Link Your Bank Account To PayPal

PayPal is one of the most largest Internet payment companies in the world. It offers payment solutions for online vendors, auction sites like Ebay and other commercial users. PayPal is a very secure way to shop online as financial information are never shown to sellers.

The principle of PayPal?

You sign up, you link your account to your credit card or you top up money on it via a bank transfer, and then you use your email address & password to complete online purchases. It is easy and very convenient. You don’t need to re-enter your financial details each time you make an order on the Internet. You just login to your PayPal account, and accept the payment.

PayPal is a powerful tool for your online purchases. The data are encrypted to prevent fraud and identity theft. It appears as being a safer way to shop online than providing your credit card number or bank account information directly on the website you are buying from. With PayPal, you have a second layer of protection and therefore a good credit card security. It offers you the perfect flexibility and security at no costs. It is available on every devices and for free (at least for the transactions made in the same currency). PayPal is therefore a secure solution to send, spend and manage money.

And what makes PayPal even more fantastic, is that it is now possible in Belgium to link your bank account to it. You don’t need to own a credit card or to top up money on your account (which requires time and energy to do) anymore.

The advantages

This might not appear as a great news to you as you are already use PayPal the way you do, but it is to us, SKIP-Q. Let me explain you the reasons.

Being able to use PayPal without a credit card is just a dream. In Belgium, the most popular payment method is Bancontact, which is the system through which payments by debit card are completed. Debit cards directly debit your bank account. In 2014, Worldline processed 5 times more Bancontact transactions than VISA and MasterCard transactions. However, there were 2 times more online transactions done by VISA & MasterCard than by Bancontact. The reason is pretty simple. VISA & MasterCard are backed by the 3D Secure system, which means that the online transactions are fast, easy and above all safe. It ensures indeed secure online transactions and fast processes.

“3D Secure is an authenticated payment system to improve online transaction security and encourage the growth of e-commerce payments. It recreates the level of security of a physical payment environment by requesting further payment authentification”. — SecurePay.

On the contrary, making an online purchase with a debit card (Bancontact) looks like a puzzle. It is time and energy consuming. While the 3D Secure system authentifies simply and quickly your identity when you make an online purchase, paying with Bancontact is quite inconvenient as it requires 3 steps instead of 1. The process begins with the identification (card details), continues with the authentication (card reader) and finishes with the authorisation (permission).

The second step unfortunately extends the process a lot. In order to make online shopping with your debit card, you must always have your card reader with you, which is very inconvenient, especially today where online payments are expected to be time saving. As mobile payments are spreading very fast, and as many companies accept only credit cards or PayPal payements on their e-shop, being able to buy online with your bank account via PayPal is a very good news.

I am sure you have at least once in your life been exposed to a situation where you could not book a hotel or purchase an item because you did not get a credit card. I did. I can’t remember the number of times I borrowed my parents’ MasterCard and paid them back afterwards.

PayPal therefore allows you now to operate online transactions directly from your bank account in a way that is convenient, fast and safe.

As soon as I got this information I sign up to PayPal and linked my bank account. I can tell you, it works really well.

Want to try?

Let me guide you through the steps that link your bank account to your PayPal account. The process is quite simple but takes at least 2 days.

1. Sign up to PayPal if not done yet
2. Go to your Wallet page
3. Click on Link a bank account
4. Enter your IBAN (International Bank Account Number)
5. Wait 1 to 2 days and check your bank account. PayPal will transfer you two random deposit of less than 1 euro
6. Once you get them, go back to your Wallet page, select the bank account & confirm
7. Enter the amounts you received
8. You can start making online payments directly from your bank account

Linking your bank account to PayPal to shop online gives you the opportunity to add a new protection layer to the transactions but also to completely simplify and fasten the process.

The reason why we are so glad it works well, is that we are convinced that we have lost lots of potential customers on SKIP-Q. Either because they did not get a credit card or because paying with Bancontact was too complicated. I encourage therefore all our future customers to sign up to PayPal and begin purchasing on our app with their bank account!