Stripe supports popular European payment methods

Payments company Stripe has today introduced support for five popular payment methods in Europe: Bancontact, Giropay, iDeal, SEPA Direct Debit and Sofort. By offering these payment methods, Stripe becomes a lot more interesting for European businesses.

Stripe announced the support for the five popular European payment methods in a post on its official blog. Stripe’s customers can activate the payment methods from their dashboard, while European businesses can now also enable 3D secure for their customers.

Credit cards may be popular in countries like the US, the UK or South Korea, but in Europe there are countries where other, local payment methods are far more popular. In the Netherlands, for example, most consumers (56 percent) prefer to pay with the local payment method iDeal. So giving customers the choice to pay using either credit cards or local payment methods can significantly boost conversion rates, Stripe explains.

Stripe customers who would like to accept Bancontact, Giropay, iDEAL, SEPA Direct Debit or SOFORT, just need to active them in their dashboard. The third-party payments processor said US businesses will also be able to accept these methods soon, while it will continue to add more payments to its system.

About Bancontact

Bancontact is the most popular payment method in Belgium; in over 80 percent of Belgian web stores, you can pay with Bancontact. Two thirds of electronic and mobile commerce transactions via Bancontact happen in Belgium, 27 percent in the Netherlands and 8 percent in the UK.

About Giropay

Giropay is a popular payment method in Germany. Introduced in 2006, it’s now offered by over 1,500 banks to more than 35 million online banking customers.

About iDeal

iDeal is the most popular payment method in the Netherlands. In May last year, it registered the billionth transaction via its system. The online payment system has a market share of about 56 percent and is being used since 2005.

About SEPA Direct Debit

SEPA Direct Debit is a pan-European direct debit system that allows merchants to collect payments from accounts in the 34 SEPA countries. It was created to have a standardized payments infrastructure within the European Union.

About SOFORT

SOFORT is another popular payment method in Europe, This bank transfers method, now part of the Klarna Group, is being used by over 65,000 online shops across 15 European countries. It’s especially popular in Germany.

For more popular ways to pay online in Europe, check out our post on the most common payment methods in Europe.