[Wikipedia-l] Re: Fundraising

Wed Jun 9 22:38:21 UTC 2004

Walter Vermeir wrote:

> Do not forget that by using PayPal WikiMedia is wasting a lot of money.
>
> Befor asking even more money a cheaper donation channel should be 
> explored.
>
> Please see 
> http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimedia_Fundraising_page#MoneyBookers 
>

Is it actually cheaper in all cases though?  Remember that the plurality 
of our donations come from the United States, and from my reading of 
their fees page it seems that MoneyBookers in some cases takes a higher 
cut of US donations than PayPal does.

The only options listed for payment in the US are SWIFT (free) and 
Credit card (3% surcharge), plus a 1% Moneybookers fee (up to EUR0.50).  
SWIFT (basically a bank transfer, if I understand correctly) is not 
typically used by Americans, and not even available through all banks.  
With credit cards, therefore the most common US payment option that 
MoneyBookers supports, the fees total 4% to send money via credit card 
(3% cc processing fee and a 1% moneybookers transfer fee).

PayPal charges 2.9% (for USD donations) plus a $0.30 flat fee, which 
makes MoneyBookers better for donations $27 and under, and PayPal better 
for donations over $27.  Thus it seems MoneyBookers would be a worse 
option for medium to large credit-card donations from the US.

Of course, we might have very few of those.  Perhaps we could just give 
a simplified version of this information to people and let them choose 
which payment option would be most appropriate for their particular 
donation.

-Mark