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Can the people from Backblaze answer when they are going to accept payement in different currencies? My Backblaze bill is around $0.50 but my bank charges fees

Can the people from Backblaze answer when they are going to accept payement in different currencies? My Backblaze bill is around $0.50 but my bank charges fees for conversion etc so the total paid is often around £2.50 or so. Would love if they’d accept bitcoin or Paypal/Amazon or charge British pounds.

fny 9y ago
Have you looked into TransferWise? I've used their debit card a few times to work around foreign transaction fees.
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  Their Borderless account debit Mastercard is in beta and hard to get unfortunately.
  - tibu 9y ago
    I got within weeks from them after being a Transferwise.com client for a month.
    - toomuchtodo 9y ago
      Did you have to specifically request it in their interface?
brianwski 9y ago
Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze. > currency conversion is expensive Backblaze probably won't accept other currencies in 2018. However, we definitely have heard about this issue, and we have a feature in the works to allow you to "load up" your account with an arbitrary amount of pre-paid cash so that you pay ONE transaction fee to deposit (as an example) £250 pounds at once (incurring the £2.50 conversion fee exactly once) and then as Backblaze deducts from this account balance instead of a credit card there are zero transaction fees. Would that help? The OTHER reason this is a requested feature is some customers want a "reserve fund" to be used if their Credit Card payment fails, as a hedge against Backblaze deleting their data for lack of payment.
- kemonocode 9y ago
  > However, we definitely have heard about this issue, and we have a feature in the works to allow you to "load up" your account with an arbitrary amount of pre-paid cash At last. I actually did abandon B2 over DO's Spaces due to the lack of this feature, despite the far more competitive pricing on your end. That, and the lack of AWS API support, but that was mostly related to my particular use case, which was the need to mount cloud storage as disk partitions using s3ql which mainly supports AWS, OpenStack and compatible services. It does have preliminary B2 support [0] but it was really hacky and I ended up losing data because of it. Having a prepaid credit option and the option to use PayPal for such payments like DO does would have tipped me towards Backblaze's favor to the point of trying to fix s3ql's B2 support, though. ;) [0] https://hub.docker.com/r/zdce/s3ql-b2/ https://hub.docker.com/r/zdce/s3ql-b2/
  - bburhans 9y ago
    Have you looked at using a s3-compatible proxy like minio? They support b2, but I haven't tested it myself.
  - daviesliu 9y ago
    JuiceFS [1] could be a replacement for S3QL, which has better support for B2, can also be mounted on multiple machines in the same time. If you don't have more than 1TiB, JuiceFS is totally free. Disclaimer: Founder of JuiceFS here.
    - nilayp 9y ago
      Nilay from Backblaze here. This is awesome! Can you reach out to us via this form? I'd love to learn more about your software and list it on our website. Just mention I sent you here: https://www.backblaze.com/b2/contact-sales.html https://www.backblaze.com/b2/contact-sales.html
MattieTK 9y ago
Get a Monzo or a Revolut card and pay with that, top up in GBP, and transfer for free at the MasterCard rate.
rahimnathwani 9y ago
"$0.50 but my bank charges fees for conversion etc so the total paid is often around £2.50" Which UK bank charges £2.15 in fees or exchange rate loading, on a £0.35 transaction? (In my experience the most a UK bank will charge for a foreign currency card transaction is 2.75%.)
- kennydude 9y ago
  All of them seem to in my experience. They charge a "Non Sterling Transaction Fee"
  - rahimnathwani 9y ago
    I bank with First Direct. I just googled 'non-sterling transaction fee first direct', and found this text: You will normally need to enter your PIN at checkouts. For non-Sterling (foreign currency) transactions we will charge a fee of 2.75% of the Sterling amount of the transaction. This fee will be shown as a separate line on your statement as a 'Non-Sterling Transaction Fee'. http://www1.firstdirect.com/1/2/travel-and-international/travel-help-and-advice/using-your-debit-card-abroad http://www1.firstdirect.com/1/2/travel-and-international/tra... And in my experience there's no minimum on this fee, i.e. the effective percentage isn't any higher for small amounts. I agree with other people's comments about using Revolut and Transferwise cards for $ purchases in general. But if the commenter to whom I replied is spending $0.50 per month in USD, then the non-sterling transaction fee should be ~2 pence per month. So not worth the extra (albeit minor) hassle of maintaining another card.
    - kennydude 9y ago
      Santander charge a minimum on £1.50 and I think Natwest and Halifax have. Monzo also has 0 fees for international card payments.
      - rahimnathwani 9y ago
        Wow. I doubted what you said, but Santander does indeed have exhorbitant fees for debit card purchases: "You will be charged a non-sterling transaction fee of 2.75% of the value plus a non-sterling purchase fee of £1.25 for each transaction"
guy_c 9y ago
Are you paying via debit card? Might be better to get a good credit card. Plenty offer decent exchange rates for foreign currency transactions https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/credit-cards/travel-credit-cards#bestbuys https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/credit-cards/travel-credit...

fny 9y ago

Have you looked into TransferWise? I've used their debit card a few times to work around foreign transaction fees.

toomuchtodo 9y ago
Their Borderless account debit Mastercard is in beta and hard to get unfortunately.
- tibu 9y ago
  I got within weeks from them after being a Transferwise.com client for a month.
  - toomuchtodo 9y ago
    Did you have to specifically request it in their interface?

brianwski 9y ago

Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze. > currency conversion is expensive Backblaze probably won't accept other currencies in 2018. However, we definitely have heard about this issue, and we have a feature in the works to allow you to "load up" your account with an arbitrary amount of pre-paid cash so that you pay ONE transaction fee to deposit (as an example) £250 pounds at once (incurring the £2.50 conversion fee exactly once) and then as Backblaze deducts from this account balance instead of a credit card there are zero transaction fees. Would that help? The OTHER reason this is a requested feature is some customers want a "reserve fund" to be used if their Credit Card payment fails, as a hedge against Backblaze deleting their data for lack of payment.

kemonocode 9y ago
> However, we definitely have heard about this issue, and we have a feature in the works to allow you to "load up" your account with an arbitrary amount of pre-paid cash At last. I actually did abandon B2 over DO's Spaces due to the lack of this feature, despite the far more competitive pricing on your end. That, and the lack of AWS API support, but that was mostly related to my particular use case, which was the need to mount cloud storage as disk partitions using s3ql which mainly supports AWS, OpenStack and compatible services. It does have preliminary B2 support [0] but it was really hacky and I ended up losing data because of it. Having a prepaid credit option and the option to use PayPal for such payments like DO does would have tipped me towards Backblaze's favor to the point of trying to fix s3ql's B2 support, though. ;) [0] https://hub.docker.com/r/zdce/s3ql-b2/ https://hub.docker.com/r/zdce/s3ql-b2/
- bburhans 9y ago
  Have you looked at using a s3-compatible proxy like minio? They support b2, but I haven't tested it myself.
- daviesliu 9y ago
  JuiceFS [1] could be a replacement for S3QL, which has better support for B2, can also be mounted on multiple machines in the same time. If you don't have more than 1TiB, JuiceFS is totally free. Disclaimer: Founder of JuiceFS here.
  - nilayp 9y ago
    Nilay from Backblaze here. This is awesome! Can you reach out to us via this form? I'd love to learn more about your software and list it on our website. Just mention I sent you here: https://www.backblaze.com/b2/contact-sales.html https://www.backblaze.com/b2/contact-sales.html

MattieTK 9y ago

Get a Monzo or a Revolut card and pay with that, top up in GBP, and transfer for free at the MasterCard rate.

rahimnathwani 9y ago

"$0.50 but my bank charges fees for conversion etc so the total paid is often around £2.50" Which UK bank charges £2.15 in fees or exchange rate loading, on a £0.35 transaction? (In my experience the most a UK bank will charge for a foreign currency card transaction is 2.75%.)

kennydude 9y ago
All of them seem to in my experience. They charge a "Non Sterling Transaction Fee"
- rahimnathwani 9y ago
  I bank with First Direct. I just googled 'non-sterling transaction fee first direct', and found this text: You will normally need to enter your PIN at checkouts. For non-Sterling (foreign currency) transactions we will charge a fee of 2.75% of the Sterling amount of the transaction. This fee will be shown as a separate line on your statement as a 'Non-Sterling Transaction Fee'. http://www1.firstdirect.com/1/2/travel-and-international/travel-help-and-advice/using-your-debit-card-abroad http://www1.firstdirect.com/1/2/travel-and-international/tra... And in my experience there's no minimum on this fee, i.e. the effective percentage isn't any higher for small amounts. I agree with other people's comments about using Revolut and Transferwise cards for $ purchases in general. But if the commenter to whom I replied is spending $0.50 per month in USD, then the non-sterling transaction fee should be ~2 pence per month. So not worth the extra (albeit minor) hassle of maintaining another card.
  - kennydude 9y ago
    Santander charge a minimum on £1.50 and I think Natwest and Halifax have. Monzo also has 0 fees for international card payments.
    - rahimnathwani 9y ago
      Wow. I doubted what you said, but Santander does indeed have exhorbitant fees for debit card purchases: "You will be charged a non-sterling transaction fee of 2.75% of the value plus a non-sterling purchase fee of £1.25 for each transaction"

guy_c 9y ago

Are you paying via debit card? Might be better to get a good credit card. Plenty offer decent exchange rates for foreign currency transactions https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/credit-cards/travel-credit-cards#bestbuys https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/credit-cards/travel-credit...