You should be able to set up a Euro account as Paypal and eBay have their European headquarters in Dublin. If you cannot get them to send you the money you can always buy other items and pay by Paypal.
You don't need a dollar account. You can convert and transfer your money in Euros. Have a read of the New to Selling community boards on eBay, there is lots of info there for new eBayers.
Sending money to someone is possible from an Irish Paypal acocunt (fund via your credit card) but if someone sends you funds (as they will if you send) than there is only limited ability to withdraw the funds if you have an Irish Paypal account as at present an irish bank acocunt can not be linked for withdraw, the only one you could withdraw to is a US bank account (which is hard to get).
So if you want to receive money for the stuff you are selling than you need to either have a US bank account or use a payment provider that allow withdraw to irish bank accounts like www.moneybookers.com .
It does not matter which paypal account you have it transactions can be made in Euro or USD without a problem but their exchange rates are not the best (to and from currency have even different rates).
Also Paypal has a big chargeback risk (search for paypal warning in google).
I use paypal to pay for auctions because a lot of sellers only take paypal these days but I don't like getting paid to it, too much fraud out there.
Notice Date: July 1, 2004
Effective Date: August 6, 2004
Beginning August 6, 2004, PayPal will enable members in Ireland to withdraw funds from their PayPal account to a local bank account.
I've been doing my nut all week trying to figure out how I was going to withdraw my €400 from Paypal .Thank you Sarsfield and AAM for this invaluable assistance.
I just sucessfully linked my irish bank account to my irish paypal account and now I can withdraw for a fee of 1€ in 5-7 business days. I alsoc an witdraw for free in 3/5 business days to my US account.
If you have a standard account you can receive money for free but if you have a premier or business account you pay at least 2.9% plus 0.50 € and worse if the sender is not irish it might even be 3.9% plus 0.50$. Make sure you check the feetable first.
I've just been charged a £6 handling charge on a transaction of £155. On top of that I lose on the exchange rate to convert to Euro's and I then pay a €1 fee to deposit money into my account.