Finding a payment partner for cross-border commerce is like choosing a co-pilot for every sale that leaves your home market. You need someone who can speak the local “payment dialects,” clear funds at a fair cost and keep fraud where it belongs—outside the checkout. Below is a practical roadmap merchants use when they run a competitive tender rather than sign the first gateway that calls.
Start by charting your payment DNA
Sketch how money already moves through the business. List every billing country and shipping destination you serve, flag the instruments buyers prefer (cards, wallets, local instant rails, BNPL), note average order value and refund frequency, and mark where you want to price in a shopper’s currency yet settle in your own. This payment map turns glossy vendor pitches into apples-to-apples comparisons.
Watch the regulatory calendar
From 9 January 2025 euro-area acquirers must price instant transfers at or below the domestic SEPA credit-transfer fee.
A month later the EU begins trilogue negotiations on PSD3 and the new Payment Services Regulation, texts that widen fraud-data sharing and hard-bake fee transparency into law.
If you plan to process in Europe, your shortlist should already comply—or at least show a credible roadmap.
Look for real localisation, not a logo farm
Approval rates climb when a gateway speaks the shopper’s language:
- Local payment methods such as iDEAL, Sofort, UPI, Pix or PayNow alongside global cards
- Dynamic multi-currency pricing so buyers see a familiar figure while you settle in a treasury-friendly currency
- Next-day funding for major corridors; no exporter wants cash trapped until T+7
Ask for live credentials to a sandbox and bring your developers into the call early. A clean REST API, well-documented webhook retries and client libraries in multiple languages cut weeks off integration.
Price beyond the headline rate
Two acquirers quoting 2.9 % + €0.30 can land very differently once the fine print surfaces. Visa levies a 1.00 % International Service Fee when issuer and acquirer sit in different countries; Mastercard charges 0.60 % for USD settlements and 1.00 % for non-USD.
Layer FX spreads, optional tokenisation modules and rolling reserves on top, and the “cheaper” provider can end up dearer. Demand a dummy statement populated with your own traffic mix before you sign.
Stress-test the fraud stack
Mandatory 3-D Secure 2 is table stakes. You also want device fingerprinting, behavioural analytics and automated chargeback representment that feed each other in near real time. Ask for aggregate chargeback ratios by vertical; anything approaching one percent hints at a porous rule set.
Due-diligence checklist for decision day
- Confirm every acquiring BIN or e-money licence in public registers.
- Review two years of audited financials to gauge capital adequacy.
- Pin down where PAN data lives—inside or outside the EEA—and how long tokens are stored.
- Speak with at least two reference merchants whose geo mix and ticket size mirror yours.
Pilot, then pivot if the data says so
Route 70 % of live traffic to the incumbent and 30 % to the challenger for six weeks. Measure authorisation-rate uplift country by country, monitor first-byte latency on hosted pages, and calculate net margin after every fee tier and FX spread. If the newcomer wins on cost yet lags on approval rates, blend the two: dual acquiring is cheap insurance in a world where regulators debate new fee caps every season.
Turn the shortlist into a scorecard
Assign weights that match your strategy—perhaps 35 % total cost, 25 % approval rate, 20 % integration effort, 10 % compliance coverage and 10 % customer support quality. The highest composite score wins the mandate, but lock pricing for at least two years and keep a secondary acquirer warm. That extra contract may be the only thing standing between you and a midnight outage during holiday peak.
With the right payment provider, international shoppers get a local checkout experience, finance teams reconcile in minutes, and your cash arrives faster than your inventory leaves the warehouse.