Bitrefill, the online merchant that sells gift cards and vouchers for cryptocurrencies, is continuing to expand its offerings, including payment via Dash and a limited 10% discount when paying with Dash.
Dash Force News talked with Bitrefill about their overall goals, expansion, and Dash integration.
“Our mission is to let people live on crypto, to create a world where people use cryptocurrencies as daily currency. So we’re trying to add things as far as possible and what we can do legally. Right now the focus is on the gift card effort which has been very well received. For future efforts we’re also looking into ways of helping people earn cryptocurrency, an area that we see as hugely underdeveloped”
Bitrefill recently started to introduce a bill pay feature to allow individuals to pay a multitude of bills in cryptocurrencies. However, due to various legal and logistical issues, they only have a limited offering so far. Thus, they have not heavily advertised the feature and are instead “focusing more on adding commerce through gift cards and vouchers”, which includes a wide diversity of products and services. They did tell Dash Force News what some of their current bill pay offerings are so far.
- Brazil: Landline phones
- Cuba: Nauta Internet and Telefonia Fijo (landline)
- India: Digital TV (DTH, all providers), Internet, Shopping
- Indonesia: PLN electricity Morocco: Internet
- Philippines: Digital TV (DTH), Landline, Internet, Pharmacy
- US: Xfinity Internet
- Venezuela: Landline, TV, Internet
However, at present, the “Xfinity Internet” bill pay option is not yet shown for U.S. customers since visiting the bill pay site from the United States reveals a statement saying that “[u]nfortunately bill payments are not available in USA”. The closest option that could be found is a “Xfinity Prepaid Internet USA” refill payment.
Bitrefill also just recently launched their limited 10% discount for all purchase made in Dash. Bitrefill also have a few expansion plans that focus on the competitive advantages and the global use of cryptocurrencies and Dash.
Expanding to worldwide adoption
In addition to Dash, Bitrefill also accepts Bitcoin, Litecoin, Ethereum, and Doge which helps them appeal to a global user base. Thus, when asked about their most popular product they said “[p]robably Steam, but international products [are] hard to compare with local ones”. Overall, Bitrefill has seen their services spike in popularity in different regions.
“We’ve periodically had huge upswings in countries like Nigeria, Bolivia, India, Bangladesh, but also western countries like US and Germany. But it’s really a long tail, and depends a lot on where we have products that people like.”
Regular Dash Force News readers will remember that Dash has seen heavy usage for mobile airtime refills in Nigeria and other African countries. This steady, but rapid increase in users and products is allowing Bitrefill to offer cryptocurrency and Dash users more real world use cases and thus are further accelerating cryptocurrency and Dash adoption.
“Right now we are focusing our efforts where we get the biggest reward per effort, products that the largest number of people can use. Still lots to be done, and paying in crypto is quite niche, so we’re focusing on really big international products.”
Cryptocurrencies, in general, have struggled with adoption by large companies that have to answer to large and skeptical shareholders. This is a barrier to wider adoption since these companies are highly involved in consumers’ daily lives. Bitrefill helps act as a middleman bridge to allow consumers access to these companies’ services while still paying with cryptocurrency. Bitrefill’s continuing expansion of real life use cases for cryptocurrency and Dash will further increase adoption, and thus, increase the overall influence of cryptocurrency and Dash.
Dash facilitates everyday adoption
Dash is able to leverage its extremely small transaction fees, quick confirmation times, and high security to facilitate everyday transactions like the ones that Bitrefill offers. Dash is able to give its users accesses to more products and services not only through Bitrefill, but also through Rewards.com, which will soon allow purchases with Dash through its 7,000+ merchants. Thanks to the DAO treasury and the supportive and active Dash community, these integrations that facilitate everyday transactions will supplement the 2,000+ merchants that already accept Dash, globally. The rapidly increasing real world usage facilitated by Dash is allowing more consumers to discover the competitive advantages that Dash offers as a new form of currency and payments system.
