Helen, it seems to be an issue with banking systems or banking regulations in different countries rather than Paypal being unfriendly. You would assume Paypal wants to do business in as many countries as possible/
well, for far-away transactions we usually have to resort to using western union or a system closer to home like webmoney. Yeah paypal’s restrictions are not because paypal is “being unfair” or anything like that, it’s more of the bad/undeveloped legal frameworks in such countries. for instance ukraine doesn’t even have “electronic currency” defined in any law. I assume most countries on paypals “pay only” list have similar legality issues and paypal doesn’t want to risk doing financial transactions not defined by law or where the laws make paypal unable to operate to the fullest. still, this makes me wonder why I see western union in almost every bank and why we have several systems like webmoney then- ahh I’m no lawyer so this issue is hard to understand even for me
The reason for the “unfriendly” behaviour - a lot number of so-called “carders” from Russia. But not only. PayPal oficially allowed to register for citizens from Russia only at 2006, with the restrictions.
I don’t wonder why they can’t transfer money to Russia - it’s just a “position”. I don’t see any logical or technical reasons for such restrictions.
But from the other side, in some cases PayPal have a problems with charging of cards! If there are some problems with russian banks (i don’t believe that that Raiffeisenbank, CityBank or GE Money Bank are SO russian banks), it should be oficially negotiated by PayPal, not me. Also my personal experience, that PayPal’s so-called “technical support” is completely useless.
So, I don’t see a reason to trust PayPal. I’m happy they could charge me for $10 as LingQ monthly payment. But I’m not sure it’ll go smoothly in the next month.
By the way, Steve, there are some problems with payment system tied to LingQ.
Firstly, before going to PayPal, I tried to pay directly by credit card on the LingQ, but I couldn’t. My credit card (MasterCard) was not accepted, however I received a notification from my bank about “blocking” a little sum of money. Also, I tried to paid by another card(Visa) from another bank. It was not successfully too. A last chance was forgotten and evil PayPal… I tried and… i’m here now 
Nikolay, I use a Visa-Internet card to pay for LingQ, and it works fine.
And I don’t see any problem in the fact that I can’t work at LingQ for money. I even can’t cover my own learning by points I earned by tutoring and creating material for LingQ library! Well, the last spring I earned about 7000 points every month (4 students who regularly speak with me, 3 who sometimes submit writings). It is $70 < 2000 RUR. Now, the number of learners of Russian does not increased, but the number of Russian tutors increased (I have one student who regularly speak, and 3 students who sometimes submit writings). I am sure that none of Russian tutor can earn more than 5000 points now (although I have not calculated my “salary” for November). Is there any reason to convert such sums into cash?..
Rasana,
We have to increase the number of tutors in all languages. In the short run this may mean fewer learners per student but in the long run it will mean more members at LingQ and eventually more learners for the tutors. I look forward to our next chat.
Steve