Freelancing has become a buzzword for the last 3-4 years in Bangladesh among the young generation. It is an alternative route to become self-employed and earn foreign currencies besides entrepreneurship and human export. It is still challenging to manage the payment solutions for Bangladeshi freelancers. Online professionals and self-employed workers may contribute with dramatic growth rate to the national economy if comfortable payment solutions are ensured for receiving payments for services to clients.
Globalization, rapid digitalization, easy internet access, government and non-government support, Covid-19 pandemic of 2020, and working freedom all those things push freelancing to flourish.
But, besides some positive aspects, it has some negative and challenging aspects too. So this sector can’t grow as much as we need or as it has the potentiality. Payment receiving and bringing problems is the main hassle that Bangladeshi freelancers face a lot.
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Payment solutions for Bangladeshi freelancers
If you are already freelancing and facing this problem or planning to kickstart your freelancing career but can’t understand how to get payment from international clients, both of you are on the right site.
I have been freelancing for many years and initially faced many problems to bring payment in this country. After facing many hassles now, I have gathered some knowledge on easy payment systems.
Here, I will discuss all the things one by one to make your freelancing journey and payment receiving system easier, smarter, faster, smoother, and less costly. Let’s keep your eyes and concentration on my further discussion. Yes, this won’t make you bored, rather you can learn many things.
What Problems Do The Bangladeshi Freelancers Face To Bring Their Payment To Bangladesh?
As much as the internet is going cheaper and quickly accessible everywhere, freelancers have contributed more than in previous times. Now, Bangladeshi freelancers are 16.8% of the total freelancers (outsourced workers) worldwide..
What a tremendous contribution it is! But, if they don’t face international payment receiving challenges, the contribution’s portion can be more extensive. Some of the problems are
● Freelancers who use third-party online workplaces and those in direct contact with foreign clients to sell their services require PayPal because the websites don’t always support other payment services. Even the clients don’t prefer any payment service but PayPal.
● Paypal is one of the most and easily used payment systems, but alas, this system isn’t approved in our country. That’s why many freelancers depend on a third party to collect their payments. Sometimes they will be created by the third party and go into frustration. Even they leave this sector when they are cheated of a huge amount of earnings.
● However, sometimes some new freelancers can’t understand how to collect payments because they don’t get any proper guidelines from anybody. They have excellent skills and avoid market hassle; they only do the national client’s work, which is very disappointing.
● Many freelancers are willing to use PayPal belongings to relatives, friends, and so-called neighbors living abroad without getting any other easy alternative way or for clients’ favor. They bring their payment to the local bank account by taking their information, which is very unethical, risky, and time-consuming.
● Some freelancers said they have to leave many projects because it doesn’t match between the freelancers and clients. Since PayPal is popular and available in almost all countries but Bangladesh, clients prefer PayPal to disclose the payment. But the Bangladeshi freelancers can’t use it. So they choose other country’s freelancers instead of Bangladeshi freelancers.
Only for payment hassle, this sector can’t grow and fail to earn a huge amount of foreign currency in our country. As the government’s commitment to building Bangladesh as a digital Bangladesh, it can’t be possible without solving this problem.
What Can Be The Solutions to Bringing The Payments to Bangladesh
It’s the demand of time and all the freelancers to find out the most suitable solutions to this payment bringing problem. Otherwise, many freelancers will leave this sector only because the newbies won’t come.
As a result, the government will be deprived of the right amount of foreign currency, and the unemployment problem will increase in your country one more step. Let’s decode the most available payment gateways. As a freelancer, you can choose one of these money transfer services to receive your payment in Bangladesh.
Payoneer
Every freelance marketplace allows Payoneer to withdraw payment from the marketplace. It is one of the most rising platforms and very much simple to use. You can use it from Bangladesh by using Bangladeshi information. You don’t need to take any wrong way to open a Payoneer account.
Payoneer keeps the account opening procedure very easy and simple so everybody can open the account with some fingertips and give some necessary information. It only needs your personal and bank information to provide you a verified account. Your local bank must have a swift code to collaborate with the Payoneer account to withdraw money.
How much does Payoneer charge?
Opening a Payoneer account is free. Even when you open an account for the first time, you will get 25 dollars. It will deduct 29.95 dollars every year for its charge and 3.15 dollars for every ATM withdrawal. A small transaction fee applies sometimes. Very recently, it has started charging $3 per marketplace withdrawal.
The benefits of using a Payoneer account
You will get lots of benefits if you choose a Payoneer account for your International money transactions. Some of the benefits are
- ● Smoothly bring your payment from any freelance marketplace through bank transfer or direct wire transfers.
- ● Send money to your abroad relatives or friends through the account.
- ● Get money from them, following the same process.
- ● Give any online shopping payment through this card.
- ● You can pay the subscription fees if you use any software based on a subscription.
- ● You can buy online software to assist you in your work, like Grammarly, Copyscape, etc.
- Supports online transactions and payment options for popular services in ecommerce websites or merchant payments.
- Serves as digital wallets supporting credit card payments
PayPal
PayPal is the most extensive, fastest, easiest online money transferring method all over the world. Since 1998 PayPal has operated its money transferring business and helped all kinds of e-commerce business owners and freelancers. It operates its business in almost 200 countries and supports 25 currencies.
But, the disappointing fact is it is not allowed in Bangladesh. Sometimes many freelancers had raised their voice to bring PayPal service to Bangladesh. Even after the freelancers’ voices raise, the ICT Division often sat for meetings to bring PayPal service to Bangladesh, but the ultimate result is zero.
So now you may think, why won’t PayPal come to Bangladesh? Is it the government’s failure, or is PayPal not interested in providing their service in Bangladesh? Let’s discuss
Why isn’t PayPal allowed in Bangladesh?
There are a lot of reasons behind the scenario of not allowing PayPal in Bangladesh. Since it will be a lengthy discussion, that’s why here I will show you some top reasons.
1. The first reason for this is the bureaucratic complexities.
2. The second reason is that some topmost position holders think if Bangladesh bank allows PayPal in Bangladesh:
- It will harm the local economy.
- More money will go abroad than coming to the country.
- The incidence of money laundering will increase.
So, PayPal is yet to be in Bangladesh.
Most of the time, all of the reasons are very silly because when anyone wants to use PayPal for any transaction, he/she must follow many rules to prove the legality of the money. Even if the freelancers can get the opportunity to use PayPal for getting their payments, they can boost up their efficiency at their work by forgetting money transferring hassle. So Bangladesh will get more foreign currency than now.
Our neighbor countries, India and Sri Lanka have grabbed most of the significant freelancing positions by using PayPal and enhancing their economies besides exporting human resources.
How much does PayPal charge?
Paypal doesn’t take any fees or charge for opening an account; that means it’s free. It deducts 2.9% and 0.30 dollars for every transaction. The rate is very fair if you consider its services and the overall security system. However, it also charges 2.7% if you receive money using debit and credit card from a person who uses PayPal app or card reader.
What Are The Benefits The Bangladeshi Freelancers Will Get If They Can Use PayPal?
The benefits of using the PayPal service for money transferring can’t describe in a sentence. As a freelancer, you will get many benefits by using the PayPal service. Some of the crucial benefits will be
- ● You can easily, smoothly, and efficiently withdraw your payments from the marketplaces where you work.
- ● PayPal supports 25 currencies, 300 million customers, 25 million business owners, and approximately 1 million global freelancers. So it’s one of the best secure and trustworthy services to get payment.
- ● PayPal has so many ways to transfer money. You can choose any method which suits your clients and you.
- ● Not only is this a safe money transferring system, but it also protects you from being cheated by fraud. So without stressing out too much about payment collection, you can concentrate on your work. Ultimately, this boosts up your work efficiency, moral support, and confidence.
- Paypal is hugely loved for its escrow services.
What Can Be The Alternative Solution Of PayPal?
In 2015 the ICT Division of Bangladesh had performed many meetings to bring PayPal service to Bangladesh. As per the Bangladeshi ICT Division’s request, PayPal started another service Xoom in Bangladesh as the alternative option of PayPal.
But, many freelancers complain that Xoom can’t fulfill their needs; what exactly does PayPal. Why? Let’s know some necessary information about Xoom and reveal the reasons.
What is Xoom
Xoom is a money transferring service under PayPal that allows you to send money abroad to your family and friends. Even you can receive payment from freelance marketplaces.
What Are The Differences Between PayPal And Xoom?
The main difference is Xoom is a company that operates its service under PayPal. That means its services are not as many as PayPal offers you. PayPal offers you to buy online and send the payment through PayPal, which Xoom doesn’t offer. That is one of the limitations of Xoom.
How much does Xoom charge?
Initially, Xoom doesn’t charge you. But it deducts 5.99 dollars for transferring up to 999 dollars and 9.99 dollars if you cross the limit of 999 dollars. If you use Xoom’s MoneyGram or transfer money through debit, credit, or PayPal card, it will charge 1.99 dollars.
Why Can’t Xoom Fulfill The Bangladeshi Freelancer’s Demand Of Receiving Payments?
At first, ICT Division said Xoom would operate its activity at least through 54 banks all over Bangladesh. But it didn’t do that.
● It started to give service only by Sonali bank, Rupali bank, another two or three government banks, which can’t reach all the Bangladeshi freelancers.
● Xoom doesn’t offer the service to purchase online, and that is another reason.
● You can not buy any online software through Xoom because it doesn’t allow you to pay the subscription fees or software buying charge.
That’s why Xoom can’t satisfy Bangladeshi freelancers with their services. So it is an utmost demand of all the Bangladeshi freelancers to take necessary actions to bring PayPal to Bangladesh.
Payza
Payza is another online money transaction method by which you can receive your payment from the freelance marketplace. They provide their services to almost 190 countries, including five continents. Payza is available in Bangladesh to support Bangladeshi freelancers to get payment from their respected international clients.
To make the payment system more convenient, super smooth, and comfortable, Payza established 5000 retail locations all over Bangladesh. So no matter where you live, you can communicate with the retail location if you face any problem withdrawing your payment from Payza.
How Much Does Payza Charge?
Payza doesn’t charge a single penny to open an account. Even, it is a pay-as-you-use or pay-as-you-go money transferring service. It doesn’t deduct any amount for a monthly or annual charge. Still, its charge is very reasonable when you compare it with the alternatives. It charges 2.5% for every transaction.
The Benefits Of Using a Payza Account
Here are some benefits of choosing a Payza account
- ● You will get 100% security of your money.
- ● No leaks of your personal or transactional information
- ● You can send and receive money through the local bank.
- ● You can order bitcoin money with this account.
- ● The Payza authority will provide you with a debit and credit card facility.
Shadhin
Now, I will talk about another freelancing payment receiving and online money transferring system Shadhin. It is not as popular as PayPal, Payoneer, and Xoom. But, day by day, this service enhances its popularity by offering better services to its consumers.
What Is Shadhin?
BASIS (Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services) first started new online money transferring service on 19 February 2018 by collaborating with Bank Asia. Since then, many freelancers use this master card to get payment from foreign clients.
How Much Does Shadhin Charge?
Suppose you compare the charges of this master card; that will be very reasonable. It charges 500tk for its charge and 75tk for vat. That means it deducts 575tk annually for its service charge.
The Benefits Of Shadhin MasterCard
Shadhin offers you a lot of benefits to getting your payment. Some of the basic benefits of Shadhin are
- ● It’s a dual currency card. It means it supports the Bangladesh currency TAKA and the USA currency dollar.
- ● This card is applicable for both personal use and company use. So you can open two types of accounts: personal and professional.
- ● This card offers you to store 70% of your income in this card.
- ● You can buy and sell e-commerce products through this master card.
- ● You have got policy service if you use this card. If you die within three months of receiving money in this card, your beneficiary will get one time 50,000 tk. ( https://www.bankasia-bd.com/retail/creditdetails/34)
- ● You can withdraw 100% of your income from this card.
- ● You can withdraw your amount through the ATM and POS machines.
- ● You will get an SMS for receiving or paying or money withdrawal from this card.
- ● It has attached a microchip so that it ensures 100% security of your money.
- ● 24-hour call center.
Skrill
Skrill is another money transferring service which offers you to receive and send money through electronic money transferring system. As a freelancer, you can receive your payment via a Skrill account and transfer your local bank account amount. As PayPal isn’t allowed in Bangladesh and Xoom can’t meet the freelancers’ expectations, Skrill can be an alternative solution to this payment receiving and bringing problem in Bangladesh.
How Much Does Skrill Charge?
Skrill doesn’t take any fees to open an account. But, yes, it takes some charges for using their services. They will deduct 2.9% according to the amount you will load using a master or visa card. They will also deduct a 7.5% amount if you use a Paysafecard prepaid card to load your Skrill account.
They take 5.50 dollars for money withdrawal and 1.9% for money transfer from the Skrill account. The maximum charge can be 20 dollars. Their charge is very high if you consider the other competitive money transferring services.
The Benefits Of Using Skrill Account
Here are some core benefits of the Skrill account
- ● Skrill is straightforward to use and offers you a lot of options to receive and send money. You can get your payment by cash, email transaction, and credit card using the Skrill account.
- ● Skrill supports 30 different currencies and 131 countries.
- ● They ensure your money transferring information 100% secure to keep you tension-free about your money.
- ● You can get access to your account from everywhere and anytime. Your account will support the mobile application, tablet, computer, etc.
- ● You can withdraw your money from an ATM booth.
- ● You can purchase anything online and send payment from your Skrill account.
The Documents You Need To Open Any Online Payment Receiving Accounts (like PayPal, Payoneer, Payza)
No matters what system you use to receive your freelancing payments online money transferring system that I have discussed above, all the systems follow the same procedure for opening an account.
If I discuss all the system’s account opening process separately, that will be a long discussion. So here I will discuss the standard process. If you need to know the separate processes, then you can follow my other articles where I have discussed one by one. You will get the link at the last of this article. If you have separate content in the future, you can link them here.
The documents you will need
- ● Your full name – to identify your account from all the registered accounts
- ● Date of birth – to ensure your age
- ● Your present full residential address (house number, road number, city, ZIP code) – to send the card and its detailed information to you
- ● Phone number – to send you a verification number or to contact you.
- ● Email address and password – to verify your Google account and protect your account from hackers
- ● Your local Bank account details – to transfer your money to your local bank account
How Much Time Do All The Money transferring Service Providers Take To Approve Accounts?
Now, it’s time to discuss the time factors of the payment gateway services.
Otherwise, you can’t choose the right options for you among them all.
Payoneer
Payoneer takes 2 to 3 business days to approve your Payoneer account after completing your application submission. Then within 2 to 4 weeks, your Payoneer master card will reach your home.
Before sending the master card to your home address, the Payoneer authority sends you a mail to inform you about your MasterCard. All the things are free of cost.
PayPal
PayPal takes 2 to 3 business days to approve the USA’s PayPal account, but it takes 4 to 6 business days outside the USA. After approving your PayPal account, they will send you a mail to inform you about your PayPal MasterCard. You can receive this card within 7 to 10 working days at your residential address. It takes three days to disclose one transaction.
But, if you will find PayPal denied your PayPal Mastercard application for any reason. Nothing to worry about! You can reapply for the master debit card after the next 30 days.
Xoom
Xoom, the sub-money transfer of PayPal, will take three business days to approve your Xoom account.
Payza
Payza takes 24 hours to successfully transfer your money to the local bank account. Once the money transferring process completes, you can see the additional balance to your Payza account.
Skrill
Skrill takes 24 hours to 48 hours to verify your account. Within this time, the Skrill authority cross-checks your given information to ensure your account safety.
Wise
Wise(Formerly Transferwise) is getting the footprints with its fast, comfortable and cheap fund transfer experience. It takes around 3 days to verify and approve your account. However, card service is not available so far in Bangladesh.
How Much Time Do All The Money transferring Service Providers Take To Get Payments?
Most of the payment solutions are fast enough to feel the speed. The solutions with MFS enabled (Bkash, Nagad, Rocket) environment is almost instant. The banking channel may generally take 1-3 business days to get depposited into your local bank accounts. Some of the time scedules are as follows:
Payoneer
Payoneer takes 1 to 3 business days to get in your local bank account. Usually, it deposits same day.
PayPal
PayPal takes 2 to 3 business days to get a bank deposit. However, transactions from cards are instant.
Xoom
Xoom takes only 24 hours to transfer money from your Xoom account to your local bank account if you send the amount before 4 pm pt.
But it takes 3-4 working days to transfer a larger amount because they have to verify many things to ensure the authenticity, transparency, and security of this transaction.
Payza
Payza takes 24 hours to successfully transfer your money to the local bank account. Once the money transferring process completes, you can see the additional balance to your Payza account.
Skrill
In the case of money transfer, Skrill takes up to 3 to 5 business days if the amount is larger and depending on the money transferring method. But, if you transfer a small amount of money, they complete the process on the same day.
Wise(Transferwise)
Wise usually takes 1-2 business days to deposit your fund at local bank account.
What Are The Negative Impacts of The Payment Hassles?
Payment method and payment solutions are very critical to any freelance worker working on online marketplaces. Only these payment hassles keep behind the Bangladeshi freelancers from the other competitor freelancers in digital economy. Most of the Indian and Sri Lankan freelancers enjoy more facilities than Bangladeshi freelancers and get the opportunity to grow their careers and earn the maximum amount of foreign currency for their country. Some of the top mentionable negative impacts are
● The newcomer can’t understand what to do and how to do it. As a result, many freshers don’t come to this sector and seek jobs, especially BCS. When they can’t manage any job and overcome the government job-seeking age, then they will frustrate and lose the reasons to live. That’s why sometimes we listen to suicidal cases because of frustration and loneliness.
● It can be a solution to our vast unemployment problem. But, some new freelancers can’t manage their livelihood through freelancing because of this payment receiving hassle.
● Many expert freelancers can’t take high-paying projects because of this payment receiving issue. So they can’t earn according to their skills, expertise, and labor.
● Bangladesh’s government loses a higher amount of foreign currency. This amount can help us to be a developed country.
● Moreover, some freelancers use PayPal unethically, and sometimes PayPal bans their account. They lose the money which is deposited on the account at that time. Even this practice makes the face loss of Bangladeshi freelancers worldwide.
● The expert freelancers can bear the high charge of the other payment system. But the newbies initially can’t earn a lot from freelancing, so when they have to bear the high charge of bringing payment, they can’t sustain this sector.
● Many clients don’t hire Bangladeshi freelancers because they don’t want to face this payment hassle. So the ultimate result is Bangladeshi freelancers lose trusty, high paying, and right clients. And other countries’ freelancers grab the chance.
The only payment receiving and bringing problem is just keeping Bangladesh 100 times behind from the worldwide freelancers. It is absolutely a disappointing sight of our country.
What can be the quickest solution to this payment receiving problem?
Here, I have described a series of problems, but the solution is not so big. Instead, it is straightforward.
Bangladesh’s government has to take necessary and proper actions to solve it. If they give the top priority to the freelancers’ problem, talk with PayPal authority keeping aside the bureaucratic complexity, and convince them to start their service in Bangladesh, that will be an excellent achievement for Bangladeshi freelancers. In the era of digitization, a major online payment gateway service provider can not be out of our reach.
What services are recommended to follow for bringing payment right now?
Since PayPal is not allowed in Bangladesh, so you have to avoid this unethical and risky use. You can use Payoneer, Xoom, Payza, Skrill for bringing international payment in Bangladesh. Before choosing any of these services, you must consider everything to avoid any further problems.
Final words
Now, it’s time to summarize the long discussion on Bangladeshi freelancing payment solutions. As this content describes all the factors of Bangladeshi freelancers and freelancing, that’s why it takes some minutes from your valuable time.
If you face payment receiving challenges for a long time but can’t find any solution to this problem, I can hopefully give you some right ways through this writing. Or, if you just started freelancing, I can help you make your freelancing journey smoother, easier, and simpler.
If you need any help with starting your freelancing career, check out the other articles. I have attached the links below. If you find this article helpful and some freelancer friends need to know this information, share my writing piece via social media.
I wish you a happy freelancing and bright career!☺️
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