Forum Moderators: buckworks
This is great news for UK sites aiming towards UK customers. I always thought that paying in $ would put a lot of customers of buying from your site. I think this new payment method will do wonders for UK customer conversions.
It was also great for me, a seasoned web user, to pay in £ with an Ebay/Paypal purchase yesterday too!
It also looks very un-profesional to operate in the UK and then need to explain to your users why they will be asked to pay in USD.
Not everyone can calculate currency conversions in their head - many people in the UK wouldn't even know how many $ there are to the £. (Probably even less know how many Euros to the £, but thats another story!)
People feel comfortable buying in a price they understand the value of. And if you don't make people comfortable = no sales.
dingman, maybe your credit card does not charge for currency conversion (one of mine charges a 'tiny' 12% to pay in US Dollars).
Nothing like a 12% surcharge, anyway. That would deffinitely change my feelings about making a purchase in a foreign currency. Depending on which card I use there might be a nominal charge, but it really is tiny. Small enough that when I've traveled abroad, I've used ATMs instead of exchanging currency at a bank, because it was cheaper. (Not to mention that ATMs don't get into a snit because you haven't had your hair cut since the passport photo was taken, several years ago :))
As for the currency conversion, I've seen a few sites that bill in one currency, but will display an estimated price with current exchange rates in another, to help with customer comfort. I don't know how well it works.
And it does occurr to me now that I've read a few of these posts that although I had no problem with a company located in London billing me in GBP, I would probably be a bit more hesitant about a company in Ohio doing the same ;)
