Hey guys.
Anthony here. I'm the founder of HodlBot.
Just to give you some context, we're a software-as-a-service company that offers a portfolio management software for our customers. Customers pay $10 per month for our software which enables them to execute an indexing strategy on their own exchange accounts.
We launched our platform around a month ago and have seen a decent amount of traction ($~3k MRR) ~300 customers.
It was brought to my attention that Stripe reviews businesses at $10k MRR, so I wanted to be as transparent and pro-active as possible by explaining the nature of our company to Stripe - that we are a software provider, not an exchange nor a currency broker. We do not take a % fee or hold any fiat or crypto. We only sell software.
I e-mailed the Stripe support team about our situation and was surprised to hear back that they had decided to terminate our services in 5 days.
Although I tried to appeal the decision, it seems that anything even remotely related to crypto is something that is considered off-limits despite the fact that we only use Stripe to collect a subscription fee for our software.
For founders here that have run into the same issues, what have you done? We really like the dev-friendly subscription-based payment option that Stripe offers.
Are there any other alternatives that we should consider? Or will we likely face the same issue? Are there any crypto-friendly payment providers?
We are also exploring the possibility of only accepting crypto payments.
Thanks guys
@dilbocabins I work at Stripe. Our financial partners have set some restrictions on crypto (https://stripe.com/us/prohibited-businesses#financial-and-professional-services), but I'd like to dig into this more. Could you email me at edwin@stripe.com?
Thank you for reaching out Edwin!
I just sent you an e-mail :)
Well that sucks, and pretty shortsighted coming from stripe.
Maybe @patio11 can weigh in on this.
Thanks man. I get why Stripe would do it. They have a lot of pressure coming from their financial partners and probably don't care about a few false positives.
Even if we had a few extra days to move off, it would be a huge help.
Just use Paddle: https://paddle.com. Been using them for the past year and their support is great. Was using Stripe previously but unfortunately, they are still (inexplicably), not available in South Africa.
Why don't you accept crypto payments? 🤔
Seems ideal for your audience!
I guess this explain why Stripe stopped accepting Bitcoin as a form of payment. Good luck, hope you get this resolved.
Recurring payments with Crypto are tough, but you could look at:
https://bitpay.com/
For one time (perhaps annual payments) these might work:
https://commerce.coinbase.com/
https://www.paybear.io/
I had an idea about a crypto-related app and I e-mailed Braintree to ask if I am allowed to use their service for it and they said no as well.
I guess the only thing to do is to accept crypto-payments.
Whats the website?
https://www.hodlbot.io
If Stripe maintains its decision, just go to paypal and only tell them you are a software company, what you are.