Payments giant PayPal has expanded its services in Ukraine, enabling people across the globe to be able to send money into Ukraine. The announcement which came on Thursday is quite big news because before now, only users in Ukraine could use PayPal to send money out of the country, receiving money with the platform was not possible.
What the new announcement means is that Ukrainians can now receive money from their friends, loved ones, business partners, etc., from across the world using PayPal. After receiving money using PayPal, they will be able to transfer it to any bank account of their choice by connecting either a Visa or Mastercard debit or credit card to their PayPal account.
PayPal also announced that it will also be waiving transactional fees for users sending money to people in Ukraine temporarily. People can send money to their friends and loved ones in Ukraine without having to pay any fee until the 30th of June. Its international remittance service, Xoom, will also not be making charges on transactions to Ukraine.
PayPal’s “big” announcement comes after Ukraine’s government requested payment companies to allow Ukrainians to be able to receive payments from other parts of the world. The country’s Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Digital Transformation, Mykhailo Fedorov, has since taken to Twitter to praise PayPal’s announcement while sharing a letter he received from the payments giant.
“Our teams have worked intensively to identify how PayPal could best and quickly provide additional services to Ukrainians. We believe this service with be helpful for people in Ukraine to receive money from their friends and relatives around the world. It will also help Ukrainian refugees in other countries, so they can receive money to use or withdraw in their current location,” a part of the letter reads.
PayPal’s Ukrainian announcement comes on the heels of its decision to shut down its operations in Russia, like other global companies, about a month ago. Other payments companies including Visa and MasterCard also shut down their operations in the country. PayPal’s decision to allow Ukrainians to receive money from other parts of the world is an important solution for people in the country who need services like these. Ukrainians have, however, turned to cryptocurrency and a handful of the donations that the country has received have come in cryptocurrency.
Ukrainians can receive money in USD, CAD, GBP, and EUR and once they transfer the money to the account associated with their linked cards, the money will be made available in the country’s local currency.
