Cards and stablecoins: one app, two ways to get paid

Yes, you can take a bank card and a stablecoin from the same FiatFlex app, with no second terminal and a single signup, in which you accept Stripe's terms for cards and Bridge's for stablecoins. They do not travel the same road, nor carry the same price. The card goes through a Stripe account opened in your name; the stablecoin arrives in a Solana wallet we operate on your behalf, which is custody. Each rail has its own price, and both are on the pricing page.

This article sets out who does what, where your money sits at each step, and which of the two rails to choose for a given sale. The full schedule is in our pricing; here the point is the mechanism.

Exactly who does what

This is the part most often misread, so here it is without hedging.

Stripe operates the card payment. The payment lands in a Stripe account opened in your own name, created during your signup.

Bridge converts the stablecoin into euros and sends the SEPA transfer to your bank account.

FiatFlex operates the wallet and the app: the payment links, Tap to Pay, the record of what came in, the conversion request, the history.

FiatFlex is not a bank, not a payment institution and not an electronic money institution. The regulated parties in the chain are Stripe and Bridge. The wallet we operate is custody: FiatFlex holds those funds on your behalf, and that wallet is not a bank account.

Where your money sits, step by step

On the card rail, the money never passes through a FiatFlex balance. Your customer's payment lands in the Stripe account opened in your name, and the balance is paid out to the bank account you registered. The funds are therefore held by the regulated payment partner, never by us.

On the stablecoin rail, your customer's payment lands in the Solana wallet opened for your account. We operate that wallet, and FiatFlex holds those funds until you ask for a conversion or a withdrawal. That is custody, not self-custody, and we will never write it up as anything else. The funds stay there as long as you ask for nothing. When you trigger a conversion, Bridge converts into euros and sends the SEPA transfer to your bank.

We publish no timing, at any step. Our partners, Stripe and Bridge, have confirmed none to us, and announcing an unconfirmed timing would be a promise, not information.

Cards: a price per payment

Tap to Pay and the payment link are each priced per payment, with a percentage and a fixed part. The fixed part does not move, so a small ticket costs proportionally more, and a card rate quoted as a bare percentage hides precisely that.

Stablecoins: one percentage per coin

We accept USDC and EURC on Solana.

You are the one who triggers the conversion into euros, when you decide to. Nothing converts on its own. The price covers the conversion and the SEPA transfer to your bank account together, as a single operation. It is a percentage of the amount converted, set by the coin, with no fixed part, and the amount you will receive is shown to you before you confirm: exact in EURC, which converts 1 for 1; an estimate in USDC, whose final amount depends on the exchange rate at conversion, while the price stays 1.5%.

Which rail, and when

The reading is simple: whatever the ticket, a stablecoin converted into euros costs you less than a card payment. Its percentage is lower than the card's, and nothing fixed is added on top: the SEPA transfer is included.

Two consequences follow.

A small ticket costs proportionally the same as a large one. The price is the same share of every amount converted, where a card's fixed part weighs more the smaller the ticket.

Grouping conversions saves nothing. The percentage is the same whether you convert one sale or ten at once, so you convert when it suits you. A conversion is possible from 5.06 EURC or 5.06 USDC. How a conversion runs is covered in converting stablecoins into euros.

The card, for its part, keeps an advantage the stablecoin will never have: every one of your customers has one. Choosing a rail is not a matter of principle, it depends on the customer in front of you.

What each rail cannot do

A card payment can be disputed by the cardholder. A refund does not return all of the payment's fees; the detail is in the terms and conditions.

A stablecoin payment does not sit inside that mechanism: once confirmed on Solana it is final, and there is no equivalent dispute procedure. That is an advantage for you, and it is also why a customer has no automatic recourse: refunds are a commercial decision you handle yourself, the way you would for a cash payment. The trade-off is real in the other direction too: a transfer sent to the wrong address does not come back.

Where this is available

Both rails described here are open to merchants established in the euro area with a euro bank account, and Tap to Pay on iPhone is available in France.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need two contracts to accept cards and stablecoins?

One signup in the app; during it you accept the Stripe and Bridge terms. Your Stripe account is created in your own name during that signup, and both ways of getting paid live in the same app, with the same history.

Is the conversion into euros automatic?

No, and that is deliberate. You keep the stablecoin balance for as long as you want and trigger the conversion yourself. The percentage is the same whether you convert each sale or several at once: the moment is yours to choose.

Do I have to manage a crypto wallet myself?

No. The wallet is operated by FiatFlex, which makes it custody. You handle no recovery phrase, no third-party software and no address to copy across.

What does a stablecoin payment cost me?

What you pay for is getting euros: one percentage of the amount converted, which depends on the coin and covers the conversion and the SEPA transfer to your bank account. It is on the pricing page. There is no subscription and no sign-up fee.

USDC or EURC?

EURC if you invoice in euros: it costs less than USDC to turn into euros. The detail is in USDC or EURC, which to choose.

To try both rails on your own amounts, download the app. The detailed terms are in our terms and conditions, and the full schedule is on the pricing section.