PayPal, one of the most popular websites on the Internet and surely the most used service for online payments and money transfers, has announced that the service would be unavailable on May 29 for approximately one hour due to scheduled maintenance. Jim McGuire, vice president of network operations at PayPal, said the website would become inaccessible on Thursday, May 29, at 11pm PDT (Friday, May 30, at 6:00 am GMT) for one hour during which most of the PayPal payment functions will be unavailable. However, Payflow Gateway customers will not be affected by the maintenance, McGuire explains.

Besides the unavailability of the PayPal website, payments processed by PayPal on the popular eBay bidding website will also be unavailable. Moreover, users won't be able to log into their PayPal accounts to verify payments. Obviously, those made through PayPal or other merchants will also be suspended for one hour.

"PayPal continually makes improvements to our systems and platforms so that we can continue to provide you with the best online payment processing solution. Rest assured, we will be monitoring the scheduled maintenance very closely to ensure that we return to normal functionality as soon as possible," Jim McGuire explains.

As mentioned, PayPal is one of the most popular services on the Internet and, for many users, it represents the main solution when it comes to online payments and money transfers. PayPal was acquired by eBay in October 2002, when the company paid $1.5 billion. Since the acquisition, PayPal has grown up a lot and currently exists in several countries around the world.

According to Wikipedia, PayPal hosts more than 164 million accounts and supports no less than 19 currencies worldwide. Moreover, people from 190 countries could take advantage of the PayPal features, more countries being expected soon as part of the PayPal evolution.