|
|
|
Payment technology provides a bridge across the English Channel

Payment technology provides a bridge across the English Channel

Five months into Brexit, it's important that eCommerce businesses be aware of payment solutions that can help them overcome its resulting pain points.

It took almost five years for the UK and EU to agree to parting terms since the British public voted to leave the union in June 2016. Now, five months into the new landscape, it’s important that eCommerce businesses be aware of payment solutions that can help them overcome the resulting pain points.

Disruption

The UK and EU officially split on January 31st, 2021. Naturally, some disruption to the flow of goods was expected, but the 68 percent year-on-year drop in exports seen in January 2021 was still hard to swallow. Complications relating to the new border include blocked payments, difficulties in processing chargebacks and refunds, tax implications for cross-border deliveries, delayed deliveries, and logistical challenges with returning goods. These factors have led to increases in the cost of doing business, and that’s before looking at the higher processing fees – for example, both Visa and Mastercard are raising their interchange fees for UK-EU transactions.

In short, online businesses face hurdles, and they need a partner to help them jump them easily.

Jumping the hurdles

Merchants need not despair in this complicated economic climate because payment technology can help alleviate some of these pain points.

For example, Nuvei has both European and UK payment entities, allowing merchants to bridge this new payment gap with a single integration. This emphasis on local acquiring not only brings optimized transaction approval rates, but it also allows our merchants to minimise fees. We achieve this with our smart routing engine which searches for the optimal pathway for each payment, meaning that we are able to cover both cost and acceptance level concerns that many businesses are struggling with to varying degrees.

The ability to process transactions locally whether a merchant is in the UK or the EU is a huge benefit for smaller businesses that can’t afford to set up an EU-based entity.

Opportunities ahead

While Brexit is undoubtably a challenge for eCommerce, having a clear payment strategy is key.

Nuvei has been helping online businesses thrive for years and we see Brexit as just another challenge to overcome with creativity and innovation. Our payment orchestration layer can mitigate many of the negative effects of Brexit. For example, our Dynamic 3DS solution maintains compliance with Europe’s PSD2 legislation and further optimizes approval rates and settlement times.

The events of 2020 pushed retail online to a greater extent than it’s ever been before, fast-forwarding consumer behavior and payment technology by a decade. As a result, small businesses have been presented with an opportunity to widen their target markets by selling further afield. Whether they join an online marketplace or operate independently, the eCommerce ecosystem of 2021 is a goldmine of opportunities for online merchants.

In short, there’s no reason why merchants shouldn’t continue to thrive in post-Brexit Europe – they just have to use the right technology.

Motiebring headshot As Chief Commercial Officer of Nuvei, Motie Bring drives the commercial strategy and leads the commercial team, while evolving its digital go-to-market channels. Motie has over 18 years of experience in payments, holding various management and leadership positions in related industries. He served seven years in senior management roles at WorldPay (acquired by FIS in 2019), most recently as General Manager EMEA, Global Enterprise eCommerce. He is a prolific speaker at payment industry events and is a regular contributor to the press on all matters related to payments and eCommerce.
Motie holds multiple degrees from the University of Kent and South Bank University, including a master’s in philosophy.
Currently residing in London, Motie is passionate about fitness and enjoys spending quality time with his husband and dogs.

 

Recent Posts
BROWSE BY TAGS