At the end of last year, Wordline announced that it would work with the financial services provider Bitcoin Suisse to increase the acceptance of cryptocurrencies in retail and e-commerce. The pilot project has been running successfully so far; the final rollout is now set to follow in the next six months.
Exactly a year ago, the French payment service provider Worldlineand the Swiss crypto broker Bitcoin Suisse signed a letter of intent to jointly bring cryptocurrencies to the till
Both companies are initially pursuing the goal of offering Swiss retailers and consumers services for paying with cryptocurrencies in shops and online shops. Wordline is the largest payment service provider in Europe and the fourth largest provider worldwide.
The French company launched a pilot with selected dealers in Switzerland this July. These include mostly hotels and restaurants, but also jewelry dealers and electronics shops in different parts of Switzerland. Since then, they have been accepting Bitcoin and Ether via the company’s solution, but they are still paid out in Swiss francs. According to Dr. Andreas Rehrauer , responsible for the payment product portfolio and innovations at Worldline, should not bear any currency risk for merchants. In addition, there is no additional complexity in billing, as the transactions are integrated into the merchant billing like other card payments.
Dr. Rehrauer towards BTC-ECHO as follows:
Since the start of the crypto initiative about a year ago, we have come a big step further and now have a successful pilot in the market. Since the end of July, three-digit transactions have been settled using crypto currencies – the trend is increasing despite Corona. About three quarters of that was in Bitcoin and a quarter in Ether. However, the solution is designed in such a way that cryptocurrencies can be flexibly expanded or removed, depending on the payment preferences of consumers.
Dr. According to Rehrauer, the feedback from dealers is positive. So they „even partially actively advertised it themselves on their channels“.
How the crypto payment works
From the customer’s point of view, the transaction works in a similar way to the online payment app TWINT, in which Worldline is involved: A QR code is displayed at the point of sale that is scanned with a crypto wallet app. Then it is shown how much the purchased goods cost in the desired cryptocurrency. As soon as the user has approved the payment in the app, it is triggered, processed and confirmed. According to Dr. Rehrauer, the crypto alliance benefits from the fact that more and more people are paying with their mobile phones:
More and more people are used to paying based on QR codes. The best example is TWINT in Switzerland, but also, for example, in an international context, Alipay or WeChat Pay. And buyers who are already used to paying with their mobile phone and with a QR code, the step to Bitcoin is no longer so big for them.