Google Checkout Vs PayPal : Review

PayPal and Google checkout are both widely used online payment services for e-commerce.  PayPal the affiliate cash register for eBay and Google Checkout a Google product are both bigwigs in the arena of payment processing. While doing with the top 5 alternatives for PayPal the first name that emerged in my mind was Google checkout.There’s often a draw between the two services when you have to decide, which service to choose. But, this entirely depends on your website needs for online payment. We decided to feature a detailed Google Checkout versus PayPal comparison to delve into the pros and cons of both the services.

Let’s begin with a basic overview of both the services

PayPal is a widely accepted third party payment provider. Apart from payment processing it provides a stream of merchant services. Google allows users to buy items right from the search page. Some of the businesses also use Google Checkout to process credit cards at a low cost them.

Modes of payment

Google Checkout’s only option are credit or debit card. But the customers can store this information in order to avoid entering it every time. In this case, PayPal offers more flexibility with option for credit card, debit card or deduction from bank account. Further, it also offers eCheck capability.

Interface

Google Checkout’s interface is not very intuitive. Overall the layout doesn’t seem to be designed for small business. For instance, you have to export the sales record to CSV, if you wanna  know sales of a particular month. To add to the misery the search interface for transactions is terrible. You can’t search customer by a portion of their email address. You can’t search for internally generated invoice numbers.

Fee for accepting payments

PayPal is more straightforward. The fee on sales ranges from 1.9% to 2.9% of the transaction and $0.030 per transaction. There are no fees charged for withdrawing money from Google Checkout to the bank account. Google checkout charges 2% of sales and 20 cents per transaction.

Faster access to money

PayPal edges out Google checkout when it comes to speedy payment. Money from PayPal can be send instantly by PayPal ATM card. Moreover, those in US are entitled to cash back offers, which reduces the PayPal fee. An ACH transfer to your bank account would have the money credited after three to four days.

Google checkout holds all the transaction for two business days, before wrapping up the whole thing and sending them in a single ACH transfer to the bank account. With the timing issue it works out to be a significantly slower than PayPal.

International shopping

PayPal is definitely a better options for those with business spread across various countries. It is the only way to get to the International shoppers. Paypal allows international shopping across 55 countries, 6 currencies(EU, CA, US, pound, yen, Australian dollar). Whereas is basically restricted to U.S only.

Flexibility

Clearly, PayPal offers greater flexibility for ecommerce than Google checkout. With PayPal sales can not only be processed online by the customer, but also by the retailer through a virtual terminal. There are no virtual terminals for Google Checkout. However, PayPal charges for this option.

Expenditure

The Goolge product as always is less expensive than PayPal. Google Checkout also offers free credit card processing.and free merchant service. One of the major advantages with Google checkout is integration with AdWords. This allows preferred pricing on some of the services. Google allows the users to automatically pay transaction fees with the earning from AdWord account. Moreover, when the ad is displayed on other web pages and in search engine results. a shopping cart icon appears so that it is easy to see that you can increase sales.

PayPal on the other hand offers a wide range of services and features that makes it the ace. Some of the most effective services provided by PayPal includes invoicing, statements,  and customer options. In addition to this it also offers shipping and tax calculations.

Security

Both Google Checkout and PayPal offer SSL security on the same level as the banks.

Customer Service

PayPal offers live customer phone support, where as Google Checkout can only be contacted through web site links and email. This could be a great advantage for PayPal, as in case of frauds a live support is always indispensable.

Fraud protection

Paypal offers fraud protection for sales of more than $50. Google allows 100% refund, but the fraud must be reported within 60 days.

Conclusion

Clearly, the bottom line reads that comparing Google Checkout versus PayPal is somewhat like comparing marketing with versatility. Having said so much about the two services, it still remains a fact that for any seller or buyer Paypal would be the better choice. With some exclusive features PayPal overwhelms Google Checkout when it comes to accommodating for small businesses. Although the price factor might be tilted towards Google Checkout, it lacks in several features that could simply e-commerce to a greater extent. Still there are several businesses using both the services side-by-side. However, when deciding for a online payment mode the final consideration should be the cost with respect to features depending on the needs of the business.