PayPal.
One may wonder the amount of power payment processors hold in business. And once a business wants to open online, it finds itself quickly stuck at a choice: abiding by PayPalβs rules, or risking to loose sales if customers prefer using this convenient payment method.
PayPal is an intermediary. Customers can βloadβ money on their account, link the PayPal account to their bank account to allow direct debit, or add their credit card to the PayPal account. PayPal handles everything behind the scene, forwarding payments from the bank through the SWIFT network (or SEPA in the Eurozone), or forwarding the orders through VISA / MasterCard / American Express / whatever-the-fuck-card network.
To make it clear: PayPal can be done without. Competition is plenty, among Google Wallet, Skrill, Dwolla, Stripe,..Β β¦ or simply the domestic bank payment gateway.
The rules of the ruler
PayPal dominates on the payment processor market. PayPalβs main revenue comes from transaction commissions. But while PayPal wants to make a profit, they also donβt want to get poked at by critics/governments. Thus, they set a large number of rules or βacceptable use policiesβ businesses must agree with, or PayPal may (and will) close down their accounts without warning.
This includes activities illegal in the USA (drug trafficking, prostitution, tax evasion,β¦), but also a bunch of things they generically list in their user agreement (like: buying cryptocurrency).
You wonβt find the typical βDonate through PayPalβ button on Onahole Review: their user agreement explicitly forbids using PayPal for βobsceneβ activity (and getting donations for a blog about sextoys and including pornographic material may be obscene).
But while PayPal gives some leeway to individuals like us, things look different for businesses.
PayPal, OtonaJP, and loli-themed products
Today, OtonaJP published the following statement about ceasing to accept payments through PayPal. This follows PayPalβs new contractual guidelines, forbidding the usage of PayPal for products featuring βloli, nudity, schoolgirl referencesβ, and (notice how specific)Β βscaled down Dolls with small Bodies as reference to possible underage naked bodiesβ.
In short: almost everything in OtonaJPβs catalog falls into those categories.
Thus the logical choice of OtonaJP: they stop using PayPal. OtonaJP already has several other payment methods, they can accept card payments through JCBβs payment gateway, and even Bitcoin. They donβt depend on PayPal, and thatβs a smart choice.
Some other shops were less careful about that.
Victims of PayPal
Over the 6 years of itβs existence, Onahole Review witnessed several downfalls of shops, suddenly frozen, painfully bleeding down, or closing down at the bat of an eye. Not so long ago things seemed shaky for Otona Sekai, possibly for very PayPal reasons. The exact events of MyOnaholeβs sinking are unclear, but we have clearly in mind the disappearance of NipponSexToys and the closure of the international division of NLS, both of which were direct results of PayPal crackdowns. One may wonder how many other shops got squeezed out of business by PayPal before even being able to build a brand in the market.
I am fed up with PayPal. They do mafia-like harassment towards businesses and play around with companiesβ and peopleβs money as it sees fit in an inhuman algorithmic mess and specifically vague user agreement rules so they can wipe away anything that could even remotely bring them any trouble with anyone, anywhere, no matter that the business is perfectly legal and owns all required rights and licenses to operate. Even Amazon Marketplace is a better choice.
If your business sells sexual wellness products, stay the fuck away from PayPal.
Paypal meddles also in politics choosing not the service certain people because on which side of the politics spectrum they are on. Whatever you agree or disagree, one thing is certain. Paypal censors and choses not to do business with people they donβt agree with.
PC is such a thing lately where companies care way too much who they do business with. This could also happen to Amazon where they decide no more loli onaholes. Amazon recently decided they would not service sellers that sell Apple reinfurbished products.
So I guess this means I am going to need to move over to Bitcoin if I ever want to buy another Japanese onaholeβ¦ A currency I have never worked with before to purchase something onlineβ¦ Iβm tech savvy so I can figure this shit out but fuck manβ¦
Well many shops accept debit/credit cards too, you can do without PayPal.
Both OtonaJP and ToyDemon also accept Bitcoin through payment processors like Coinbase or BitPay, the process is pretty easy:
After confirming your order, you get redirected to the payment page showing an unique Bitcoin address. You send the converted amount in Bitcoin to this address, and the payment processor detects almost instantaneously that a transaction showed up on this address (I guess at this point the processor informs the shop that an order is currently getting paid, and the parcel preparation could begin). Once the amount is paid in full and after the network confirmed the transaction (usually shops select a 6-block confirmation to be sure the transaction is fully adopted by the blockchain, so it takes at least 2 hours), the processor forwards the payment to the shop and the order gets green light for shipping).
Sure Bitcoin payments sound inconvenient for a VPS hosting service promising a 1-minute delivery, but for a shop where delivering goods takes at least a few days anyway this is hardly an issue π
PayPal are just scum. They have a quasi-monopoly, and they definitely (ab)use it to their advantage.
Theyβre a privacy nightmare (they share your data with 600+ third parties! [https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2018/03/the_600_compani.html]) and their ToS disallows VPN use.
They act like a bank when it suits them, and claim that theyβre not when it doesnβt (to avoid regulation, of course).
People have had accounts randomly frozen (just search the internet for βPayPal frozen accountβ), particularly those with large PayPal balances in them [http://launch.co/blog/paypal-freezes-diaspora-account-disrupts-fundraising-efforts.html] (why not, thereβs a tempting amount of funds there), which also has caused some businesses (completely unrelated to adult products) to shut down [https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/29402]
PayPalβs fees are stupidly high.
People use them because they think their card details get protectedβ¦ okay, Iβll give them that, but youβre probably better off just using a debit card or various virtual card services around. If anything, youβll save on fees.
This is just a taste of what PayPal does β just search around the internet for tonnes of PayPal horror stories.
To re-iterate the post, STOP USING PAYPAL!
first hentai haven, then paypal⦠and long before then, a few countries about those Trottla dolls (although those are cutting it rather close).
when are these fuckers gonna learn that LOLI ARENβT REAL? Hell, they might as we wash their hands away from anything that βwould be a crime IRLβ, like bestiality, necro, guro, ryona, incest, rape, or any other genre that would break laws if you did it IRL.
now do i like the stuff i mentioned⦠not all of it (sure as hell hate necro and guro), but i just mentioned it to drive my point.
itβs like telling someone not to look at food that makes you fat cause theyβre on a diet.. they arenβt EATING IT, theyβre LOOKING AT IT
and no claims about it being tempting either. if you did something cause you βsaw it somewhereβ, you still chose to do it like a dumbass.
Still wondering why they arenβt stating sentences like βwe do not involve in any illegal activities intentionally. Itβs the userβs money and why should we give a damnβ. I guess that will make everything okay.
So whatβs the best payment now? Visa card?
HI. This is Yuka from otonaJP. The problem with PayPal is that their rules are very vague. For example a couple of months ago they claimed to us that the selling of Virgin Age Admission Hard would be a problem, while the normal Virgin Age Admission would be just fine. Its pretty much the same artwork and it shows how random their rules are. But starting from about 2 weeks ago they heavily started cracking on anything adult related. They even closed personal accounts who received affiliate payments from a big video site as we heard. So best options now are credit or debit cards, as well as Bitcoin for example.
yeah, iβd rather just use a credit card next time i get something from you guysβ¦
i did love that βMouth of Truth Peroinβ and Iβm probably coming back for the original
Itβs a shame, but thanks so much Yuka! I love buying from otonajp, and the plastic baggies with little extras like thank you notes and candies are really a wonderful touch, youβre doing great and i wish your website a prosperous future!
Thanks for all the nice answers from you all π