letters

[Chris]

PayPal does not charge anything for a refund. Also returning a check includes postage and envelope have to cost .53 plus man hours. That is ~1.5% of the $40.00.

[John Gardner]

Love the idea and happy to add enough to the letter cost to cover any loss of revenue to the association due to payPal fees. It's a particular pain for me as I have to stand in line to get a bank draft in US funds as well.

I needed a draft for my membership last year and this year used payPal which was great. I picked up a gift membership for a friend and may get a couple more because it is so darned easy. Like Scott I'd have two (3?) more letters by now.

Of course having a paypal account is also the reason my eBay purchases have gone up.....

If it makes Chuck's life easier too than that is another excellent reason. Look forward to it.

[charlie cleveland]

sounds like a great idea but i ve been told pay pal supports the people who are against guns..there is proof of this...charlie

[Fishtail]

I find it hard to believe anyone has a hard time mailing a letter. I agree post offices are to be avoided like the plague, but nowadays stamps can be bought even in places like grocery stores. Plus, I assume you are buying stamps for other needs anyway so a stamp for a PGCA letter is just you steal from your wife's booklet.

Paypal? It's troublesome that so many people are falling back on Paypal to conduct business. Their fees? Well, I can't say I really care about 2% but what do I care about is Paypal's unethical policies and practices. I'm amazed that when people sign up for Paypal they think nothing of giving out their bank account information. That's a big deal. Why? You are giving a third party (probably one that is staffed by 20 year olds in India) the authority to unilaterally access and withdraw funds from your account. I don't even allow my wife to do that.

What's more, if you ever bother to read the fine print, once you give that agreement, you also give away the ability to end that agreement. Only Paypal can discontinue it.
What that means is if you get into a dispute with Paypal and decide to "show them a thing or two" by calling your bank and having them disallowed, your bank will take Paypal's side and tell you to get lost.

Not for me, brother.

[jeffkinser]

My 2 cents:

Disclaimer: My background is Computer Database Design and ecommerce Design so I am a little biased.

I would support this idea as it would be pretty easy to implement with fairly inexpensive software. Even using a traditional CC payment instead of Paypal is really pretty easy.

Too me, the first step would be to have a "letter lookup" routine. We would put in our serial number and the system would respond with "letter available" or "letter not available". Then we just mail in the check and letter like normal. This would eliminate questions on the board about if info is available as well as having to respond to "letter not available" situations by the committee.

The next progression would be adding the payment online.

Jeff Kinser

[Jean Swanson]

For those that think it is easy to establish a "GUN " organization account with Pay Pal----think again . When the account was established for the membership side of the PGCA , there was a tremendous amount of manipulation and time spent to get it approved and set up . Question----Who is going to take the time and effort to do this ??

Another question----Who is going to manage the account ??

Another question-----Who is going to write the programs that will be combatable with our web site ??

I am not saying it is a BAD idea , I am saying that the BOD/Staff of the PGCA are volunteers and to add additional responsibilities onto those that already give of their time , is something to consider !!!

Additionally----the PayPal fee is great than that mentioned and is ,if I recall ,an additional fee for those outside the United States .

I kind of like Bill Murphy's concept ---I like it the way it is !!!

Allan

[10 bore]

you can keep it the way it is for people who want to mail. but for others like me it can be set up like the membership sign up. I haven't seen a problem with that from our volunteer's. I was just thinking out loud, This does not have to be done just thought it would be a good idea, I do know people don't like change and yes this would be change. I just think it would sell more letters. scott

[Bill Murphy]

Maybe we could talk to Craig Larter at the Southern and let him tell us how the AHFCA does it. I get a card copy in ten minutes from AHFCA, and realize that there is more information that must be processed from PGCA than just the scanning of a card. However, I'm just letting our readers know how it is done over there.

[10 bore]

Originally Posted by Allan H. Swanson

For those that think it is easy to establish a "GUN " organization account with Pay Pal----think again . When the account was established for the membership side of the PGCA , there was a tremendous amount of manipulation and time spent to get it approved and set up . Question----Who is going to take the time and effort to do this ??

Another question----Who is going to manage the account ??

Another question-----Who is going to write the programs that will be combatable with our web site ??

I am not saying it is a BAD idea , I am saying that the BOD/Staff of the PGCA are volunteers and to add additional responsibilities onto those that already give of their time , is something to consider !!!

Additionally----the PayPal fee is great than that mentioned and is ,if I recall ,an additional fee for those outside the United States .

I kind of like Bill Murphy's concept ---I like it the way it is !!!

Allan

Allan, It does not have to be pay-pal- could be CC. I did post "pay-pal, ect" ,And if some one want to do the work ?

[10 bore]

Originally Posted by greg conomos

I find it hard to believe anyone has a hard time mailing a letter. I agree post offices are to be avoided like the plague, but nowadays stamps can be bought even in places like grocery stores. Plus, I assume you are buying stamps for other needs anyway so a stamp for a PGCA letter is just you steal from your wife's booklet.

Paypal? It's troublesome that so many people are falling back on Paypal to conduct business. Their fees? Well, I can't say I really care about 2% but what do I care about is Paypal's unethical policies and practices. I'm amazed that when people sign up for Paypal they think nothing of giving out their bank account information. That's a big deal. Why? You are giving a third party (probably one that is staffed by 20 year olds in India) the authority to unilaterally access and withdraw funds from your account. I don't even allow my wife to do that.

What's more, if you ever bother to read the fine print, once you give that agreement, you also give away the ability to end that agreement. Only Paypal can discontinue it.
What that means is if you get into a dispute with Paypal and decide to "show them a thing or two" by calling your bank and having them disallowed, your bank will take Paypal's side and tell you to get lost.

Not for me, brother.

I do have a hard time; that's why I posted this, It does not have to be pay-pal, and you don't have to do it, you could still mail your letters. How about the checks they have to send back because of no records or checks made out for 2 letters and only info on 1 gun, now they have to cut a refund check, now is that's ez ?, scott