I have been a PayPal user for many years, but I have only recently started receiving money in my PayPal account. Funds that I have received were in two different currencies — Australian Dollar and US Dollar.

Using up Aussie dollar in my PayPal account is easy. Many online shops would let you pay in PayPal (Deals Direct, OO.com.au and SoldSmart for example), and the competitions at OzBargain are mostly funded by the AUD I have in my PayPal account.

Using up my US dollar portion part of the fund is another matter. First of all, I rarely buy things from the States. Maybe I should, as things are usually far cheaper than the rip off price we pay here, even including delivery. Moreover, while PayPal is even more acceptable there, it was surprisingly (or not so surprisingly) not supported by one store that I visit occasionally — Amazon. Neither is my hosting company supporting PayPal, so that I have to pay them using my Australian credit card.

That’s the main problem, you see. I have USD in PayPal — but I cannot buy things in my preferred US shop. I do not want to transfer USD in PayPal into AUD in my Australian bank account, and then pay those US goods and services using my Australian credit card either. I would have to pay the currency transfer fee twice in this case.

I was happy to find out that PayPal has a MasterCard debit card which allows you to use your PayPal fund everywhere MasterCard is accepted! That means I can buy from Amazon and pay my hosting bills using USD in my PayPal fund! “Signing up is easy… click Continue to get started.” So inviting! That’s exactly what I need.

Until the sign up process barking at me, saying that the country I have entered is Invalid. Its user agreement says:

The PayPal ATM/Debit Card is available only to US members with an address in the 50 states, and select Canadian users.

D’oh. Looks like I am living in the wrong place.

Anyone got any suggestion on how I can spend USD in my PayPal account with the least overhead?