Paypal is Germany’s leading online payment service but also the most expensive.
Germany’s antitrust watchdog said on Monday it had opened an investigation into PayPal to see if the US online payments giant was using its dominance to limit competition. are not.
The Federal Cartel Office (FCO) said it would examine whether the conditions outlined in PayPal’s terms of use lead to the potential to “impede competitors and limit price competition”. .
The regulator says Paypal is Germany’s leading online payment service but also the most expensive.
“We will now examine the market strength of PayPal and how dependent online retailers are on offering PayPal as a payment method,” said FCO President Andreas Mundt.
Fees charged by merchants to use PayPal’s services start from 2.49% of the payment amount plus 0.35 euros per transaction.
Under the FCO, merchants are not allowed to offer their goods and services at a lower price if a customer chooses a cheaper payment service, nor can they show preference for pay methods other than PayPal.
This can prevent rival services from entering the market, keeping the surcharges high.
In the end, says Mundt, customers lose out because “ultimately they have to pay for these higher fees indirectly through the price of the product.”
New law in 2021 gives Germany’s antitrust watchdog the power to act against technology company suspected abuse of their dominance market position.
The FCO has also opened proceedings against Google, Amazon and Facebook.
© 2023 AFP
quote: German antitrust watchdog opens investigation into PayPal (2023, 23 Jan) accessed 23 Jan 2023 from https://techxplore.com/news/2023-01-german-antitrust -watchdog-probe-paypal.html
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