RMT sellers who depend on PayPal to process its credit card transactions may want to check out the growing number of alternatives to the world's largest online payment portal which may offer better, more glove-fitting service.

One of the most prevalent complaints about PayPal is its sometimes heavy-handed methods to prevent fraud. The New York Times documented a pattern of security measures used by PayPal that would outright freeze accounts identified as suspicious for fraud.

One potential sign of fraud is an unusually large transaction, said PayPal's Katherine Hutchison in an interview with the New York Times's Brian Chen. "Another warning sign is a spike in activity, like a sudden burst of transactions in a formerly quiet account," added Chen.

Between both fraud-flagging offenses, RMT sellers are more likely to fall into the second category - a stratospheric surge of sales possibly related to the launch of a new game currency such as the launch of Diablo 3 Cash, or related to the release of a new expansion such as World of Warcraft's fourth expansion, Mists of Pandaria, less than two months from now.

While there is no data on how many RMT sellers are affected by PayPal's stringent anti-fraud policies, there is a clear incentive for them to explore other emerging online payment portals not as a replacement for PayPal but as parallel payment channels.

WePay is an emerging competitor cited in the NYT article and, according to its website, charges 3.5% in sales processing fees at a minimum of $0.5 with no additional setup fees or monthly fees. Before freezing an account, WePay also widens its investigation variables, such as including social media interactions when determining fraud.

"The main difference is that its system takes into account a business's social networking profiles when investigating suspicious transactions. A small company's Facebook pages, Yelp reviews and Twitter account are evaluated to gauge its legitimacy, and a business's account is frozen only when it has been conclusively determined that fraud has taken place," said Chen in the same NYT article.

Given these parameters, RMT sellers who sustain social media accounts - such as IGE.com's well-liked Facebook page and Guy4Game.com's active Twitter account - could reasonably integrate WePay with less fear of fraud-related investigations.

Other PayPal alternatives noted by NYT include BrainTree, Amazon and Google.

Of course, RMT sellers should be very wary about dropping PayPal altogether in favor of these less entrenched options. "None of them have the global reach of PayPal," noted Samee Zafar to NYT's Chen. For now, it seems the best course of action is to stick with PayPal while adding parallel payment channels to at least mitigate the risk of putting all transactions in one easily frozen basket.