Paypal and currency exhange rates

tmnt

tmnt

King of Australia
Ok, I live in Australia and everytime I use paypal the exchange rate is usually about 3 cents or so behind. This adds up to a lot with all the eq. I've purchased (Oz is too dear for many items).

My question is... How come paypal seems to be ALWAYS wrong on currency exchange rate? Is there somehting I'm missing?

Ian
 
My guess is they're either taking a larger spread (the difference between the buy and sell price) than most dealers would when offering exchange rates, or that extra 3 cents is some other type of fee. Since Paypal is so large and virtually has a monopoly with its online payment system, they don't need to be as competitive with their rates like other exchange houses do.
 
There is no fixed currency exchange rate. It's whatever the vendor (i.e., paypal, or your bank, or whoever) decides to charge. If Paypal's consistently shorting you, then that's because they've decided they want a wider profit margin on currency exchanges than other institutions are happy with.

So yeah, basically exactly what weltonfilment said.
 
The Aussie dollar is high atm. But paypal isnt great, I usually keep paypal under 100USD for that reason. I try Credit card for the rest. I have found AMEX is usually solid with exchange rates on purchases.
 
I live in Canada and order all of my equipment from the U.S., so I've encountered the same high currency exchange rates.

However, Paypal does give you an option to either use their currency exchange rate or the charge can go to your credit card company and be converted by them. Incidentally, the credit card companies are usually way off on the current exchange rate, but are closer than Paypal.
 
tmnt said:
I figured as much, looks like paypal's just ripping me off consistently.
Click to expand...

What? You thought PayPal was a free service?

They gotta make their money somehow. Exchange rates is one way. Holding the money for a little bit of time is another.
 
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