Are you unable to decide between Stripe and PayPal for payment options on your eCommerce Website?

Stripe and PayPal are the most popular online payment gateway and your decision on choosing a payment gateway for your eCommerce website will come down to these two.

In order to make it easy for you to decide on which payment gateway, the article will compare both the Payment Gateways, giving you the pros and cons of both. so that you can choose what suits the best for your business. 

Stripe

Stripe is an online payment gateway that allows people to accept and send money over the internet, and its popularity is growing in the eCommerce industry especially. Stripe is more admired by the tech-savvy people and eCommerce business owners, with teams of programmers in-house. That's because of its customizable development tools. It is a popular choice for small businesses and Companies like Pinterest, Blue Apron and Task Rabbit are also using it.

PayPal

PayPal is another Payment Gateway that allows Users to send and receive payments online. PayPal is popular and well-known. PayPal has over 267 million with Customer accounts that includes over 21 million merchants. So, it clearly states that almost every online user owns a PayPal account and it is especially popular in the eCommerce industry.

Who use PayPal and Stripe?

Sending and receiving payments is not just restricted to eCommerce Industry. Users of PayPal and Stripe also include:

• Freelancers

• Brick-and-mortar shops who want to sell online

• Nonprofit's collecting donations

• eCommerce companies

• Agencies

• Entrepreneurs

• And more

Things you need to consider before choosing a Payment Gateway

Cost

When it has come to the cost, both PayPal and Stripe have won the hearts of eCommerce business owners. This is one of the primary reasons why they are the widely used Payment Gateways across the globe. Both PayPal and Stripe charge the US fee of 2.9% to 3 Cents. Both offer plans with no set up costs, nominal monthly fees or contracts.

So, with both Stripe and PayPal, your business will become eligible for lower pricing, on reaching a certain number of monthly sales. Stripe fees get lower at $80,000 per month and with PayPal fees, it is much lower, at the sales volume of $3,000 per month.

Micropayments

If your transactions are less than $10, then, Stripe has a micropayment support option with the same flat rate as the standard fee per transaction. PayPal's micropayment rates are 5% + 0.05 Cents per transaction.

Charge backs and Refund

When a Customer contacts their bank and complains saying that their card has been charged for something that they don't agree, or think it is a fraud, then, a chargeback or the reversal of charge happens. This is in effect in order to safeguard card holders. However, if the Customers take this as an advantage and start over utilizing it, then, it can affect your business as a fee is incurred on every chargeback that happens.

Stripe's charge back fee is $15 and PayPal is $20. Also, if your Customer gets a refund, Stripe will not return any processing fees to you. PayPal returns just the fixed fee and not as a percentage.  

Customer Support

Stripe has multiple customer support channels that includes help center, social media and chat support with support representatives or developers. In addition, they also have phone and email support.

PayPal also has multiple channels for customer support like a community forum, help center, social media, email, live chat and phone support.

Even with multiple customer support channels, Users' experience with the customer support of both PayPal and Stripe has a vary from good to poor. Stripe recently introduced 24/7 access to both phone and chat support, however PayPal's support is completely off for a few hours of the day. Stripe has also introduced premium support, for which they claim that the response time is much lower.

Ease of Use

Both Stripe and PayPal are super easy to use and both the companies have made it extremely simple for Customers to pay online.

Ease of Setup

Stripe is more flexible for customization than PayPal. Both have an option to enable Pay With Card button on the site. However, Stripe requires a little more development knowledge and can be tricky for non-technical users.

Ease of Setup

Both Stripe and PayPal comply to the norms of Payment Card Industry (PCI) and they meet all the strict standards of PCI and the card holder's data will be stored securely.

Availability

PayPal is available in more countries than Stripe. Currently, PayPal is servicing in 200+ countries and Stripe in 32+ countries and growing.

Access of Funds time

Stripe will automatically transfers your funds into bank account in an average payout time of 2 days. On the other hand, your funds will be immediately available for you in PayPal with PayPal Standard. However, PayPal averages 2-4 days' of payout time to transfer your funds from PayPal account to your bank account.

Data Portability

If you have to move all your data to some other payment processor from Stripe or PayPal, it is called Data Portability.

Stripe accepts Data Portability and they will help you move your credit card data in a PCI, in a compliant manner.

However, PayPal will not give you this data, if you have to shift to another payment processor. For some people, if it is important to have several options for payment gateway, then it is a headache.

Online Invoicing

Stripe and PayPal, both have customizable online invoicing and this is free in PayPal. However, in Stripe, it is until your bill reaches over $1 million.

Card Readers

If you are a physical store and you are planning on having an online presence, then you can use both PayPal and Stripe Payment Gateways and have an online store for your physical store.

PayPal has tied up with several popular Point of Sale systems, and both Stripe and PayPal give their own physical card readers. PayPal gives free card readers and they also have paid card readers. Stripe offers only paid card readers.

Where Payments Are Handled

Stripe gives an advantage here and it lets people pay you without leaving the website. PayPal, requires people to leave the website and login to PayPal account and re-directs back to your site, after successful payment.

Wrapping Up

With both PayPal and Stripe, having their own advantage and disadvantages, I recommend having both. And, having more than one payment gateway options leaves your Customers with more payment options, with also an advantage for you as more conversions can happen.

The Spurtcommerce team can integrate both PayPal as well as Stripe Payment Gateway options for your eCommerce store front. To know more, write to support@spurtcommerce.com