We can now enter a gift card or promo code on eBay without using Paypal at all.
Back in mid-2015, eBay split Paypal off into a separate company, though there remains a 5-year agreement between the two about certain key partnership operations. In April 2016, eBay began tying an eBay gift card to the eBay account where it began it’s use, not the Paypal account. Sometime later, eBay introduced the option to checkout without logging into Paypal by simply entering your card information on the eBay site directly (though these payments are still processed by Paypal, whatever, it’s complicated…).
More recently, perhaps within the past month, eBay began allowing eBay gift cards or promo codes to be entered directly on their site, entirely without Paypal. (Hat tip to reader JasonP) Oddly, the eBay gift card terms have not yet been updated to reflect this change.
[Update 3/31/19: this is no longer working; you now need Paypal to apply a gift card or promo code. Terms are all the same, but they are now being enforced.]
As an aside, the current limits on eBay gift card usage are $2,000 per day, $5,000 per calendar month, and max eight gift cards in a single transaction. This used to be more interesting to us back in the day when it was possible to buy third party gift cards with eBay gift cards. Those days are long over.
