Intergrating Payments to your SaaS from Cameroon shouldn’t be this much of a Hassle

In my last post about renaming Trivue to Tagviu, I mentioned having a rough time integrating international payments. This was mainly due to my region / geolocation.

I tried several popular payment providers and Merchant of Records: Polar, Stripe, Dodo Payments, Lemon Squeezy, Paystack, Flutterwave, and a few others.

The problem was:
A good number of them do not support businesses in many African countries.

Some of the payment gateways that do support a handful of African countries, like Paystack and Flutterwave, also currently do not support Cameroon

So I started looking locally.

I looked for tools built by Cameroonians, or at least providers that allowed operating in the CEMAC region. Anything that could let me accept international card payments for a product built in Cameroon.

I came across a few that seemed like a solution;

But most were built primarily around local payments like MTN MoMo and Orange Money.
I even found several that advertised card payments, only for me to sign up and discover that card payments weren't actually available.

Honestly, the quality of some of these platforms was disappointing.
Poor UI, Poor typography, Broken form validations, Weird things happening in the network tab etc...

Man I'd leave some of these sites thinking: "I know we can do better"

And that got me wondering:
Why aren't we more represented when it comes to global payment infrastructure?

Out of pure fraustration I kept asking; Is it the economy? Regulations? The developers? The market? something far deeper ? Is it me? Is it you?

At one point I even thought about what it would take to build my own payment platform for Cameroonians, and then African businesses, for accepting international payments. What it'll take to intergrate with banks like UBA, and EcoBank...

I could, but tbh:
There is bound to be a LOT of legal & financial hurdles (which I probably do not have the resources for), and potentially very very slow adoption, and also;
Do I wish things were in place already ? Absolutely!

But is that a rabbit hole i'm willing to go into rn ? Absolutely f*ing not.

So, I'm still looking.

I haven't integrated payments into Tagviu yet, but I have a potential way forward.

One way or another, Tagviu and all my SaaS Ideas are getting payments

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Comments

[chenningdev]

Checked the official lists today (2026-10-21) instead of guessing. Here's what I found for a Cameroon-based individual:

Confirmed NOT available for Cameroon sellers (the payout side, which is what actually decides it):​

• Dodo Payments — their docs state eligibility is decided by the country that issued your government-issued ID, and that payouts are only supported in the listed countries. Cameroon is not on the accepted list.
• Polar — payouts go through Stripe Connect Express, and Cameroon is not on that country list. (Polar can still charge customers in Cameroon; the problem is getting paid.)
• Creem — supports merchants in 87 countries; Cameroon isn't one of them.

Worth your time:​

• Paddle — their help centre says they work with software businesses anywhere except an explicit unsupported list, and Cameroon is not on it. Two caveats: they review every application, and you should email them before integrating to confirm they can pay out to a Cameroon bank account. (Side note: Nicaragua is on their unsupported list, which explains the allow_sales: false you saw in that other thread.)
• Payoneer — Cameroon appears on their global payout coverage map, so a USD receiving account looks available. Useful for invoiced/B2B work, and as a payout destination if the platform paying you can send there.

The structural point:​ for self-serve SaaS the question isn't "who can charge a card" — it's "who will pay a bank in your country." Those lists are much shorter, and they're the ones that decide your case.

What are you selling — self-serve SaaS (Tagviu) or invoiced work? The answer changes which of these is worth your time. If any of the above is stale by the time you read it, correct me — I'd rather be fixed than agreed with. (Not affiliated with any of them; I just read their public lists today.)