Making Payments Online

This article focuses on making payments safely to us online, using PayPal to process the payment. Your payment could be made online using a PayPal transfer (like a bank transfer) or by using your credit/ debit card. Sometimes we have a ‘touch’ card reader with us and its just like being in a shop! We also talk about online safety generally.

Who is PayPal?

PayPal are on of the largest banks in the world and are specialists in online payments. They were also one of the first, and consequently, one of the oldest online (web) payment services. Many more companies have come along since, but we are currently sticking with them!

What Does PayPal Do?

Think about your credit card. It might be issued by your bank, or another bank, but it is always separate from your bank account. When you buy something you will later have to transfer money from your bank account to pay your credit card account. In contrast, your debit card is tied to your current account – money you spend comes straight out of tour current account.

Paypal is a separate account, completely separate from your bank. When you set up a PayPal account you have to tell them where to get the money to pay for the purchase: from your current account, or your debit or your credit card (or a combination of these).

So when you go shopping and want to buy something, you have only to tell the shop your PayPal details – PayPal will then go fetch the money and pay the shop. You see how you dont tell the shop your bank details? The shop only ever knows your PayPal details (and PayPal dont pay out until you authorise the payment).

If there is a problem you speak to PayPal, who will sort it out.

Is Online Shopping & Banking Safe?

Its probably more safe than shopping on the high street. Like everything it depends on you doing things safely.

Nowadays most of us have smart phones (iPhone or Android) and these are inherently safer than the average home computer. We can install apps onto our phone that come from our bank, our favourite shop, or PayPal even. These apps were specifically built and published by those organisations, so dont you think you can trust them to do the right thing? They dont want to be responsible for you losing your money do they?

Yes it will strange at first. I dont need to remind you of the risks involved in going to the high street, yet you accept those as normal.

My recommendation is to use the app in preference to the website: it is much harder to corrupt or spoof an app.

Remember though, your personal safety always depends on you being careful at all times!