what is this

And they are getting even more strict when it comes to not using invoices for charging for Digital Goods.

Whatever Invoices make you uncomfortable or not, you gotta start using them if you want to keep your PayPal and your money. Changes starting this October 19th.

Honestly I don’t get why so many artists are so overwhelmed by invoices, takes just a few clicks to set up. 

And is not only “oh you have to use invoices because PayPal says so” if you don’t use invoices you’re putting yourself at risk of being scammed by an user abusing the buyer’s protection. 

Since PayPal ain’t got no idea of what those $50 you received were for, but the buyer is saying they didn’t got anything for the money, PayPal will just side with the buyer.

I’m seriously begging ppl, start using invoices. I’m tired of seeing ppl complain their paypal was banned, or is under investigation, or worse, the $100 they got for a very complicated commission, 3 months later get a refund issue. 

just

start

using

invoices

for your own sake. 

Here is how you use invoices because I can’t keep playing devil’d advocate, yes I would love to help you get your PayPal restored but just this last month I had to help three persons, and they were MORE than aware of this issues. 

Just protect yourself. 

Step 1. You login and click here

Step 2. You click create new Invoice. YOU NEVER CLICK REQUEST MONEY, unless you want to risk yourself to get scamer by buyer’s protection exploit and not only lose your money but your paypal account, and any future paypal linked to your irl name. 

Step 3 You follow this steps

1. Invoice for amount only

2. Ask your client for their PayPal email and put in that field

3. Add a vague description of what you’re doing, something like “Character Coloured with Background” is good enough, and if you need more than 1 character you can type in “2″ where it says amount, or just say “2 characters”.

Warning: don’t type in “Naruto rawing Sasuke”. That will get you banned. 

4. Click send. 

Optional steps. Create a template, doesn’t take more than 10 minutes and it will save you a lot of time for future invoices, you can even click on “items” right next to “create invoice” and add a list of services you offer such as “character sketch” “character flats” along with a price, so next time you invoice you just add to the invoice from your list of items and you saved yourself some more time. 

More importantly, you protect yourself from buyer’s protection exploit because if PayPal knows you’re doing digital goods, then you will be allowed that you did in fact created a digital good. 

Keep PayPal happy, as for right now there are no alternatives to this service, and this is the only source of income for many freelancers. 

SO go to the invoice (i think this can be done BEFORE the buyer pays?? Didnt try myself tho, i did it after it was paid), and click on VIEW DETAILS in that first box 

Scroll to the bottom of the page and click ADD TRACKING INFO  (YES COUNTER-INTUITIVE AS BALLLLLS.)

of course HERE IS WHERE YOU'RE GIVEN INSTRUCTIONS ON PROCESSING DIGITAL GOODS. HIDDEN BEHIND A BUTTON YOU WOULDNT PRESS IF YOU WERE, SAY, TRYING TO SELL DIGITAL GOODS. Select Order Processed/Service Rendered

But there’s a way around it!

FIRST > Edit / customise your theme (the desktop version, aka the actual HTML and CSS junk) Find this button:

Add your page like you would for other pages! Except on the drop down select “Redirect”!

The insert on the right is what will appear on the preview side on the right. Here I’ve put in my twitter! Fill it out and give the page URL something lowercase and easy to remember (like /twitter)

Post your stuff how you would normally. Unfortunately using the bottom left ‘source url’ button on the image as usual itself still gets censored (seriously fuck you Tumblr what the fuck).

Link your sites as you would normally EXCEPT we use the tumblr link (for me it’s the above!). If you use a domain name, you WILL need to use your tumblr URL rather than yourname.com/redirect ! This will link people to my twitter but still show up in /tagged/ and /search/

Your stuff will now should show up! This doesn’t seem to work for editing older posts but I haven’t tested that out fully.

And lastly

Fuck you tumblr

There’s been a lot of posts going around lately about Paypal and their policy on fees, and I’ve seen a lot of people suggesting you move to invoices. What you might not realise unless you have a closer look at these payments once you receive them, is that Paypal is expecting you to ship an item. This remains the same regardless of whether you use the default form, the ‘services’ form and charge by the hour, and whether you put 0.00 in the postage section.

After a call to customer service this morning, I have confirmed there is actually no option on invoices for a seller to indicate that postage is not required if you are invoicing from the main paypal website (ie. you don’t do paypal checkout through your website, there may be a work around if you have a purchase button on your website, which isn’t entirely practical for commissions as prices can often vary and most do payments through the site directly). This means that if you don’t provide shipping / tracking information on that payment, Paypal may freeze the funds and/or your account.

Apparently the way to avoid this is to include in the notes section of the invoice that the invoice is for goods and services, and that no shipping is required. 

They also said that the buyer should indicate in the notes when they pay that they have received the goods/service, however this is going to cause issues with commissions as most are either paid upfront or partway through. 

But also to choose this option when the payment has been sent and the commission has been completed