litecoin wallet fees (kind of wierd, kind of high)

[Littleshop]

I am surprised that the fees are so high to transfer just 1 LTC.  I see some very strange behavior when I send, such as it asking me to approve one fee, then a higher fee, then taking less in the end.  .1 LTC fee on 1 LTC is 10%.  Seems high to be a useful currency.

I also see no way to send with no fee.  Is this a wallet limitation or a network limitation? 

[1714797349]

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[wtogami]

Litecoin uses a modified fee formula to discourage spam.  Spam is a significant problem in the Bitcoin network.

• Fees get smaller with coin age.  Usually that means "wait long enough" and it becomes free.  Depending on the number of inputs it can become a free transfer if you wait a few days.
• If your inputs are numerous and small, you might be able to fit only a limited number of them in a free transaction.  If all the inputs have sufficient coin age, you can make these free by splitting them into multiple transactions that are below 10KB in size.  There might be delays in confirmation.
• If your output is too small (less than 0.01), the fee will always be high relative to amount you are sending.  This is to prevent spam.
• Litecoin-0.8.x will have improvements to the fee calculation to allow "normal" transactions to have a lower fee while continuing to be hostile to spam.

[Littleshop]

Litecoin uses a modified fee formula to discourage spam.  Spam is a significant problem in the Bitcoin network.

• Fees get smaller with coin age.  Usually that means "wait long enough" and it becomes free.  Depending on the number of inputs it can become a free transfer if you wait a few days.
• If your inputs are numerous and small, you might be able to fit only a limited number of them in a free transaction.  If all the inputs have sufficient coin age, you can make these free by splitting them into multiple transactions that are below 10KB in size.  There might be delays in confirmation.
• If your output is too small (less than 0.01), the fee will always be high relative to amount you are sending.  This is to prevent spam.
• Litecoin-0.8.x will have improvements to the fee calculation to allow "normal" transactions to have a lower fee while continuing to be hostile to spam.

I am looking forward to those improvements.  I guess the calculations for fees are really off.  You can discourage spam without charging 10% fees on a 1 LTC transaction.  The current fee structure makes the coin unfriendly to actual users.

I have changed pool settings to have less transactions per amount of LTC.  I am sure this will help some.

[wtogami]

I am looking forward to those improvements.  I guess the calculations for fees are really off.  You can discourage spam without charging 10% fees on a 1 LTC transaction.  The current fee structure makes the coin unfriendly to actual users.

I have changed pool settings to have less transactions per amount of LTC.  I am sure this will help some.

I didn't design the fee structure.  I am just stating how things are now.

Generally, you pay more if you are impatient.  You pay less (or even free) if you are more patient.

This will be a little better in 0.8.x but the details haven't been worked out yet.

[BeejMiner]

Well, it has been over a year and the fee structure is still bad for average usrs.  Anyone know if it is documented somewhere?

[wtogami]

How is it bad?  The fee is roughly 1 cent for most transactions now.