Payment problems with Paypal and Google Wallet

Payments with a smartphone or smartwatch that have configured Google Wallet with a stored PayPal account are currently often canceled without further notice. The only remedy is to store other means of payment in the wallet or to carry bank cards, for example.

Many people are currently experiencing this problem if you look at internet forums: Paying with a smartphone or smartwatch, which otherwise runs smoothly, seems to work at first, as the cell phone or watch confirms a successful transaction with a green tick and vibration. However, the payment terminals report an unsuccessful transaction and ask for a different payment method.

Cause currently unclear

The cause of this error is currently unclear. The combination of Google Wallet with a PayPal account is not unusual. For savings bank customers, for example, it is one of the easiest ways to pay with Google Wallet, which works on both smartphones and smartwatches – proprietary solutions from the savings banks are currently only available for smartphones. Accordingly, the circle of those affected is quite large.

So far, there has been no information from Google or Paypal about any problems. We have contacted both companies and will update this report if we receive any feedback.

It is therefore currently unclear when the problem will be resolved. It is also not known whether users need to take action. According to forum reports, however, it does not help to add the PayPal account to Google Wallet again.

PayPal has been available as a payment method in Google Wallet since the end of 2018. As the direct support of German banks in Google Wallet looks rather poor, Google's Paypal support enables millions of customers in Germany to use Google Wallet via a small detour.

(dmk)