Been using GoCardless for a couple years now they have been great.
The API is simple enough and does exactly what one would expect, Stripe used to be like this but right now is a complete clusterf"#%k, they have so many "products" that they've become the quintessential example of feature creep.
I have the idea that the US is the Mecca of credit cards, how widespread is the usage of Direct Debit in the US?
Hi Pedro, Brad from GoCardless here. So glad to hear you're enjoying the product. The US (well, North America, really) definitely has a penchant for credit cards relative to the rest of the world, but Direct Debit is sizeable (and growing)!
Last year, the ACH network (the US's equivalent of Europe's SEPA network, or the UK's Bacs network) added more than a billion new transactions for the 4th year in a row. The system saw 23 billion transactions, of which 13.4 billion were debits.
The org that oversees ACH - Nacha - has indicated 80% of US businesses prefer to receive B2B payments via ACH debit, and 53% of consumers share this preference for recurring bills. (That said, there's still a lot of opportunity - a Goldman Sachs report found that 60% of B2B payments are still done by check.)
It’s pretty common. If you pay a lot of household bills—for electricity, water, insurance, rent, tuition, etc.—many of those will accept credit cards, but most will also allow ACH direct debit as a payment option and a few will only allow direct debit and check. Or sometimes there is a credit card option, but it is run by a third party and comes with a surcharge.
On the other hand, direct debit is often not an option at all for “online” subscriptions such as news sites or streaming services, or for newspaper or magazine subscriptions.
FWIW, I've been working with the Stripe API for the last 5 years, on an integration spanning 7 years of API changes, and I find it necessarily complex. I'm not sure it would be possible to reduce the complexity much without sacrificing quality.
I would disagree or maybe we have different ideas of what recurring payments are. Most businesses that use recurring payments require their customers to allow them to ACH debit their account.
I was there recently and people seemed blown away at my instinct to pay by contactless card payment. At one or two shops, the staff member serving me commented on how rare it was to see a customer do that. ️
The API is simple enough and does exactly what one would expect, Stripe used to be like this but right now is a complete clusterf"#%k, they have so many "products" that they've become the quintessential example of feature creep.
I have the idea that the US is the Mecca of credit cards, how widespread is the usage of Direct Debit in the US?