Venmo Slams Door on Personal Selling with 2.99% 'Goods & Services' Fee Hike

There is an inverse relationship between the Decline of Society and Rise in Nitpicky rules. We are calling this the PNPI (Pickaxe Nit-Picking Index)

The chart on the left represents a state in decline, and the (corresponding result) is an increase in inconvenient, annoying, and expensive rules, fees, oversights, regulations, and laws.

Venmo is increasing the transaction fee for payments received on personal accounts and marked as "goods and services" to 2.99% per transaction, effective July 1, 2024. This appears to be a significant increase from the previous 1.9% + $0.10 fee for such transactions.There could be a few key reasons why Venmo is implementing this steep 2.99% fee increase:

1. To disincentivize use of personal accounts for commercial transactions
   Venmo's terms prohibit using personal accounts for business purposes, as they lack tax reporting and buyer/seller protections. By sharply raising fees on goods/services payments to personal accounts, Venmo is likely trying to push businesses to use proper business accounts instead.

2. To increase revenue from commercial transactions
   For payments received through a Venmo business account for goods/services, the fee is lower at 1.9% + $0.10 or 2.29% + $0.09 for tap payments. The 2.99% personal account fee brings those transactions more in line with Venmo's pricing for business use, allowing them to generate higher revenue.

3. To offset costs of improving services and features
   The search results note that Venmo says the transaction fees "allow Venmo to continue providing and improving the service." The higher 2.99% fee could help fund investments in new business tools, fraud protection, etc.

4. To better compete with payment processors
   Payment processors like PayPal charge around 2.9% + $0.30 for online transactions. By raising Venmo's fee to 2.99% for goods/services, it may allow them to better compete for those types of transactions.

So in summary, this 2.99% fee hike seems aimed at pushing businesses away from exploiting personal accounts, increasing Venmo's cut from commercial transactions, funding service improvements, and aligning pricing to compete more directly with payment processors in that space