The whole premise of eBay is based on good faith; anyone with any degree of cynicism will not be surprised that over time they have brought in checks and measures to bolster that good faith.

In large part, it will be a business decision on eBay's part to push PayPal of course - they then own the payment method as well as the transaction and increase their own margins. That does indeed provide better protection for buyers. It doesn't, however, provide them carte blanche to renege on every payment they make, as PayPal have to offer a seller compensation scheme. Now, I can guarantee you that that compensation scheme is underwritten; I am also sure that the underwriters will be more cautious than eBay, who stand to benefit more from selling fees than just for listing fees, granted. I don't know if eBay publish figures on how many transactions are subject to these credit card chargebacks, but it has to be fairly marginal or the underwriters wouldn't go for it. The number where the seller is not subsequently compensated smaller still; those where eBay or PayPal can't recover the funds from the buyer the smallest. That's the bottom line for PayPal and their underwriters.

Let's look at the other payment methods.

Bank transfers, or wires, put the risk on the buyer rather than the seller. In fact, there may well be more risk for a buyer using a bank transfer than a seller receiving PayPal payment, as many banks will not allow the transfer to be caveated as in payment for specific goods - you are simply committing to transfer that amount of cash to a second party. If that party doesn't come up with the goods, the bank will not be party to the contract and the transfer won't be reversible as far as they are concerned. Good luck with pursuing a small claims case, especially if the buyer and seller are in different countries. It can also be expensive. I am surprised that Germany hasn't had PayPal pushed on it more heavily before now - it actually costs me a lot more than PayPal fees and currency conversion margins if the seller wants the money to be transferred to their bank. IBAN numbers or not, not all the European banks are linked - while I can transfer to a UK bank for free at home, I incur fees for a transfer anywhere in Europe and I have to go and visit a bank branch.

Cheques do provide some more protection for the buyer, in that they can be cancelled, but many banks will restrict how far in retrospect after the cheque has been cashed that you can cancel it. In that case, the dubious seller just needs to wait out that period, just as a dodgy buyer might time his chargeback on PayPal. Cheques also hit the internationality of some of the transactions as lots of banks will not accept cheques that are not drawn on a bank of the same nationality, or even in a different currency.

Cash on collection/delivery? Can work if vendor and buyer are close, provided both parties are happy carrying around the requisite amount of course.

Escrow can work if the sums involved are particularly large.

So, there's no one right or wrong answer or method. Each has risks to different parties in different degrees; some are better in some situations than others. I have no connection to any of the companies involved, I just think it's a bit easy and lazy to demonise PayPal all the time, without acknowledging there can be issues with the other payment methods too.

Just my 2 cents / €0.0146892 / £0.0131039 worth :)