If you are selling globally, it’s vital to allow your customers to make payments in their preferred currency, which, in most cases, is the currency of their country of residence. The capability to accept payments in multiple currencies with SHOPLINE Payments helps you expand your customer base significantly and hence boost sales.  

Refer to our documentation on SHOPLINE markets function and learn how to create different markets, display product pricing in your customer’s local currency, manage exchange rates for product pricing, and more.

 

In This Article

• Understanding the Currencies Used in a Transaction
• Currency Availability by Countries and Regions
• How Currency is Converted for Your Payment Collection
• Conversions on Disputes and Refunds

 

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Understanding the Currencies Used in a Transaction

A single transaction can potentially involve multiple currencies:

• The store currency is the default payment currency for your SHOPLINE store and your sales and order reports. You can set it up by going to your SHOPLINE admin panel > Settings > Basic settings > Payment currency. 
• The customer currency is displayed to a customer while they’re browsing your store and the currency the customer is charged in when they pay for their order. This can also be referred to as the “presentment currency.”
  • By default, the customer currency will be the same as your store currency.
  • The customer currency (but not the store currency) can be changed by using SHOPLINE Markets functions.
    
• The deposit currency is the currency in which funds are deposited into your bank account.

Example 1

You are a registered UK merchant who is selling mostly to US customers. In such case, you can set your store currency in USD and register SHOPLINE Payments with your UK entity information. The customer currency will be USD (the same as store currency) and deposit currency will be GBP (as default to UK merchants).

Example 2

You are a registered UK merchant who is selling in both the UK and US market. In such case, apart from setting your store currency in GBP, register SHOPLINE Payments with your UK entity information, you can also create a US market and set the market payment currency as USD. Then your US customers pay in USD but your deposit currency will still be GBP.

 

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Currency Availability by Countries and Regions

Currently, SHOPLINE Payments supports multi-currencies payment processing in:

 

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How Currency is Converted for Your Payment Collection

When you charge your customers in a currency different from your deposit currency, we will convert those transactions to your deposit currency at the exchange rate based on pricing data sourced from third-party service providers.

• Time of conversion: The conversion for multi-currency payments will be influenced by settlement period. For example, if your sales on Monday are $100 and £100, the £100 will be credited into your SHOPLINE Payments account immediately after successful payment on Monday. On Thursday we will convert the $100 into £80 (assume the conversion rate is 0.8 GBP per 1 USD) and add it to your account balance.

• Currency conversion rate and fee: The transaction exchange rate is adjusted regularly at 12pm Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) on every calendar Day. You will pay a default currency conversion fee applied on an external base exchange rate. The external base exchange rate is based on rates within the wholesale currency markets on the conversion.

Prior to settlement, the exchange amount and related fees for multi-currency payments remain in a pending status. After settlement, the exact amount and fee will be displayed:

 

 

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Conversions on Disputes and Refunds

If a currency-converted payment is disputed or refunded, the amount you received is converted back to the customer currency at the current exchange rate. Exchange rates fluctuate with the market, so the rate used during the payment often differs from the rate used when a dispute or refund occurs. The amount deducted from your merchant balance depends on the current rate and this amount might be more or less than the original payment. The customer is always refunded the exact amount they paid and in the currency they paid in, regardless of any rate fluctuations.

For example, given that the exchange rate is £1=$1.224 when payment is made, the customer pays $12.24 and you earn £10. When a refund occurs, the exchange rate becomes £1=$1. In order to refund $12.24 to the buyer, you need to pay £12.24. The extra £2.24 is the exchange rate loss you bear.