Paypal smart connect

[Anonymous]

Seems like they are starting to put paypal in some stores see: https://www.paypal.com/webapps/mpp/use-paypal-in-stores

I think it is in Beta though

[Anonymous]

You absolutely cannot use your PayPal Debit Card to as a credit card when it is linked to your Smart Connect or if your Smart Connect is used as backup funding for the debit card.  You can try it and see.  Call PayPal and they will eventually tell you that Smart Connect is "Online Only" credit.

PayPal does a good job at making their "credit line" seem like a real credit line but it's more like a store card because they control where you can use the credit, which is mostly ebay and sites that take PayPal as a form of payment, but sometimes even that doesn't allow the credit to be used.

[core]

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@Anonymous wrote:

You absolutely cannot use your PayPal Debit Card to as a credit card when it is linked to your Smart Connect or if your Smart Connect is used as backup funding for the debit card.  You can try it and see.  Call PayPal and they will eventually tell you that Smart Connect is "Online Only" credit.

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I am afraid you are mistaken.  If you run your PP debit card as _credit_ then you can use Smart Connect as a backup just fine.  I ran about $500 through mine in May.  They were in-person transactions:  Auto parts store, supermarkets, etc.  It worked just fine.  I wouldn't trust anything any PP CSR said either way.  But it does work; that's all that matters.

By the way this thread is 2 years old.  Policies change.  Fortunately this policy has not.

[JoshNurse]

How do you balance transfer debt in an account like this to lets say a Discover it card or a chase slate?

[IWOL]

If you set your smart connect account as backup funding for your debit card you can use the debit card for signature purchases or pin based transactions and it will draw from the smart connect account.

You can do aba once transfer for smart connect the same way you would nay other credit account. You give Discover or whoever it is the account number and it would transfer just like any ore credit card.

[sportsguy83]

This is a good card to have if you're just trying to build (or rebuild) credit but with the likes of rewards cards I haven't had much use for it in the last year. Still, no harm in having it since there is no AF and it does report to all 3 bureaus.

[core]

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@sportsguy83 wrote:

This is a good card to have if you're just trying to build (or rebuild) credit but with the likes of rewards cards I haven't had much use for it in the last year. Still, no harm in having it since there is no AF and it does report to all 3 bureaus.

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Even though I have some decent rewards cards, I still find myself using this way more than I expected.  When linked with the PP debit card you get 1.5% cash back on all purchases if your account is old enough  to have it.  That beats all my other cards' 1.0% for the misc category.

[sportsguy83]

Ah, that makes sense for those who have an account old enough to 1.5% back.  I can't so it makes more sense to me to just get 1% back from any of my other rewards cards.

[randeman]

Occasionally they offer a "use your card three times in the next quarter and we'll give you a $10 (or some amount) credit to your PayPal account".

One thing I just discovered recently (that makes me a bit crazy) is that they don't take ACH payments FROM my bank.  They do if you have the payment deducted from your account through their payment system.  95% of my creditors use ACH when I set up payment through my bill pay at Citi.  This means they don't get a paper check, the funds are transferred to them electronically.  The creditor gets the payment in about two-three business days.  Citi has to send PayPal a paper check.  Last month something happened at Citi and all payments from my account over a four day period had a problem.  I look at the payments from my account every day to see what has cleared and I couldn't understand why PayPal hadn't gotten the check after the ten business day period they ask you to allow.  Fortunately, I still had time before the payment was due, so I went through the PayPal system to make the payment.  Citi sent me a letter a few days later explaining what happened.  I had a long talk with one of the PayPal representatives and told them that their system of needing paper checks was ridiculously antiquated as it doesn't cost them more to accept payments by ACH from customer accounts.  I don't think it's going to change anytime soon, so if you pay your bill through your bank's bill pay, be sure to allow plenty of time for them to receive your check and watch it constantly.

[DrMac210]

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@JoshNurse wrote:

How do you balance transfer debt in an account like this to lets say a Discover it card or a chase slate?

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I recently did a BT from my PPSC account to a Barclay's 0% account by using the BT checks that Barclays sent me.  Seemed like the easiest way.