PayPal Nigeria limitation has restricted Nigerians from the full use of PayPal services.
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PayPal Nigeria has been an evergreen query on Google for years now and this is due to the limitation Nigerians have when trying to open a PayPal account that can send and receive funds in Nigeria.
For every four of five websites you browse today, you are likely to need a PayPal account to sell or buy a service. And this only shows how popular and important the payment gateway is.
To many Nigerian Freelancers who need a functional PayPal account to sell on platforms like Fiverr; become an affiliate on a platform like Clickbank, the need for a functional PayPal account cum PayPal Nigeria becomes imperative.
Till date (2021) this need is still far fetched and many are left with no better option than to bypass the PayPal Nigeria Limitation, and to achieve this, it means one would need to use a foreign country PayPal in Nigeria.
It’s painful!
But it is better to focus on providing better service once and for all rather than on how to get a functional PayPal in Nigeria, and this is what this post will help you achieve.
Why You Need To Bypass PayPal Nigeria Limitation
- You cannot send funds to another PayPal user, you can only use it to pay for goods online.
- Nigerian PayPal does not have a balance. You only spend from your card.
- It does not receive PayPal payment. You can only spend from the attached card.
At the end of the day, if you cannot send your PayPal funds to other PayPal users, the whole idea of online work from Nigeria becomes too difficult to handle that it can get you frustrated.
Thus, for a typical freelancer who earns from micro job sites like Upwork, Fiverr, Gigbucks, 99design, Freelancer, etc., it’s useless.
And for a PayPal money exchanger in Nigeria who receives funds from myriads of freelancers,
using PayPal as-it-is, is not an option.
Since PayPal Nigeria limitation is something that knocks out Nigerians from the global economy,
the next thing to think of is, how to create a PayPal account in Nigeria that sends and receives funds without limitation?
And the brief answer is to open a PayPal account as a Nigerian with a foreign business location (as at today 8 June 2021, I know someone who successfully verified her Lesotho Business PayPal both with her Nigerian Name on her ID and her Nigerian CAC document, and it was successful).
You may want to follow suit.
Nevertheless, if you wanted to purchase goods on Amazon for example, your Nigerian PayPal account might also be useful, especially when you are not able to pay directly with your Nigerian card.
In that case, you only need to head on to paypal.com/ng to register for a Nigerian PayPal account. But for the purpose of this blog post, we will be registering with other country’s PayPal links.
What this means is that you would be leveraging other African countries that have functional PayPal usage to meet your end.
For some IMERS (Internet Marketers), you may want to learn how to withdraw your PayPal funds at CBN and BDC rate, right now it is 470 Naira Per Dollar, right from the comfort of your home without being a victim of PayPal Nigeria limitation.
There is much content around this topic but this blog stands out because it will show you what you really need to know about this subject.
For example, if you query the keyword,
How to open a PayPal account in Nigeria on google.com,
you’re most likely to see several pages that won’t satisfy your search.
One of them is from the popular Punch online news page How to open a PayPal account in Nigeria.
While the post provides an answer in its own way,
it doesn’t really satisfy the PayPal needs of a typical Nigerian like you and me.
And in my opinion, it’s useless to spend time opening a Nigerian PayPal account the way it’s described or the usual way.
Because you’d be better-off purchasing foreign currency through the bank than spend time trying to fiddle with PayPal Nigeria because it doesn’t work.
Why you should listen to me instead:
As a Nigerian-based online freelancer, who has worked on various micro job sites,
starting from freelancer.com to fiverr.com for over four years now, I must say,
I have mastered the process of how to open a PayPal account in Nigeria that allows you to send and receive funds.
Not alone opening, but operating it in a way that your account doesn’t go against the PayPal operational policy.
So far, like many other Nigerians,
Using PayPal in Nigeria involves circumventing the process to work for you, and this includes the use of VPN, VPS etc.
But in 2021, you do not need all these (that is if you want to open a Lesotho, Mozambique, Kenya, South Africa PayPal.
Outside these, you would need a VPN or VPS.
PayPal Nigeria Step 1: Signup with any of the domain names below.
Some of those gateways you can use include,
- PayPal US (www.paypal.com/us)
- South Africa (www.paypal.co.za)
- Lesotho (www.paypal.com/ls)
- Kenya (www.paypal.com/ke)
- UAE (www.paypal.com/ae)
- Mozambique (https://www.paypal.com/mz/home)
- UK (paypal.com/uk) etc.
You can withdraw your PayPal funds at NGN470/USD without any exchanger. See how to open a Lesotho PayPal that sends, receives and withdraw funds to your Nigerian bank account.
The registration process is the same for each of the above gateways. However, we will use the South Africa PayPal gateway for this blog.
PayPal Nigeria Step 2: Choose between a business and a personal PayPal account.
There are two types of accounts, business and personal.
A personal PayPal account has certain restriction from the amount of funds you receive into it,
to how much you can spend.
What is the difference between PayPal personal and business PayPal?
PayPal Personal Account
With a personal PayPal account, you are declaring to PayPal that you will be using it for private transactions.
And this can be for purchase of books from Amazon, to make payment for your internet bills, water bills etc.
This is important because it will affect how long you will have to stay on PayPal.
If you do not understand this before opening an account, you may easily get into trouble with PayPal.
For example, when you use a personal PayPal to run an eBay store, you are likely to lose claims when the need arises.
And this is unlike a business PayPal, except you are the customer making such a claim.
If you are not, it becomes troublesome.
Apart from single users, Personal PayPal accounts are also suitable for freelancers.
But if you operate a company other certain employees may be required by law to have limited access to your PayPal account,
and that is where a business PayPal becomes crucial.
PayPal Business Account
A PayPal business account allows you to add certain employees like your accountant access to the account for accounting purposes.
This privilege is not available in personal accounts.
For an average Nigerian who only buy and sell stuff online,
Owning a personal PayPal might be cool, as it requires less complex data from you.
During verification (later when you are already using your account) only two documents may be required of you.
A government issued ID (preferably your Nigerian Passport or Driver’s License) and your proof of address (NEPA Bill or Water Bill).
But for a business account, they may require you to provide the above plus a business document and most times a detailed explanation of the various transactions you have made.
Expert Advice: During registration, make sure you use a verifiable business address (except you plan to try with your full Nigerian details, then it may pass since we currently only have few registered addresses in Nigeria)
Pros and Cons of Personal PayPal
It is easy to sign up for a personal account as it requires just basic information.
Currently the restriction on a personal account when compared to a business account aren’t clear yet as you can transact as much as possible upto $10,000 on a single transaction (depending on your account’s trust level).
If you have a registered business in Nigeria, you may try a business account, otherwise a personal account is fine.
But sometimes, it is easier to pass PayPal verification if you have a legitimate business than a personal account.
This is because it is easier to verify a business document than a person (except you are from US and UK etc.)
If you receive online payment from your website,
you’re most likely suitable for a business PayPal account in Nigeria as opposed to a personal account.
Pros and Cons of Business PayPal
Using a business PayPal opens you up to the world of opportunities and flexibility.
You’ll have the privilege to send payment simultaneously and instantly to more persons than you can with a personal account.
Using a business PayPal is the most professional way of spending as a business online.
With a business PayPal,
you’ll have access to send an invoice to clients and increase your spending limit as opposed to a personal PayPal account.
So depending on what you want, you can decide which one is most suitable for you.
PayPal Nigeria Step 3: Fill in your personal or business details or both.
As part of the PayPal Nigeria signup process,
you will need to fill in your personal or business details or both,
depending on the type of account you decide to open.
Either of which account type and country gateway you chose, you will need to provide your address and ID number.
For Nigerians, you’ll need your National Identity Number (NIN), or the number on your Passport.
PLEASE NOTE: if you’re opening a business PayPal account in Nigeria, you are going to open it as a Nigerian who owns a business in a foreign country, or you stick to the “lady’s” own I mentioned above.
This means, you will require document for the foreign country,
and depending on how connected you are, you can find your way around a foreign country where you can get these documents legally.
In the US, for example, there are some companies in Delaware that offer such services. Like helping you get a US LLC company and a US address for a token.
Fiverr Elevate has some of those companies as their partner,
and the service is quite affordable if you’re into something serious.
For pseudonyms,
you will need to head on to yellow pages for the designated country you wish to open your Nigerian account,
get all the details you need to set up your PayPal except the virtual credit card (VCC).
You can always get a Canadian based VCC from Alat by Wema, or Eco Bank VCC. GetBarter VCC also works and others you may have come across.
Otherwise, you can simply use your Nigerian cards such as the UBA Africard etc.
And these cards can be used on any of the above gateways. They’re entirely legitimate alongside your legitimate personal Nigeria details.
PayPal Nigeria Step 4: Verify your email
You should now head over to your email,
and verify your email to get your fully functional Nigeria PayPal account set up and ready to receive its first fund.
PayPal Nigeria Step 5: Remove your limit with a PayPal VCC.
The next step will be to lift your limit and enjoy the full functionality of the PayPal account.
So, grab your already acquired VCC from Alat by Wema and input it to verify your account.
and to lift your spending threshold on your newly created Nigeria PayPal account.
Test your newly created Nigeria PayPal Account
Now that you’re close to owning and operating a foreign PayPal account in Nigeria without having to experience the PayPal Nigeria limitations,
you should test your PayPal for full functionality.
And the first and most important test is to receive funds.
You’ll need to receive a little amount (as small as $0.10 still works) into your PayPal account.
Once it shows in your cleared balance, know that your PayPal is set to enjoy what every other PayPal account in unrestricted countries enjoys.
All things being equal, you should now receive payment as family and friends (FNF) and goods and services (GNS) in your PayPal account in Nigeria.
If you don’t know where to get funds, you can join our group on telegram and find people who can help you get funds to activate your PayPal account.
Other things to note
You can withdraw your funds from your US PayPal account to your Nigerian bank account without an exchanger.
As you know, trusting any Nigerian you see on the internet to exchange your hard-earned PayPal funds,
is one of the very hard things you will face in your freelance journey.
So, withdrawing your PayPal funds to your bank account at a more dignifying rate is something you don’t want to lose out.
Also, you cannot send FNF from a Lesotho PayPal account, or to a Lesotho account.
However, you can withdraw your PayPal funds almost instantly to your Nigerian bank.
Mostly when you set up a fully verified Lesotho PayPal account.
On a general note, to date, PayPal is the most flexible and most widely accepted means for online payments. Yet it remains the most fragile payment gateway there are.
You may want to keep up with our next blog on how to set up and verify your Payoneer account. And also how to withdraw to your Nigerian bank from Payoneer at the CBN official rate.
Updated 08/06/2021
If you are looking for ways to withdraw your PayPal funds at CBN rate to your bank in Nigeria, you should read our post on Lesotho PayPal.
And there are other methods such as Iceland PayPal with GTBank Mastercard, US PayPal to Payoneer then to your bank etc.
Also if you work full time and thinking of transitioning to being a freelancer or doing freelancing part-time to augment your revenue, you should see our post on HOW TO GET APPROVED ON UPWORK IN LESS THAN 24HRS or how to work on weekends online offering Data Entry service on Upwork.
Let’s meet in the comment section.
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