees, but if it happens again I'll be insisting that they fix it.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

purplepoisiniv — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 03:05:01 GMT

Happened to me last time they had an ebay voucher special. I rang paypal and was told if a purchase is paid for using a voucher code you cannot give a partial refund only a full refund. I would guess your buyer has used some promotional code when they have paid you.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

saarzi — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 03:37:07 GMT

Sounds very strange - I had an overpayment on postage last week and did a partial refund with no issues.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

digital*ghost — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 04:41:29 GMT

Every time this has happened to other sellers, the buyer had used a promo code to make the purchase, and eBay did recently have that 15% off deal, so I can almost guarantee that's what's probably causing it.

I used the promo code when purchasing 3 items from a seller the other day. They were all free post, so combining wasn't a consideration (the seller sends everything separately, anyway, as the package sizes are quite large) and I just added each one to my cart then checked out.

For some unknown reason, though, my payment was split into two, so I check out once, but the seller would have received two separate payments, and been charged for the privilege (I spent $150, so they're unlikely to be concerned about the 30c extra PayPal nabbed, but it's not the first time that's happened, and it's been on much lower value items, too, so if it happens enough times, PP would be making a fair bit in extra fees).

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

lyndal1838 — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 05:35:38 GMT

That happened to me last night with the Click15 promo Digi.

I bought 5 DVD sets, all Post Free, put them into my cart then paid. The receipt came back as 2 payments. The 4 lower value items were grouped together as Free Post but the $50 item was separate and said Signature Required Post but there was no extra charge.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

beautysecretfashion — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 06:55:25 GMT

Personally I think it is just ebay and Paypal getting together to make it more difficult for sellers who charge postage. I know they are now separate companies but I still feel they are in cohouts!!! I haven't had to do a refund for a couple of days, so I'll see what happens when I have to.

Also with ebay I spoke to a CS person asking WHY a few of my sales are not showing combined P&H discount when I clearly offer this. It only happens when customers use the ebay APP. CS person admitted that when they designed the app they did not put that aspect into the app!!! My reasoning again to induce sellers to offer FREE postage. Well everytime I give a refund for P&H I call ebay and they give me a credit of the % on FVF of the postage ie: $5.45 = 68c refund. Not worth it you may say BUT

a/ it is a matter of principle b/ .68c adds up when you have 5 - 10 each fortnight.

c/ ebay get enough off me now and I won't let them have anymore than they are entitled to.

JMO

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

digital*ghost — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 07:53:26 GMT

@lyndal1838 wrote:
That happened to me last night with the Click15 promo Digi.

I bought 5 DVD sets, all Post Free, put them into my cart then paid. The receipt came back as 2 payments. The 4 lower value items were grouped together as Free Post but the $50 item was separate and said Signature Required Post but there was no extra charge.

It more than likely does have to do with different postage options selected in the listings, I didn't double-check my recent purchase, but I know when it's happened in the past that different items had different postage services selected, but in one case I won two auctions from an OS seller on different days, paid for them together and the payment was split, with a different exchange rate applied to each one.

Still wholly unnecessary, though. Separate payments will require separate packages for seller protection (if the seller wants it), but one payment doesn't require one package, so PayPal are (effectively) taking an option away from the seller, and they (PP) are the only one who benefits from the split payments.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

englishrosegardens — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 14:58:51 GMT

Last time it happened to me the buyer said they'd used a voucher. I read the fine print on the last voucher (15% off) and it said something about not being able to get partial refunds, but can't remember the exact wording.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

aussie.grazing.boards — Fri, 02 Oct 2015 00:42:31 GMT

Maybe your doing it wrong. Click view sales record, click view PayPal transaction, (which takes you to PayPal website), click issue refund, then enter the amount and click confirm.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

englishrosegardens — Fri, 02 Oct 2015 03:29:22 GMT

It doesn't matter which way they do it - sometimes there's just no place to put a partial amount because that's the way they've set it up, especially when people use discount vouchers.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

aussie.grazing.boards — Fri, 02 Oct 2015 03:31:03 GMT

One thing I noticed, if the customer has opened a dispute on the sale in question, it is frozen, and your unable to refund or do anything with the funds.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

lyndal1838 — Fri, 02 Oct 2015 04:01:00 GMT

If you want to do a refund for a transaction that is in dispute you need to contact paypal to do it for you.

There is not much point in having the funds on hold if the seller can still access them.

Re: Paypal won't allow partial refund for payment?

rachelle011273 — Fri, 02 Oct 2015 12:41:26 GMT

I am currently dealing with this situation, this morning I processed a refund for 7.30 to the buyer as I was able to combine items and wished to remiburse, when I got home this afternoon paypal had reversed pending withdrawl transactions to my account to cover the refund which was for the total transaction amount of 87.30 not just the 7.30 I entered to be refunded

I have contacted paypal and am awaiting a reply however I also contacted the buyer who is also a seller and they are only to happy to send the payment to me again if I cannot have the pending refund transaction cancelled by paypal

I am thankful my buyer was so understanding however in future I think I shall always use the send money option rather than risk processing partial refunds