Finally got rid of the banner ad (at least, I hope it disappears as I publish this post!). It was an almighty palaver getting signed up to PayPal, and the verifcation code took 6 days to appear in my VISA online statement. Sorry, but there's no excuse for that! The thing that really got my goat was this "warning" from PayPal at the bottom of the verification email:

Note: PayPal strongly discourages users from calling their credit card companies in order to obtain their PayPal Member Confirmation Number
before receiving their monthly statements in the mail. If PayPal receives a complaint from Visa, MasterCard, or your card issuer regarding your account, your PayPal account may be permanently closed.

Excuse me? Hello? Is that the sort of friendly customer service tone you want to hear after signing up to a new service?