Important PayPal Update for AAPK Store Sellers

[Bryan]

Please note that this is a consolidated version of a former forum post. If interested in longer form discussion, please see the following link as there may be a bit more info there that could help:
viewtopic.php?t=84479

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Effective March 20, 2025

PayPal has updated its payment integration requirements for multi-vendor eCommerce platforms which directly affects AAPK.

What’s Changed?
Sellers must now provide their PayPal Merchant ID instead of their PayPal email address in order to accept payments through PayPal on our platform.

This update only affects platforms like AAPK. It does not affect anything regarding how PayPal works outside of these venues.

What You Need to Do
To continue accepting PayPal payments on AAPK, you must enter your PayPal Merchant ID in your AAPK account settings.

How to Find Your Merchant ID

For Business Accounts:
All PayPal Business accounts have a Merchant ID.

1. Log in to PayPal
2. Click the gear icon or your name in the top-right corner
3. Go to Account Settings
4. Click Business Information from the left-hand menu
5. Your Merchant ID will be displayed there

account-settings-business-1.jpg (21.57 KiB) Viewed 11649 times

OR:

account-settings-2.png (28.39 KiB) Viewed 11649 times

THEN:

merchant-id-business-account.png (71.65 KiB) Viewed 11649 times

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For Personal Accounts:
Most personal accounts do not have a Merchant ID—unless they were previously Premier accounts.

To check:

1. Log in to PayPal
2. Click the gear icon in the top-right
3. On the Profile page, scroll down to see if a Merchant ID is displayed

personal-account.jpg (23.46 KiB) Viewed 11649 times

personal-acct-merchyant-id.jpg (29.41 KiB) Viewed 11649 times

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What If You Don’t Have a Merchant ID?

You have two options:

1. Upgrade to a Business Account
– Ensures you receive a Merchant ID
– According to PayPal, you can downgrade back to a Personal account by contacting support, and your Merchant ID will remain valid

2. Open a Separate Business Account
– Use this account for AAPK sales
– Keep your Personal account for peer-to-peer transactions

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Entering Your Merchant ID in AAPK
Once you’ve located your Merchant ID, go to your AAPK Payment Settings page and enter it there and submit the form to continue receiving PayPal payments through the platform.

aapk-payment-settings.jpg (51.69 KiB) Viewed 11649 times

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If you need assistance or have any questions, feel free to reach out.


Sincerely,
Bryan

[just bob]

You know what they say, there's one in every crowd and I guess it's me. I'm trying to wrap my poor, old, tired, worn-out brain around this subject and feel a fog coming on. Wouldn't it be true that is you were already an established eBay seller and accept PP payments, then you already have all the credentials in place to accept merchant payments? I don't have one PP account for AAPK and another for eBay, as far as I know all my PP payments are directed to my email address or my eBay user ID into the same account. I'm also very curious as to why if I need to change things PP wouldn't send me an email. They have in the past. Maybe everyone else gets this and it's just over my head, but my thoughts are to leave things as they are until I get specific instructions from PP, although I already know it's most likely I won't understand them either.

[Bryan]

You know what they say, there's one in every crowd and I guess it's me. I'm trying to wrap my poor, old, tired, worn-out brain around this subject and feel a fog coming on. Wouldn't it be true that is you were already an established eBay seller and accept PP payments, then you already have all the credentials in place to accept merchant payments? I don't have one PP account for AAPK and another for eBay, as far as I know all my PP payments are directed to my email address or my eBay user ID into the same account. I'm also very curious as to why if I need to change things PP wouldn't send me an email. They have in the past. Maybe everyone else gets this and it's just over my head, but my thoughts are to leave things as they are until I get specific instructions from PP, although I already know it's most likely I won't understand them either.

You're not alone. I guess I'm not communicating the situation well.

When a customer checks out on AAPK and chooses to pay with PayPal, our software communicates directly with PayPal to process the payment. As part of that communication, we have to tell PayPal who the payment is going to... that's you.

Until now, we’ve always used your PayPal email address to identify your account. But as of March 20th, PayPal no longer accepts email addresses for this kind of integration. They now require us to send your PayPal Merchant ID instead.

[bestgear]

I don't have one PP account for AAPK and another for eBay, as far as I know all my PP payments are directed to my email address or my eBay user ID into the same account.

As an eBay seller, you don’t receive payouts directly to a PayPal account; instead, you must have linked a bank account to your seller account to receive your sales proceeds through eBay's Managed Payments program. This is completely different than how AAPK works with PayPal. I think you’ve got yourself confused

[just bob]

I don't have one PP account for AAPK and another for eBay, as far as I know all my PP payments are directed to my email address or my eBay user ID into the same account.

As an eBay seller, you don’t receive payouts directly to a PayPal account; instead, you must have linked a bank account to your seller account to receive your sales proceeds through eBay's Managed Payments program. This is completely different than how AAPK works with PayPal. I think you’ve got yourself confused

Right, but I accept pp payment for items I sell on eBay.

[bestgear]

Right, but I accept pp payment for items I sell on eBay.

actually eBay accepts PayPal payment for items you sell on eBay and then pays you through their Managed Payments program which operates completely different than a sale in an AAPK store where you are paid directly from a buyer.

[Bryan]

Right, but I accept pp payment for items I sell on eBay.

actually eBay accepts PayPal payment for items you sell on eBay and then pays you through their Managed Payments program which operates completely different than a sale in an AAPK store where you are paid directly from a buyer.

Tom is exactly right. AAPK interacts with PayPal in a very different way than eBay does. If we were operating at eBay’s scale, I’m certain we’d have access to a broader range of payment processing options. Unfortunately, PayPal only makes certain methods available to us. We have actually tried to get accepted into more robust systems with not only PayPal, but many other alternatives, but our niche market ("weapons") results in denial most every time.

[bestgear]

I'm also very curious as to why if I need to change things PP wouldn't send me an email.

the change is between AAPK and PayPal and not PayPal and you - I wouldn’t expect a communication from PayPal on this matter.

[270Collectibles+]

So just for clarification. Can buyers still pay AAPK using PayPal Friends and Family?
I do NOT have a member ID for PayPal, I have to switch my account to a PayPal Business account to receive a Member ID. But PayPal stated that I can no longer receive Friends and Family payments. Thx

[bestgear]

So just for clarification. Can buyers still pay AAPK using PayPal Friends and Family?
I do NOT have a member ID for PayPal, I have to switch my account to a PayPal Business account to receive a Member ID. But PayPal stated that I can no longer receive Friends and Family payments. Thx

F&F transactions are not allowed with business accounts; what PP stated is 100% true. Some sellers have elected to have 2 PP accounts, one truly for F&F and one truly for purchase transactions where a merchant number is required.

[Bryan]

So just for clarification. Can buyers still pay AAPK using PayPal Friends and Family?
I do NOT have a member ID for PayPal, I have to switch my account to a PayPal Business account to receive a Member ID. But PayPal stated that I can no longer receive Friends and Family payments. Thx

All payments made to AAPK for commissions, premium subscriptions, apparel and club knives have always been received through standard PayPal and not friends and family.

If you switch to a business account, you would no longer be able to accept Friends & Family payments through that account.

None of this changes how payments are made, only how they can be received by sellers through the AAPK store.

With that said, I am working my tail off on a work around that will hopefully enable sellers to receive standard PayPal payments on the AAPK store platform with only their PayPal email again soon.

While it's a bit clunkier for the customer experience and doesn’t offer some of the nice features available in the newer integration (which now requires a Merchant ID), it may be a better fit for casual sellers who prefer not to upgrade or open a PayPal Business account.

I found a legacy integration that still works by passing in email address & works for all personal & business accounts. I think PayPal hates that this is still available, but it looks like it is still very widely used and if they abandoned it, it would break a lot of existing payment integrations, so it appears they choose to keep it and support it.


Per PayPal: "Important: NVP/SOAP is a legacy integration method. We accept new integrations and support existing integrations, but there are newer solutions. If you're starting an integration, we recommend our latest solutions."
https://developer.paypal.com/api/nvp-so ... ormbasics/

I thought we were being good little soldiers by using the latest solutions, but it bit us in the rear a bit. I'll be announcing more about this soon.

[hobiefarmer]

Any updates to this? May I sell a knife now without a PayPal Merchant ID and get paid? Thank you.

[Bryan]

Hi hobbie,

The image at the bottom of his post is our last communication on this matter. The integration of the legacy AAPK is mostly complete and working well. The only thing left to do is make one option redundant to the other so that if one is shut down or fails for any reason, those with both selected will be protected from interruption.

Everyone can use either or both now. Just some tweaking to be done. I'll add an update on the dashboard soon.

The following link can be used for account modifications to accept PayPal with email.
https://www.allaboutpocketknives.com/ca ... t_settings