[sabslaurent]

I have a CAD Paypal account - but I charge customers in USD. To withdraw money I have to pay Paypal's exchange rate, they won't let me attach a Canadian USD bank account. That means I have to pay exchange rate to take money out, then pay exchange rate again to convert the money to USD to pay my supplier and Facebook Ads in USD. It makes much more sense keeping my money in Paypal, that they are a fraud of a company is a different story.

[allannienhuis]

Have you thought of setting up a USD account with a US Bank? Canadians can do that without a problem at most branches near a border, and I expect it could be done remotely. Another alternative is to set up an account with RBC(USA) https://www.rbcbank.com/banking-in-the-us/checking-accounts/....

[kirykl]

That would probably raise a flag to the IRS. I suspect the purpose for using Paypal, and a contributing factor for the freeze, could be tax issues

[allannienhuis]

I think people use Paypal because it's easy to use in general, not because it makes tax evasion easier (I suspect it's a pretty dumb choice for that :) ). Taxes need to be paid regardless of how the money get brought into the country, and Canada and the US have a pretty well understood tax treaty.

When I opened up my account at the BOA, it seemed to be a very well used and smooth process - they mentioned that the number of Canadians holding accounts at that branch (close to the border) was a significant percentage of their total. I really doubt it raises any red flags on it's own - there are a lot of legitimate legal reasons for the arrangement.