I collect payments on my website with PayPal and Stripe, and am satisfied with neither. So what alternatives do I have?
From my perspective, the advantage of PayPal is that users worldwide can pay in weird currencies and it just works. Stripe is much better designed but I'm not keen on their plans for world domination. I just want a payment system that works and does not take exorbitant fees for routine transactions.
I'm not sure what you're looking for beyond what PayPal offers. You say you "just want a payment system that works and does not take exorbitant fees" but you also say that PayPal "just works," which seems to satisfy your requirements.
So, can you elaborate more on what you want? Do you feel that PayPal is taking exorbitant fees? What would make a "just works" system better than PayPal?
Does Stripe "just work" for you? If not, what doesn't work?
Are you looking for a payment processor with no "plans for world domination?" (Good luck with that! This problem is hard and globe-spanning ambition seems to be universal among the competitors.)
PayPal's APIs, SDKs and documentation are leagues below Stripe's. It's simply much more of a pain to work with. And if you are using PayPal for a SaaS, it quickly becomes clear that it's not the intended use case (every payment has the option to "print a packing slip", for example).
I'm fine with plans for world domination in the early stage, I just don't really want to help the drive to monopoly later on. Stripe is now big enough that I'm ready to point my meager business at the next upstart.
As far as being better than PayPal, I mainly want something that customers who hate PayPal can use (there are many of them and they are vocal).
From my perspective, the advantage of PayPal is that users worldwide can pay in weird currencies and it just works. Stripe is much better designed but I'm not keen on their plans for world domination. I just want a payment system that works and does not take exorbitant fees for routine transactions.