Should Your Business Accept Cryptocurrency?

Cryptocurrency popularity seems to come in waves. For a few months, it’s all the rage, then the hype about it will begin to die down as prices decline and people no longer want to purchase them.

Because cryptocurrency popularity is difficult to gauge, you may be wondering if your company should consider offering to accept cryptocurrency as payment for goods and services. This can be a difficult decision, especially when you have to obtain a new payment processor in order to do so.

Well, we’ve done your research for you. Below are some of the reasons your business should and should not accept cryptocurrency.

Reasons Your Business Should Accept Cryptocurrency

1. You’ll Gain a Larger Audience

Cryptocurrency is a global currency, which means it is the exact same all over the world. Whether you are located in Europe, the United States, or even South America, cryptocurrency is the same, so when you accept it for purchases, a wider number of people can purchase your products.

While this may not matter as much for a brick-and-mortar store (unless you are in a touristy area) if you have an online version of your store and ship internationally, there is no reason not to accept cryptocurrency as this just makes it easier for you to sell to more people.

2. Sometimes the Fees Are Lower

Let’s face it, accepting credit cards is not cheap or free. And while not all the cryptocurrency fees are low (namely Bitcoin and Ethereum) there are tons of cryptocurrencies that do have low fees like Dogecoin. Accepting these cryptocurrencies for payment can actually save your company money in Visa fees each year. It may not seem like much at first but over time it will add up!

3. Convenience

In this day and age, everything is about convenience, which is why so many people order online in the first place. When your business offers cryptocurrency payment options, you are only increasing your convenience for your customers and there is no reason not to do so.

4. Security

Visa and Mastercard are not near as secure as they once were. When you accept cryptocurrency you are accepting a form of payment that is completely encrypted, meaning you don’t have to worry about your customer’s data being accessed in a breach. This can help you to sleep easier at night and not have to worry about your customers being left vulnerable.

There is also no fraud possible when accepting cryptocurrency because of all the double spend protections. Just be sure a customer’s payment processes before they leave the store.

5. Get Ahead of the Game

Cryptocurrency popularity is increasing each year. Chances are even if you don’t implement it now, you will need to offer a cryptocurrency payment method to stay competitive in the future. Especially when you consider that there are already many large companies like Tesla, Overstock, and Whole Foods that already accept a variety of cryptocurrencies for payment.

Remember the saying that the early bird gets the worm!

Disadvantages of Accepting Cryptocurrency

Of course, every rose must have its thorn and before you begin accepting cryptocurrency at your establishment, you need to be aware of the downsides.

1. Volatility

The major downside to accepting cryptocurrency as payment is its volatility. While a product may cost $30, so you accept the equivalent in say, Bitcoin, the price could rise or fall by the end of the day—leaving you with less than $30 (or maybe more than $30!)

Either way, this can be scary to a small business that has razor-thin margins. Luckily, the volatility associated with cryptocurrency should dissipate a bit as it becomes more mainstream so over time this will be less of a disadvantage to accepting cryptocurrency at your business.

2. Regulation

Unfortunately, cryptocurrency is still a regulatory gray area in most countries. This means you can’t be 100% what to expect going forward with certain currencies even if it is legal for you to accept them now.

The reality is, however, that this is true with ANY currency. Tomorrow, the US government could wake up and make the US dollar worth nothing (just look at current levels of inflation if you don’t believe it) meaning you may as well just accept cryptocurrency if you are also accepting US dollars for payment.

3. Limited Payment Processors

Because of its low level of regulation and volatility, it can be difficult to find payment processors that you can use to accept Bitcoin. But they are out there and they do work.

For exceptionally small businesses, it may be as easy as downloading the Coinbase app on your phone and accepting payments that way. For larger businesses, you may need to get Coinbase Commerce or BitPay which will allow you to integrate it better into your website or allow other employees to accept cryptocurrency payments.

Either way, you will be able to accept a large number of different cryptocurrencies which are sure to please your customers!

Many companies, like BitPay, have already partnered with Visa and Mastercard anyway to produce several cryptocurrency debit cards. This means, that even if you don’t plan to accept cryptocurrency, you may have already just by accepting Visa and Mastercard!

Is it Worth it to Accept Crypto as Payment?

Overall, if you look at the positives versus the negatives, you can see the positives win by a landslide. While volatility is probably the only downside you need to actually worry about, remember that adopting cryptocurrency as a payment choice will only get better with time and there really isn’t any reason to not look into setting it up now.

If you are really worried about the volatility, it may be worthwhile to up your prices a bit before you begin accepting cryptocurrency. Because of the current levels of inflation around the world, it is unlikely you will receive much backlash for doing so. And who knows, maybe that $30 of products you sell today will be worth $75 tomorrow!