Your personal Venmo profile can be used to send and receive payments for good and services. Learn all about buying and selling (without a business).
If you have a Venmo business profile or are interested in signing up for one, please view our Business Profile Help Center.
How does buying and selling work on Venmo?
When you pay another personal profile on Venmo, you may have the opportunity to tag that payment as a purchase. Eligible payments will be covered by the Venmo Purchase Protection Program if this option is selected by the sender, and Venmo will charge a small fee to the payment recipient.
Users who receive payments tagged as purchases will incur a fee. This fee amount is automatically removed from the total amount received.
Learn more about fees on Venmo.
Venmo’s Purchase Protection Program is designed to help both buyers and sellers manage their next steps when things don’t work out with an eligible purchase.
- If you’re the buyer, and what you bought isn't delivered, arrives broken, or is just plain wrong, let us know. Venmo Purchase Protection may be able to help make it right.
- If you’re the seller, Venmo Purchase Protection can help prevent you from losing money due to unauthorized transactions or claims that the buyer never received their purchase.
What’s eligible for Venmo’s Purchase Protection program?
The terms and conditions for Venmo’s Purchase Protection program are available in the User Agreement.
Some examples of situations that could be covered by Venmo’s Purchase Protection program include:
- If you bought a book, but received a DVD
- If you purchased an item described as authentic, but received a knockoff
- If the item you bought is missing major parts that the seller didn't report
- If you purchased three items but only received two
- If the item was damaged during shipping
This payment wasn’t for a purchase. What do I do?
If you accidentally tagged a payment you sent as a purchase, or if someone accidentally tagged a payment they sent to you, please contact our Support team.
There isn’t a way to un-tag or recategorize a payment after the sender identifies it as a purchase, but we may be able to return the fee for payments tagged in error. Alternatively, our Support team may be able to assist in returning the payment to the sender so they can pay you the correct way.
It’s important to understand the potential tax implications of receiving payments tagged as purchases, especially if the amount received meets or exceeds the reporting threshold. Please visit our Tax Center for more information.
Disputing these transactions will not rectify this situation, but if there an issue, please contact us as soon as possible
Why isn’t the ability to tag a payment as a purchase showing in my app?
If you don't see the ability to tag a payment as a purchase, it means the option isn't available for that particular payment. You may have this option for other payments in the future, but please note that not all payment activity is eligible for Purchase Protection.
You can review the terms and conditions of the Venmo Purchase Protection Program here.
If it’s a time-sensitive payment, you can also check out our parent company, PayPal.