I only have good experiences with using paypal as a buyer of goods from ebay. Three times I have been scammed with a stolen ebay account and all three times I have received a complete refund from paypal. I also use paypal to receive payment for some freelance work I do, and except for their very high rates (combine their transaction fee + lousy exchange rates and you end up paying almost 8 %), I find that it works good. I did have to jump thru some hoops when I first reached the money laundering threshold. They asked me to send in a copy of photo ID and a utility bill.