Latin America has long been classified as an emerging market and with a total population of around 600M, the new business potential is obvious. Unquestionably the payments space continues to gather momentum within the Latin American markets but in doing so also presents challenges to international merchants actively targeting this region. As the areas covers around 25 countries, each local payment ecosystem will differ accordingly.  It is therefore essential that merchants have a clear understanding on local purchasing habits which, if acted upon, will assist in transforming previously poor acceptance rates that, in the past, have been the bane of many a payments manager.

Local Payment Acceptance.

Put simply, indigenous payment methods are king, especially when it comes to fighting fraud. Local providers in comparison to the larger global payment operators will be able to offer enhanced customer validation by having access to local databases.  Consequently, there are a multitude of local card and cash based e-commerce payment systems available across the continent that remain the automatic consumer preference at the point of checkout. Even though (for the moment at least) most credit cards issued by local banks aren’t enabled for cross border purchases, this is changing –  Visa/Mastercard usage continues on an upward trajectory, albeit at a slow pace. As much as this trend is encouraging we must still remember that as many as 70% of the Latin American population still don’t have a bank account, therefore offering players viable alternative payment options remains key for any merchant or gaming operator that has designs on cracking these lucrative markets.

Lateral Payment Solutions can keep merchants ahead of the game via our single payment gateway integration. Please visit www.lateralpaymentsolutions.com for more information