PayPal is one of the most used online payment processors, especially global ones. I’m pretty sure there are other platforms, including well-known ones in other countries, yet PayPal is well-recognized but also greedy with its absurd fees. So this month I took the risk and made a switch.

How It Began

During my first official role as a freelance concept artist for a video game studio in the UK (working remotely), I was briefly introduced to Wise. However, since I already signed the contract and deadlines were set, I had no time to investigate deeply about this platform and its terms, fees, and policies.

What Is Wise?

It was previously named WiseTransfer, which is a financial technology company focused on global money transfers. It offers three main products: Wise Account, Wise Business, and Wise Platform. Wise is much more transparent with the procedures, has no conversion fee, and lower charge for each transaction, especially international ones, compared to PayPal (although PP offers more flexibility in payments and locations).

Massive Fee Charge

My first payment was huge, and so were PayPal’s fees, taking a huge chunk that could’ve been used for my phone bill. And because it was an international payment, it did leave a huge gap in the transaction. I was not willing to lose $120 in total for the PayPal charges, so I decided to investigate Wise and risk creating an account.

The Procedures

It took me a while to complete everything, like 2 days in total between setting up the correct account, providing official documentation, ID verification, contacting customer service for clarification, bank credentials, etc. Honestly, this procedure was longer and tedious than PayPal itself. Also, it is a bit confusing to navigate the new platform and request payments. Here are a few interesting details:

• Their fees are much lower compared to PayPal.
• I had to make a one-time payment of $27 to receive money.
• You can choose different countries to do business without extra cost.
• My fee for transferring the Wise balance to my bank account was $1.13.
• But it can take up to 2 working days for your bank to credit the account.
• I was guaranteed my money would be transferred to my bank the next day.
• If I wanted to send money using my bank to Wise, the fee would’ve been $6.72.
• The platform is simple and clean, contrary to PayPal, yet sometimes I feel a bit lost.
• “Business accounts” are not discoverable in the tag or email search system by others. You must request money directly from your clients.
• If you live in Puerto Rico, please make sure to first choose the USA as a primary selection. Sometimes PR alone is not recognized on several platforms, and it’s only “operational” if you choose it under the USA.

Conclusion

For the record, I’m just a beginner. Please research to decide if Wise is beneficial for you before creating an account with the link below. I was growing frustrated with how simple and clean the platform is due to having fewer protocols, tabs, or buttons compared to PayPal.

• They take extra rigorous security steps whenever a transfer is involved in your account and ask you to provide several security codes.
• The staff is very prompt and detailed, but sometimes I wish they not only relied on providing links as solutions to my issues. Would love to have step by step explanation based on my screenshots.
• I’ve watched several videos about navigating Wise and each of them had different elements or procedures based on their locations. For example, their transfer tab had a button called “send money to myself” and I didn’t have that. They were from Canada.

For now, I’m going to keep experimenting with Wise and decide the best scenarios to switch between each platform when it comes to gigs. International projects will be managed by Wise while local ones will be with PayPal.

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