Fyi, Wero only supports three countries: Belgium, France, and Germany.
wrong, also the netherlands
Wero – Digital payment wallet, made in Europe
21–30 of 141 posts
Re: Wero – Digital payment wallet, made in Europe
#22Fyi, Wero only supports three countries: Belgium, France, and Germany.
Netherlands and Luxemburg joining soon, along with what I believe is Austria's biggest bank. But yes, hardly a pan-European project.
Re: Wero – Digital payment wallet, made in Europe
#23would be cool if they'd also only be using Europe tools for hosting but so far I've seen Atlassian Statuspage, Zendesk, Google Tag Manager, HubSpot, Matomo Cloud (which uses AWS), Digital Ocean and Google Ads.
Re: Wero – Digital payment wallet, made in Europe
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ah, so this EU wallet is only usable after US companies bless my device? Outstanding move!
I think this is more about fees than sovereignty.
It can be both, the plumbing is straight forward, simply a matter of will to implement. UPI in India, Pix in Brazil, FedNow in the US, etc. Trimmings are things like paying via QR code and alias support (phone, email IDs). Pix had native alias support, Wero is alias support on top of SEPA Instant payment rails (with a ~ten second settlement SLA).
This gets you to utility cost recovery fee structures and sovereignty over your payment infra, versus other countries controlling your value transfer capabilities.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant_payment
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wero_(payment)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_Euro_Payments_Area
https://www.ecb.europa.eu/paym/retail/instant_payments/html/...
Re: Wero – Digital payment wallet, made in Europe
#25Can anyone explain me exactly why it is a suitable alternative to VISA and Mastercard (and why people were waiting for it). I am trying to understand the full picture here, so multiple things come to my mind. First, SEPA instant payments already exist and are really instant up to a certain amount, and I am guessing that Wero builds on top of that a sort of identity layer, to sidestep the whole IBAN thing. But it is l…
Sepa-inst requires 10 seconds or less end to end, this isn’t as easy as it sounds to implement, but we are kind of there.
The problem is how do you initiate this payment? Some kind of scannable code or nfc interaction seems to be the missing part. I’d also like to see some kind of physical card also work for those who don’t want or are unable to have an attestable device with them.
Re: Wero – Digital payment wallet, made in Europe
#26From what I've gathered, they've decided to make this completely unusable without a Google- or Apple-approved smartphone. Horrible! Are individual banks even allowed to make that an option for clients? Though even if they are, I doubt any will. I would LOVE a PayPal alternative, but this is just not it. -- From https://support.wero-wallet.eu/hc/en-us/articles/25599074240... : > It is not possible to use Wero via a we…
That link is broken for me. I would like clarity if they support AOSP devices. That would be a meaningful departure from the status quo.
Re: Wero – Digital payment wallet, made in Europe
#27Related: https://werotracker.eu/ Europe's $24T Breakup with Visa and Mastercard Has Begun - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46958399 - February 2026 (1020 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46963089 (Wero subthread)
Wero Wallet has been posted half a year ago as well but 1 comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44683739
Re: Wero – Digital payment wallet, made in Europe
#28Can anyone explain me exactly why it is a suitable alternative to VISA and Mastercard (and why people were waiting for it). I am trying to understand the full picture here, so multiple things come to my mind. First, SEPA instant payments already exist and are really instant up to a certain amount, and I am guessing that Wero builds on top of that a sort of identity layer, to sidestep the whole IBAN thing. But it is l…
It's really simple.
You're in the Netherlands, and you are going to buy something in an on-line store. Steam perhaps, or any Dutch retailer.
You put the game in your Steam cart, and go to pay. You select Ideal (which Steam provides as an option), you pick your bank, and you follow the on-screen instructions (but you probably do that pretty much automatically). Usually that means scanning a QR code with your bank app on your smartphone where you confirm the amount and recipient, but you can use a physical card reader with your debit card for an OTP to use as well and do it in your bank's online environment in the browser.
That process is what the whole of Europe wants (Wero builds on the Dutch Ideal). It is stupid simple, and once you've used it you don't want to deal with credit cards and bank transfers for buying a thing on-line any more.
That's all there is to it. There is a whole country which already does this, and it works so well everyone wants it. No major US companies needed (big plus these days), and no parasites like Klarna either. Just an easy way to pay a shop using your bank account, just like you use a debit card in physical stores do the same.
Re: Wero – Digital payment wallet, made in Europe
#29Can anyone explain me exactly why it is a suitable alternative to VISA and Mastercard (and why people were waiting for it). I am trying to understand the full picture here, so multiple things come to my mind. First, SEPA instant payments already exist and are really instant up to a certain amount, and I am guessing that Wero builds on top of that a sort of identity layer, to sidestep the whole IBAN thing. But it is l…
For the neobanks I think it's very easy to explain: Their customers need Visa or Mastercard. No Visa/Mastercard? No retail customers. It's as simple as that. Any other payment scheme is a bonus thing that can be put on the backlog.
Re: Wero – Digital payment wallet, made in Europe
#30From what I've gathered, they've decided to make this completely unusable without a Google- or Apple-approved smartphone. Horrible! Are individual banks even allowed to make that an option for clients? Though even if they are, I doubt any will. I would LOVE a PayPal alternative, but this is just not it. -- From https://support.wero-wallet.eu/hc/en-us/articles/25599074240... : > It is not possible to use Wero via a we…
As long as it works on a degoogled Android phone I'm fine with it. Maybe someone in the supported countries with an GraphenOS or /e/OS phone can confirm?
Edit: for some banks it will just forward to the bank's app. So most likely it works as long as your bank supports degoogled Android, similar to how iDEAL + Tikkie works on degoogled Android with most Dutch banks.