buyer wants to send postal order

[katiewins22]

hello - i sold item on friday and hadn't received payment. just got a message asking if ok to send cheque or postal order. i state paypal only on my sales as i have had problems in past - one cheque bounced and sometimes people have said sending postal orders but it has been another week before they have arrived. Also I do my banking online - dont have a local branch so have to either post them in or travel fair distance to cash these things. What should I do?? Buyer said they have paypal account but not able to use at the moment????

Refuse. Your buyer knew what your payment options were before bidding, so they either paypal or you cancel the sale and relist (you could also sell to the second bidder). It's really not worth the hassle.

Frankly, I would accept the Postal order. It sounds like the buyer is having problems with their paypal account. You can cash it at the Post Office when you post the item.

and you save on Paypal fees and have no risk of a chargeback too.

you can only cash it if it is uncrossed and it isn't safe to send uncrossed as it's just like sending cashed

You could say yes....maybe they are having genuine paypal problems. I had this once. I bid and won on something in good faith with my paypal fine, but my paypal fouled up over lost card details (paypal mistake, not mine, and unexpected) and it took a good couple of weeks to sort out. I had to contact the seller and explain. They agreed to hold the item for me for two weeks until I had been able to sort my paypal account out (that is another option you could consider).
If you do decide to accept the Po make sure you agree with the buyer that you recieve and cash the PO then send out the item, not before. If the buyer doesn't like that then cancel the sale.