The Problem We Were Actually Solving
We thought we had a decent payment system by just using PayPal. We were sending invoices to our patrons, and they were sending money in. Sounds straightforward, right? But as our community grew, we started to notice a disturbing trend. People from certain countries, mostly in Africa and Southeast Asia, were having trouble receiving payments from us. The issue wasn't with the invoices or the payment method themselves; it was that PayPal had restrictions on who could receive payments without a bank account.
We started getting complaints from our community members about being unable to receive payments, and we were powerless to fix the problem. It was a real problem, because we were also losing money to transaction fees, currency conversions, and even outright account closures. It was clear that our existing payment system was not sustainable for our global contributor base.
What We Tried First (And Why It Failed)
We decided to investigate alternative payment methods that might be more accessible to our community members without bank accounts. We experimented with Stripe, but it was expensive and had even more restrictions on who could receive payments. We also tried using Amazon Pay, but it required users to have an Amazon account, which wasn't feasible for many of our users. Every solution we tried had a new set of problems that made it unsuitable for our use case.
The more we dug into payment systems, the more we realized that none of them were designed with global contributors in mind. Everyone seems to assume that contributors have access to traditional banking systems, which isn't the case for many people. We were trying to force our contributors to fit into an existing system that wasn't designed for them.
The Architecture Decision
After months of experimentation and research, we finally decided to switch to a cryptocurrency-based payment system. We integrated a cryptocurrency payment gateway that allowed us to send and receive payments in Bitcoin. We chose Bitcoin specifically because of its relatively low transaction fees, minimal restrictions on sender and recipient locations, and the fact that it doesn't require a bank account to receive payments.
We also set up a process to convert cryptocurrency payments to fiat currency, which we could then use to pay our contributors. It wasn't an easy decision, and we knew it would come with its own set of risks and challenges. However, it was the only way we could ensure that our contributors from around the world could receive payments without hassle.
What The Numbers Said After
The results were almost immediate. Within a few weeks of switching to cryptocurrency payments, our payment success rate increased by over 90%. Contributors from countries that were previously unable to receive payments were now able to do so seamlessly. We also saw a significant reduction in transaction fees and currency conversion losses.
However, there was a downside: we needed to educate our contributors on how to use cryptocurrency payments. Some of our contributors were hesitant to use a new and unfamiliar payment system, and we had to provide support to help them set up their wallets and convert their cryptocurrency payments to fiat. It was a lot of work, but it was worth it in the end.
What I Would Do Differently
In retrospect, I would have started investigating cryptocurrency payment systems earlier. We ended up trying a lot of other solutions that ultimately didn't work out, and it took us a lot of time and effort to figure out what would actually solve our problem. If I had to do it all over again, I would jump straight to cryptocurrency payments and see if we could make it work.
Additionally, I would have involved our community more in the decision-making process. We had a lot of feedback from our contributors about our payment system, but we didn't involve them in the solution-finding process enough. I think if we had been more transparent and collaborative in our decision-making, we would have arrived at a better solution earlier.
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