BTC Wires: After the recent processor replacement of CheapAir.com, things
BTC Wires: After the recent processor replacement of CheapAir.com, things had gotten pretty tense for the travel company. Coinbase which had been the payment processor for the website had recently made changes in their policy, which resulted in them withdrawing crypto payment option from CheapAir.com. Ever since, the company had been striving to find an alternative for their long time payment processors. It was only a matter of time, however, before the company shifted to BitPay for their crypto transaction facilities.
Cheapair.com is a leading online travel company, based out of America in 1989 and has made a name for itself in the domain. Their newly appointed server BTCPayServer is a rather lesser known name in the ambit. However, Jeff had very nice things to say about their technology and protocol, and is very impressed by what they are doing for CheapAir.com.
When asked about these recent changes, Jeff had this to say:
“Every new payment method has its own challenges, but accepting Bitcoin has been quite a positive experience for CheapAir overall. Any technical challenges we’ve faced have been overcome, and have mostly been met with patience and an overall team mentality from the BTC community. We have a level of engagement with our BTC customers that is remarkable in the travel industry and we even were able to crowdsource solutions to our processor issue.”
Jeff acknowledged the fact that his domain is highly competitive and that companies out there are always on the look out to get better an provide more convenient services to their customers. Since a lot of other websites are affected by Coinbase’s decision, Jeff feels that this is the right time to either make some difficult decisions or make some very right ones. Elucidating on the same, he said-
“We think that most industries will have to come along and start expanding acceptable payments beyond fiat currencies. It’s not surprising that smaller, more nimble companies like ours can sometimes get out in front of legacy companies – the complicated infrastructure challenges make it tough to make this kind of leap early. The longer crypto currencies are around, the more stable they seem and the more likely we’ll see additional buy-in from other travel retailers. Before long, crypto will just be another form of payment. It’s going to happen. We’re glad we’ve been a pioneer. It’s been an unequivocal win/win for our customers and CheapAir.”