Update 5/11/19 - good news: A spokesperson provided the following statement in response to our inquiry: "While we recently updated our user agreement to give us the ability to align our refund policy with market practices, we have no plans to make any changes to our existing policy at this time."





Is PayPal delaying implementation of a costly new policy? A longtime seller told us today that she was told by a customer service rep that it is putting a hold on the policy change, and for now, will not be keeping 100% of the fees for refunds (the longstanding policy was to only retain the 30-cent fee and refund the transaction fee).





Rumors are also abounding on discussion boards and we've heard from numerous readers looking for confirmation.





PayPal had recently notified sellers of the controversial new policy , which was set to take effect yesterday, May 7, 2019: "If you refund (partially or fully) a transaction to a buyer or a donation to a donor, there are no fees to make the refund, but the fees you originally paid as the seller will not be returned to you."





The change would be costly - previously PayPal retained the 30-cent per-transaction fee but refunded the variable fee (2.9% of the transaction for most sellers).





We are awaiting confirmation from PayPal and will update this post as soon as we get an official answer.





Please note that logging into our PayPal accounts shows the new policy under fees: "If you refund (partially or fully) a transaction to a buyer or a donation to a donor, there are no fees to make the refund, but the fees you originally paid as the seller will not be returned to you."