Stripe launches German beta

by TomAnthony • 13 years ago

193 161 13 years ago

stephanos2k3• 13 years ago

It's astonishing how quick they can expand something as complicated as payment processing to many - bigger and smaller - countries in Europe.

cperciva• 13 years ago

One you get into one EU country, dealing with other EU countries is probably quite a bit easier...

donw2• 13 years ago

Especially if that first country is Germany, as they're one of the economic powerhouses of the EU.

mhd3• 13 years ago

Well, you probably need some kind of foothold for legal reasons somewhere in the EU/EEC (probably some tax-haven like Luxembourg), but after that it's not really that easy, as each country has its own legal and technical banking peculiarities. A pretty big mess.

marijn2• 13 years ago

They've been talking about this for more than a year. Not sure if that qualifies as quick. That being said, it's awesome that they got there—I got into the Dutch beta and can say the process of dealing with Stripe is an order of magnitude better than dealing with Paymill (the clone that rolled out earlier).

k__3• 13 years ago

Sadly Germans hate credit cards.

donw2• 13 years ago

I'm in an office in Berlin as I type this. Every person around me has a credit card. Every German I personally know, including my destitute student friends, have credit cards.

It's not like online retail isn't a huge business here, and credit cards are the easiest payment method available, due to the incredibly restrictive nature of German banks.

A lot of startups here have been screaming for this day.

k__3• 13 years ago

I have one, too. The younger generation is okay with this, but most older people prefere "real" money :\

qznc2• 13 years ago

Direct debit is just as easy. Two numbers to enter.

raverbashing5• 13 years ago

Too bad most stores have never heard about this "credit card thing", some will grudgingly accept EC (the german debit card)

rbehrends• 13 years ago

Credit card ownership in Germany was around 33% in 2011 [1].

The problem that credit cards have in Germany is that they have to compete with ELV (and soon SEPA Direct Debit, I suspect), which from a consumer's perspective (though not from a seller's) is the superior payment system (ease of chargebacks, plus the up to 150 Euro that you may have to eat if your credit card details are stolen, plus the historical tendency of the courts to side with banks over consumers in the case of card theft [2]).

[1] http://www.bundesbank.de/Redaktion/EN/Downloads/Publications...

[2] The law has recently been changed to no longer make a prima facie assumption that you mishandled your PIN if your card was used fraudulently, but you may still have a lot of hassle to go through.

wozniacki• 13 years ago

Really?

I'm certain they hate the notion of credit too which has long been attributed to their post-war mindset.

Are other European notions similarly disposed towards credit (and thus credit cards), too?

skrause5• 13 years ago

Credit card usage isn't low here because Germans hate credit, it's because we simply have had better alternatives for ages. Instead of credit cards people use Electronic cash (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_cash) in stores which is much cheaper for merchants, so they often don't even accept credit cards because of the fees. Online payments and payments of bills are usually done through direct withdrawals (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_debit#Germany) with easy chargebacks.

mbesto• 13 years ago

In general, yes. My friends in the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium and Switzerland all notoriously shy away from CC.

Interestingly my friend in Switzerland couldn't finance his car purchase. You either have to lease or buy the car in cash. Yes, full cash payment. For an American, that's baffling...our whole car industry is based off of credit (and perhaps quite indirectly related to it's demise.)

sveme• 13 years ago

There is actually a major difference between the majority of German credit cards and, e.g., US credit cards, which fits nicely into your argument:

Most German credit cards are "not-revolving",i.e., at the end of the month the amount you spent with your credit card will be withdrawn automatically from your bank account. It is therefore much more like a debit card in concept than a credit card.

The only reason why credit cards are more used nowadays in Germany is because of their use in international online shopping (and when renting a car in the US, which is the reason why I had to get one).

pc12• 13 years ago

Credit card usage is somewhat lower in Germany (though by a smaller margin than people think), and we considered holding off 'till we had a better answer to this. But we thought about it more, and talked to a bunch of German companies, and realized that a lot of German users want to sell to a global market in the very same way that, say, an American company would -- there isn't necessarily a tight coupling between the geography of your customers and the geography of your business. (This is what's great about the internet!) Travis CI is a good example here.

Seen this way, we figured it made sense to bring the capabilities that US users have today to Germany as quickly as we could.

Concours2• 13 years ago

Thank you guys/girls, we have being waiting for this for a while now, we almost went with Paymill , so this is some awesome news. What's the issue with being able to accept Dollars only with a US Bank account, would you fix this after the beta or is it supposed to stay like this? ...or have I misunderstood something?

k__3• 13 years ago

Hm yes, to sell stuff "from" Germany to the rest of the World this would be pretty nice :)

WA• 13 years ago

I just signed up for PayMill yesterday, but didn't send them the paperwork yet. I might as well sign up for Stripe then.

danmaz74• 13 years ago

Kudos for this choice. Internet businesses are often naturally international.

microtonal3• 13 years ago

Maybe, but it's certainly not hard to get a credit card in Germany. I moved from The Netherlands to Germany on August 1 and I got a credit card with my bank account at no extra cost.

A really big difference here however is that for daily groceries people tend to pay in cash and for lower amounts they'll refuse use of a debit card, while in The Netherlands practically everyone pays with a debit card all the time.

It would be interesting to see per-country statistics.

levosmetalo4• 13 years ago

It has to do with privacy. Germans are quite fond of keeping up personal information personal, and they just don't want that bank can keep track of their purchases. That's the main reason why people here prefer cash as a method of payment.

Of course, when paying or order something online, you need to provide your shipping address anyways, so credit cards brings at least a benefit of possible dispute if anything goes wrong.

MrBuddyCasino2• 13 years ago

Germans pay by card all the time (I think you know them as debit cards?), we just don't use credit cards, because there is no advantage of doing so. Every "giro" account comes with one, and you can use it at the ATM and at the cash register.

I think this is because historically, wire transfers between most banks in Germany have been easy and cheap for decades, while it is different in the US, as I understand it.

superuser22• 13 years ago

Wire (instant) transfers from consumer US bank accounts typically carry a $25/transaction fee, and in some cases can only be initiated by phone or in person.

Interestingly, Citi has a nice web interface for person-to-person ACH transfers (direct deposit), but it's not widely used and I don't think most other banks have it.

marijn2• 13 years ago

That's not quite accurate, as other comments pointed out. But even if no German resident ever used a credit card, the significance of this is that German-based merchants can start using Stripe to accept Internet payments from people all over the world.

LinXitoW• 13 years ago

I'm German, and can confirm two things:

- Almost anyone that would be able to actually use a credit card online has a credit card

- Everyone i know dislikes credit cards, including me. They still have the correct stigma of paying with money you don't have and causing a housing crisis because of it; they're "american" and very "capitalist".

cmarschner2• 13 years ago

Credit cards in Germany are for the most part debit cards. You only pay an annual fee and the charges are deducted from your bank account at the end of the month. No credit involved apart from the late processing. There are some special laws in place for this I think which don't exist in other countries. On the other hand merchants pay a hefty fee for each transaction whereas EC/debit card fees are very low. That's why many merchants (especially outside tourist areas) don't accept CCs.

lukeholder• 13 years ago

Just got accepted into the Australia Beta, its working awesome.

thetron• 13 years ago

Thanks for mentioning this! I had completely missed the announcement. That's really exciting, I wonder if pin.net.au will adjust their pricing to match Stripe's. Good to have some healthy competition locally.

tomcorrigan• 13 years ago

Pin will need to drop its prices to below stripe's or drastically improve the product. I started in integrating pin payments into my SaaS app and gave up when I realised pin would send an ugly email to my customers _every_ time I charged them. Ugh, no thanks.

thejosh3• 13 years ago

What is required for a client to use Stripe? A merchant account? We're using eWay for those with merchant accounts, and PIN/PayPal for small busineses without.

pc12• 13 years ago

No need for a merchant account or anything like that -- Stripe handles everything from accepting the payment to depositing the money in your bank account.

janekk3• 13 years ago

D'oh, I had no idea, and here I am already having spent months talking to NAB in order to charge USD and support AMEX. Stripe seems a lot cheaper too in terms of fees.

Stripe AU supports AMEX and USD charges, right?

thairu3• 13 years ago

Stripe AU supports AMEX (as well as Visa and MasterCard!), but is currently only for AUD charges. We are actively working on adding USD support, and hope to roll it out soon. Email me @ thairu@stripe.com if you would like a beta invite.

ghiculescu• 13 years ago

pin.net.au supports USD. Doesn't support AMEX yet though, which is a bit annoying.

beshrkayali• 13 years ago

This is fantastic news for german startups. I wish Stripe can expand to more countries around the world faster!

Anyone knows how easy would it be for them to expand to Dubai for example?

frank_boyd3• 13 years ago

Honest question to everybody:

Would you trust your financial data (= growth data, etc.) to a company like Paymill that's owned by a clone factory (i.e. the Samwers') or do you think that's being paranoid?

EDIT: I wasn't asking for downvotes, I was asking for rational comments, explanations, thoughts.

kfk3• 13 years ago

Hi, I asked them few questions and they seemed quite professional. Very German, asking for lots of paper, but that kind of make me feel safer.

And let's stop with this clone thing. If we are a community striving for execution, we should not be so annoying when people simply take ideas from somebody else and start executing.

frank_boyd3• 13 years ago

I have no problem with cloning, everybody does it if we're being honest.

It's just that I'm not sure it's a good idea to give your business data to people whose main business model it is to look for the best ideas/markets/businesses and then to copy them.

To me, there seems to be a pretty obvious conflict of interest that might work against you.

nhaehnle• 13 years ago

It is a good question, though in this case it could actually cut in the other direction. Stripe is a US company, which means that - from a German perspective - your data is less secure there. Think NSA and industrial espionage, obviously, but also think different data protection standards. The official legislation tends to be better in Europe when it comes to privacy, and this is especially true in Germany.

iSnow2• 13 years ago

Well, Paymill is German and Stripe is based in the US, so from a trust viewpoint, I'd go with Paymill, maybe their customer data gets fleeced a bit less by the NSA than Stripe's.

progx3• 13 years ago

Dont dream of that. The data get transfered to the card companies and that are 90% US or US controlled companies.

pc12• 13 years ago

Stripe has never participated in any kind of government surveillance program. Quite the opposite -- we're trying to figure out new ways to protect our users: https://stripe.com/blog/towards-transparency. As CEO, I'll do everything in my power to make sure that that remains the case. If you follow me on Twitter (I'm @patrickc), you'll notice that I'm no fan of this stuff.

patman81• 13 years ago

I was just about to go with Paymill. It's great to have one more option. Now the rest of Europe please.

m_st3• 13 years ago

What speaks against Paymill? Are there any problems with them? They support a lot more countries than Stripe right now.

Edit: Just read that its from the Samwers. Might be enough to wait for Stripe then.

StavrosK4• 13 years ago

When I tried to use them, they required me to mail in a bunch of paperwork. Stripe doesn't.

paymill-sales• 13 years ago

Guys seriously. There's nothing going against PAYMILL just because theyre a 'clone' company. Theyre working with 2 big acquirer banks which probably wouldnt do so if the company wasnt trustworthy. Might wanna think about that. Plus being available in 39 countries across Europe is more than beneficial for so many small business owners who previously did not have the chance to onboard with any other payment provider. But PAYMILL is there for them! Im a happy customer of theirs and have not experienced any kind of slight problem. In contrast, their support is very helpful, answeri ng all kinds of questions no matter how much youre asking. They even helped me generate my contract, adjusting it and sending it over to the bank for activation. So if you ask me - go for PAYMILL.

germangirl• 13 years ago

Ecio78• 13 years ago

According to the linked site they seem to be in Beta also in France, Belgium and Netherlands. I think I lost those announces in the past weeks. Congrats!

vbsteven• 13 years ago

Indeed, I just received my invite for the Belgian beta

m_st3• 13 years ago

Any schedule yet for Switzerland?

kops• 13 years ago

UBS allows you to open a bank account in Germany and connect it to a Swiss account. You can setup automatic transmission of money from German account to Swiss account every 15 minutes or so.

blackdogie3• 13 years ago

Great to see the acceleration of roll out of counties ! DE does have lower CC usage, but I think it will be more use for DE businesses operating internationally to accept in EUR & USD. btw. I threw together a handy tool for calculating the cost of a transaction. http://www.blackdog.ie/stripe/

edit : clarity

philjr• 13 years ago

Completely off-topic - but why does a consultancy company in Munich have a .ie domain? :-)

annnnd• 13 years ago

Guessing: "black doggie"?

blackdogie3• 13 years ago

Because I'm Irish.

contergan• 13 years ago

Good .de or .com domains are not exactly easy to get these days without paying ridiculous amounts of money to some domain squatter...

deskpro2• 13 years ago

Nice calculator; but it misses the currency conversion costs. You can't get $9.46 as a UK merchant - you get paid in £GBP and they add another 2% from mid-market rate - so $9.27 would be more accurate.

blackdogie3• 13 years ago

Thanks.

Stripe.com says Charges made in a currency for which you haven't connected a bank account will be converted to your default currency. A 2% fee applies for currency conversion, and all fees are calculated in the currency we transfer to you.

So you can avoid it by having an USD / EUR account. Or you have to pay this 2% fee. I will add a note to the page.

solaris1520002• 13 years ago

What's so great about Stripe? What does it do that other payment processors don't? I don't get it.

axefrog• 13 years ago

It's developer-friendly, very fast to get started and doesn't require a merchant account.

solaris1520002• 13 years ago

Ah, cool thanks.

stephanos2k3• 13 years ago

To those who say "I almost went with PayMill, thank god Stripe is here now" don't forget that PayMill features direct debit. Depending on who your customers are this might be an important feature for you!

rmoriz• 13 years ago

Direct debit can easily done by creating some CSV-style file without additional charges using FinTS/HBCI.

For most SaaS/e-product models "direct debit" is not an option because a customer can do a refund without a reason for at least 6 weeks. It also has no CVV2, so you can just abuse some charity bank details for a direct debit purchase. Good luck dealing with fraud.

locusm• 13 years ago

What criteria is Stripe looking for to get in the beta? Anyone know?

pc12• 13 years ago

No criteria per se -- everyone is welcome. We're just rate-limiting it a bit to make sure that everyone has a good experience.

skore2• 13 years ago

I've just sent my "notify me", but the response left me a little uncertain: "We’ll get back to you as soon as we launch in Germany.".

So... is this what I need to do to get into the beta? Or is there something else I need to do?

TeeWEE• 13 years ago

Fun to see stripe in europe, however in europe almost nobody pays by card, or let alone: even owns a credit card.

We pay by baking systems such as Ideal (in the netherlands).

selectstar2• 13 years ago

Debit cards are quite prevalent here, rather than Credit i'd say.

xsace• 13 years ago

Actually most people speak about credit card when they actually mean a debit one.

padenot• 13 years ago

Well, this statement is wrong. In France, at least, virtually everybody has a debit card and we use cards all the time.

However, closer to the point, Germans are known to use cash a lot, so it's interesting that Stripe launch there.

Jakob• 13 years ago

While that was true some years ago, right now, in Germany almost everyone I know has a credit card, too. Some popular banks like the DKB hand it to you with no additional cost, perhaps to incentivize the usage of cards away from cash, which is still very prevalent.

bolder88• 13 years ago

In Europe, you can't generalise.

The countries that make up Europe are extremely diverse.

DrJokepu• 13 years ago

That really depends on the country, Europe is not homogenic like that. Here in the UK everyone has a debit card and almost everyone has a credit card and people use them to pay online a lot. In France paying with your Carte Bleue online is also pretty standard. Online debit/credit card payments are fairly common is Eastern Europe as well. I could go on.

egeozcan• 13 years ago

In Germany, mine and most of my friends' favorite is Sofort Überweisung[1]

[1] https://www.sofort.com/eng-DE/

Kiro• 13 years ago

In Scandinavia you use the card for everything so not sure what you're talking about.

workhere-io• 13 years ago

You should read this: http://soimovedhere.wordpress.com/2013/03/04/stop-generalizi...

leh• 13 years ago

Oh hallelujah!

stephanos2k3• 13 years ago

Do you guys usually just use Stripe API directly or do you use some kind of middleman (e.g. spreedly.com)?

nXqd• 13 years ago

Congrats to Stripe team. They have done a really good job, I find since they get it work in UK, they are expanding in a very fast pace for now (y) Hope it will come to Northen EU soon :)

thairu3• 13 years ago

Northern Europe is on our roadmap. Please sign up at https://stripe.com/global to be notified when we launch there

realbot• 13 years ago

Is 3D Secure supported?

_urga• 13 years ago

Any plans for Stripe to serve startups based in South Africa?

thairu3• 13 years ago

South Africa is on our roadmap, but have no current ETA for when it will be available. Please sign up at https://stripe.com/global to be notified when we launch.

wikiburner• 13 years ago

Just curious, does Stripe's recent expansion have any impact on US companies using Stripe? Can Stripe now process German and UK customer credit cards for US companies, or was that already available?

dubcanada• 13 years ago

I'm pretty sure that any Visa/MC can be processed at Stripe, regardless of location. Country specific cards, like Diner's Club and others may require extra effort by the processing companies, and sometimes lead to higher costs. But can generally still be processed.

Moral of the story is anyone anywhere can buy something from a US company using Stripe on their credit card.

lhaussknecht• 13 years ago

Does Stripe deal with scoring and fraud prevention etc. or do I have to implement my own countermeasures?

abuiles• 13 years ago

Any plans for Latin American countries?

happywolf• 13 years ago

I can see a vast majority here are very positive on this news. Just wonder in areas that are yet to be covered by Stripe, what are you guys using? Also, I recall a few months ago PayPal introduced a revamped set of APIs which claims to be more developer friendly. Anybody cares to chime in on that front?

CarlHoerberg• 13 years ago

We use Paymill for which we're very satisfied with. The initial paperwork isn't fun, but the experience is much better than all previous options for EU companies..

I believe that PayPal's new API is only available for american merchants.

js4all• 13 years ago

I just signed up. There is no setting for Germany in the account details, just United States, United Kingdom and Canada.

Stripe launches German beta

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