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I am using paypal personal sandbox account and I need to get PAYPAL_ID as a recepeint type. In my business account, I used Merchant ID as PAYPAL_ID and it worked for transactions but in personal account, I am unable to see Merchant ID in my account settings.

Can anyone please let me know how can I get or see Merchant ID or PAYPAL_ID in personal sandbox account? And is Merchant ID only given by paypal in business account and there is no Merchant ID in personal account?

Thanks in advance.

Asma Imtiaz
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1 Answers1

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All PayPal accounts have a unique Merchant/Payer ID, but there's no straightforward way to find it out in a personal account's interface since it's not needed for anything. [Edit: actually, personal accounts should also display it on the settings page you get when visiting https://www.paypal.com/businessmanage/account/aboutBusiness -- the interface is different than with business accounts, but the value should be there ]

You can find it in the page source, or by first signing in to https://www.sandbox.paypal.com/signin and then once signed in going to https://www.sanbox.paypal.com/buttons and creating a Buy Now button. If it is a Personal account there won't be options in Step 2, but if there are options, uncheck the one to save the button at PayPal. Then create the button and above the generated code there will be a link to remove code protection. The "business" value will be that account's MerchantID/PayerID.

This value shouldn't be needed for anything, but that is how you can manually obtain it.

Preston PHX
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  • As you mentioned "This value shouldn't be needed for anything" **One correction:** PayPal payouts API requires the recipient's payer ID (an encrypted PayPal account number). https://developer.paypal.com/docs/payouts/ – Noor Muhammad Jun 24 '20 at 12:30
  • @Preston PHX Thank you so much. I got payer_id by following this method. I forgot to add in my question that, It is mandatory in our business requirement to use payer_id as recipient type in payout API's. Is there any other way to get this ID without using these buttons? – Asma Imtiaz Jun 24 '20 at 13:03
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    Payouts can use an email address. But if you require a payer_id, you could integrate https://developer.paypal.com/docs/connect-with-paypal/ – Preston PHX Jun 24 '20 at 13:19