I know Wero is still in its infancy and the digital Euro is still a few years away, even if you believe there’ll be no delays. But depending on where you live you can already do a lot for EU financial independence.
- Use cash (very easy but not ideal in many situations/online)
- Use a national payment providers:
- Germany 🇩🇪: Girocard
- Netherlands 🇳🇱: iDEAL
- France 🇫🇷: Cartes Bancaires
- Poland 🇵🇱: BLIK
- Italy 🇮🇹:Bancomat/PagoBancomat
- Many other options, check for your country
- Use SEPA direct debit mandate or wire money directly if you can
- Sign up to a european crypto exchange and use it for direct purchases. although I get if you don’t like crypto but this is just for direct purchases
Otherwise American Payment providers usually get at least 1% and if you use card payment a lot over time that can really add up. This also mostly makes sense when buying from a european company. For US companies it really doesn’t matter much. I’ve been trying to replace Amazon with Otto and I use SEPA direct debit mandate to avoid fees.
In germany, most banks that offer free banking (ING, Comdirect, DKB etc.) have switched from girocard to VISA/MC Debit cards. If you want an actual girocard, you’ll need to pay a monthly fee, either “directly” for the card (In the case of ING, Comdirect etc.), or by having a paid account in the first place (like Sparkasse, Raiffeisenbank, Commerzbank etc.)
Good to know, I was talking about Google Pay and Apple Pay, though.
Ah, in that case I only know a handful of people personally that use Apple pay, but I do see some people occasionally pay by tapping their phone at the checkout