Paypal Import Agent Skill

PayPal Import

Overview

Import transaction data from PayPal CSV exports. Handles payments received, fees, refunds, and currency conversions. PayPal CSVs include many transaction types — this skill filters to financially meaningful entries and maps them to Open Accountant's format.

Wilson Tools Used

• transaction_search — check for duplicates against existing transactions
• categorize — assign categories to imported PayPal transactions
• export_transactions — export reconciled PayPal data

Column Mapping

| PayPal CSV Column | Open Accountant Field | Notes |

|---|---|---|

| Date | date | Transaction date (MM/DD/YYYY format) |

| Time | — | Not stored, date is sufficient |

| Name | description | Counterparty name |

| Type | — | Used for filtering (see workflow) |

| Status | — | Only import Completed transactions |

| Gross | amount | Transaction amount before fees |

| Fee | amount (separate row) | PayPal fee (negative = expense) |

| Net | — | Calculated, not stored directly |

| Transaction ID | reference_id | PayPal transaction ID for dedup |

| Currency | currency | 3-letter ISO code |

| Subject or Item Title | notes | Optional detail |

Workflow

• Ask the user for the PayPal CSV file path.
• Parse the CSV (PayPal uses comma-separated with quoted fields).
• Filter by transaction type:
• Import: Payment Received, Mobile Payment, Website Payment, Invoice Received
• Import: Refund, Reversal, Chargeback
• Import: Subscription Payment
• Skip: Transfer to Bank, Bank Deposit (appears in bank import)
• Skip: Currency Conversion (handled as part of the parent transaction)
• Skip: Authorization, Pending, Temporary Hold
• Filter by status: only Completed transactions.
• For each payment received, create two transactions:
• Revenue: gross amount (positive), category "Revenue:PayPal"
• Fee: fee amount (negative), category "Fees:Payment Processing"
• For refunds/reversals, create a negative revenue transaction.
• For currency conversions: attach the conversion rate to the parent transaction notes.
• Deduplicate using PayPal Transaction ID.
• Preview and confirm import.

Without Wilson

To work with PayPal exports manually:

Downloading from PayPal

• Log in at paypal.com
• Go to Activity (top navigation)
• Click Statements > Activity download (or Reports > Activity download in business accounts)
• Select date range (max 1 year at a time)
• File type: CSV
• Click Download
• For business accounts: Reports > All reports > Transactions > select date range > Download CSV

Manual Processing in a Spreadsheet

• Open the CSV. PayPal CSVs use the encoding Windows-1252 — if you see garbled characters, re-open with UTF-8 encoding.
• Filter Status: Keep only "Completed" rows.
• Filter Type: Remove "Transfer to Bank," "Bank Deposit," "Currency Conversion," and "Authorization" rows.
• Split revenue and fees:
• For each payment, the Gross column is revenue and the Fee column is the PayPal fee.
• Create a new row for each fee with the negative fee amount.
• Handle refunds: Refund rows already have negative Gross amounts. Keep as-is.
• Currency conversion: If you received a payment in EUR but your account is in USD, PayPal creates two rows — one in EUR and one with the USD conversion. Use the USD row and note the original currency.
• Summary formulas:

   Gross Revenue:  =SUMIFS(Gross, Type, "Payment Received", Status, "Completed")
   Total Fees:     =ABS(SUMIFS(Fee, Type, "Payment Received", Status, "Completed"))
   Total Refunds:  =ABS(SUMIFS(Gross, Type, "Refund", Status, "Completed"))
   Net Revenue:    =GrossRevenue - TotalFees - TotalRefunds
   Fee Rate:       =TotalFees / GrossRevenue * 100

Reconciliation

• PayPal transfers to your bank should match the sum of Net amounts between transfer dates.
• If they don't match, check for held funds, disputes, or currency conversion differences.

Important Notes

• PayPal CSV encoding can cause issues. If the file won't parse, try saving as UTF-8 first.
• PayPal date format is MM/DD/YYYY (US accounts) or DD/MM/YYYY (international). Wilson auto-detects based on account locale.
• "General Payment" type in PayPal can be either sent or received — check the sign of the Gross amount.
• PayPal business accounts have more detailed CSVs than personal accounts. The column mapping above covers both.
• Do not import "Transfer to Bank" rows — these are the PayPal-to-bank transfers that appear in your bank statement.