>Are you saying you should empty your account constantly
This doesn't really help. When you link your bank account with PayPal the link is 2 way. I.e. PayPal can, without any input from you, transfer money out of your account. They can even do that if the account is empty. Your bank will almost certainly allow an overdraft on your account and you're still liable for the amount + overdraft fees.
I had some issues with PayPal about a year ago and a senior rep at my bank talked me through these details.
With my bank, it wasn't even possible to turn off the overdraft feature.
You can upon sign up of any bank account not allow overdraft. In fact it is an opt-in feature, that depends on your bank they communicate properly with you. I have for instance ensured there is no overdraft added in our business accounts.
Or perhaps I am missing something here?
But yes, please remove overdraft from your accounts. I have no input to offer on paypal at this time.
P.S. Are you in the U.S.? I am just really surprised they bank deemed overdraft as a necessary feature in your case. I am personally interested in this case.
Not quite the same situation here, but overdrafting is a rather nasty feature in my experience. As a student I used a debit card to simplify my banking do I wouldn't have to think about how much money is in my account (if I'm unsure, simply send a text to get my balance or transfer); if I didn't have enough money in my account to buy a $10 lunch, then I wanted my transaction to fail, for budgeting reasons. This didn't work for two reasons:
1. Overdrafting. My bank would not allow me to turn off overdrafting on my checking account; any money in my savings account would be used to cover an underfunded purchase from my debit card, causing a $25 fee and there was nothing I could do about this, short of closing my savings account or reducing the amount of money in it. Since free checking was dependent on a linked savings account with $500 minimum balance, this wasn't an option. The overdraft/fee could cause the savings account balance to go below the minimum, and if I didn't notice I'd get a $25 fee for my savings account as well.
2. The school would constantly charge my debit card as a credit card, and the transaction wouldn't appear for up to two days. Doesn't really help me keep track of my balance when transactions don't show up. Cashiers at the student store could usually process the card properly, but every time I bought something to eat at the cafeteria it would process as credit, regardless of what I told them.
Today, I think bank policies have changed (though I switched banks before this) and I believe you can disable overdrafting on most large banks (WF and BofA, anyways)
This doesn't really help. When you link your bank account with PayPal the link is 2 way. I.e. PayPal can, without any input from you, transfer money out of your account. They can even do that if the account is empty. Your bank will almost certainly allow an overdraft on your account and you're still liable for the amount + overdraft fees.
I had some issues with PayPal about a year ago and a senior rep at my bank talked me through these details.
With my bank, it wasn't even possible to turn off the overdraft feature.
Bottom line is, PayPal almost always wins.