If you're buying something and the seller asks you to send the money as a gift, DON'T DO IT! Gift transfers are not reversible if the item never arrives or is not as advertised. It's like sending money via wire transfer. Once your money is gone, it's gone for good. There are no ebay transaction details attached to the transfer of funds like there would be if you had paid for the item normally so you can't prove you actually bought anything from the seller.

Not necessarily - if the seller has some reputation then it's fine to send as a gift.

Paypal really is a horrible ripoff though - even on the exchange rate they include an extra 4% margin.

Yes. If you have a credit card which provides commission-free foreign currency transactions, always use that over PayPal's conversion.
The exception is when sending a gift which would be fee-free from PayPal balance but for which you would incur a fee for paying by CC.
In this case the PayPal exchange commission can be cheaper than the fee incurred for paying by CC.

Well...
I have put my ACE up for sale, setting the money transfer as PayPal Gift. In order to save the customer the fee.
On the other hand, I let the buyer choose what type of shipping he or she chooses.
It can be shipped (up to 2 kilograms) as eighter a letter priority a, letter priority b or a package with track and trace.
If the buyer chooses the last option, I really don't see a problem here.

Anyway.... The buyer has to find out were it's for sale. Will not say were in the open here on Vogons.

AmiBay! Jay!

I have sold 200+ items over the years with PayPal family/friends: never an issue.

The only option in "my" PayPal is "Family/Friends" or "Goods and services". I see no gift option so many users talk about (here and on other forums).

For the buyer if he doesn't have any funds on PayPal there is no difference in value if he pays as a friend or for goods. If he pays as a friend, he pays PayPal fee. Or with goods the price is usually higher when seller adds the final PP fees.

Only the PayPal protection is a big plus if the seller doesn't have a good reputation.

I usually pay via friends option and I've had no bad experiences so far.

Ok. Been snooping around on PayPal a couple of hours now.
The fee's. Am I right and understand it correct, when a fee can be payed when I pay for the item by using the email provided? Meaning... I pay what the stuff is worth, and then PayPal will charge me additional fee when I checkout.

Is that how things work?