The OP is pointing out that bitcoin can take hours for your transaction to be included in a block. So it's far from 'instant' payment or settlement. You then ha

The OP is pointing out that bitcoin can take hours for your transaction to be included in a block. So it's far from 'instant' payment or settlement. You then have to wait for several block confirmations to be sure that your transfer took place. Currently, people are reporting three or more hours wait to get a transaction on to the blockchain, because bit-coin has a capacity problem.