Top 5 Payment Gateways in Kuwait That You Need to Know

Kuwait is steadily becoming more digital, promoting the growth of the eCommerce industry, which is expected to reach US$7.06 billion by 2027. This growth attracts foreign businesses to Kuwait and motivates local businesses to become digital and offer digital payments. And for digital enterprises to facilitate payments, they need reliable payment gateways.

This blog lists the top 5 payment gateways in Kuwait that businesses can rely on and factors to consider for making an informed decision. You'll also learn about the present payment landscape in Kuwait, proving the need for digital payment solutions.

Payment Landscape in Kuwait

Primarily led by the COVID-19 breakout, the eCommerce market in Kuwait is witnessing growth, boosting electronic payments. For instance, financial institutions in Kuwait are expanding their infrastructure to facilitate electronic payments. Even offline businesses are digitizing their sales to offer customers more convenience and a competitive edge.

Criteria to Look out for Payment Gateways in Kuwait

Here's what you need to look for while searching for a payment gateway in Kuwait:

1. Reliability

An ideal payment gateway is a reliable one. Because if it's not, your customers won't be able to make payments smoothly, which isn't good for your business's bottom line. So, make sure your payment gateway is reliable. And to ensure that, you can check out customer reviews, the type of customer support they offer, their service uptime, transaction approval rate, time taken to process the transaction, and other similar factors.

2. Supported Currencies

While a payment gateway that supports KWD will get the job done if you want to operate just in Kuwait, you must consider the one that supports the most significant number of currencies. Why? You may be dealing just in Kuwait for now, but you may want to expand to other countries in the future. And at that time, switching to other payment gateways or bringing in additional payment gateways won't be a smart move. So, look for a payment gateway that offers support for numerous currencies. 

3. Payment Options

The more payment options, the better it is. While credit card payments aren't that popular in Kuwait, you will still need them in the future. Credit cards and other advanced payment options will flourish as the country develops and the regulations ease up. 

Therefore, you must find a payment gateway that supports all the payment options the customers in Kuwait use, along with the ones they may use in the future. This way, you won't have to switch to a new service provider when needed.

4. Integration

Integrations are crucial. Not only the payment gateway should be easy to integrate, but it should also offer decent support for market integrations. For instance, you should be able to integrate your payment gateway with WooCommerce, BigCommerce, accounting software, CRMs, etc. This helps boost productivity, reduces reliance on manual elements, and improves overall efficiency.

5. Security

While all payment gateways offer a decent level of security, you must not settle for less. Otherwise, you could risk the safety of your customers and even your business. So, look for payment gateways that follow the highest security standards. Ask what modern systems they have to prevent fraud or money laundering attempts. This way, you can ensure completely secure transactions for your customers.

6. Pricing

Another essential factor to consider while choosing the payment gateway is the pricing. There are several types of charges, such as setup fee, flat transaction fee, or transaction fee that varies with the transaction amount, refund fee, chargeback fee, etc. Confirm all these expenses with your payment gateway service provider and determine if you can bear them. This will help you stay profitable always.

Top Payment Gateways in Kuwait

Here are some of the payment gateways in Kuwait you can rely on:

1. 2checkout [Verifone]

2Chechkout is a reliable payment gateway for countries in the Middle East, including Kuwait. It’s ideal for both customers and merchants as it charges a pretty low fee.

Also, 2Checkout is available in +30 languages, offers +45 payment methods, follows high-security standards, and has decent customer support.

Here are the primary features that 2checkout offers:

Pricing and Other Fees:

Setup Fee: Free

Annual Fee: Free

Monthly Fee: None

Charges on Refunds: Information Available on request

Commission per transaction: 3.9% + 45 cents

Accepted Payment Methods:

• Credit/Debit Cards: Cards from JCB, Discover, American Express, Diners Club, Visa, PO, Skrill, and MasterCard are supported.

• Other methods: Digital wallets, such as AliPay, OPay, Apple Pay, and Google Pay, are supported.

Supported Currencies: It supports +87 currencies in +190 countries.

Approvals and Onboarding Time: N/A.

eCommerce Platform Integration: Offers integration with major eCommerce and CRM platforms such as:

• BigCommerce
• Magento
• WooCommerce
  
  

2. Checkout 

Checkout is yet another popular payment gateway in Middle Easter countries such as Kuwait. It supports over 150 currencies and +20 settlement currencies and caters to the needs of a variety of merchants.

Checkout is built using the latest technologies, is secure, and is easy to use, offering a seamless experience to its customers.

Here are the primary features that Checkout offers:

Pricing and Other Fees:

Setup Fee: Free

Annual Fee: Free

Monthly Fee: None

Charges on Refunds: Information Available on request

Commission per transaction: 2.9% + 20 cents for non-European and 0.95 % + 2 for European cards.

Accepted Payment Methods:

• Credit/Debit Cards: Cards from JCB, Discover, American Express, Diners Club, Visa, and MasterCard are supported.

• Other methods: Omannet and digital wallets such as OPay, Google Pay, Apple Pay, AliPay, and are supported.

Supported Currencies: It supports over 150 currencies.

Approvals and Onboarding Time: Information Available on request.

eCommerce Platform Integration: Offers integration with a range of eCommerce platforms such as 

• Salesforce Commerce Cloud,
• WooCommerce,
• SAP Commerce Cloud,
• Shopify, and more.
  
  

3. PayTabs

PayTabs is a reliable payment gateway platform that not only helps you facilitate payments but also allows you to track all the transactions. Businesses in Kuwait can send or receive funds by sending QR codes or payment links and even collect recurring payments with PayTabs.

PayTabs supports multiple local payment methods and currencies and is PCI DSS certified and EMV 3D Secure 2.0 ready and ensures completely safe transactions.

Here are the primary features that PayTabs offers:

Pricing and Other Fees:

Setup Fee: Free

Annual Fee: Free

Charges on Refunds: Information Available on request

Commission per transaction: 2.85% + $0.27 per transaction.

Accepted Payment Methods:

• Credit/Debit Cards: Visa Electron, Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, and American Express cards are supported.
• Other methods: Knet. 

Supported Currencies: It supports SAR, USD, GBP, AED, EUR, KWD, OMR, IQD, EGP, and JOD.

Approvals and Onboarding Time: The onboarding process is pretty fast and takes anywhere between 24-48 hours.

eCommerce Platform Integration: Offers integration with a range of eCommerce platforms such as: 

• Magento
• Shopify
• Prestashop
• Expand Cart
• CS-Cart

4. CCAvenue

CCAvenue is a payment gateway popularly used in the USA, India, and the UAE. It offers numerous payment options (EPP, net banking, debit and credit cards) and supports multiple currencies making it easy for businesses to expand their business globally.

Moreover, CCAvenue is customizable, easy to integrate, has an amazing transaction success rate, and a risk identification system to keep frauds at bay.

Here are the primary features that Checkout offers:

Pricing and Other Fees:

Setup Fee: Free

Monthly Fee: AED 200

Annual Fee: Free

Charges on Refunds: Information Available on request

Commission per transaction: AED 1.0 and 3% on card transactions.

Accepted Payment Methods:

• Credit/Debit Cards: All major cards are supported.
• Other methods: Mashreq Net Banking, Easy Payment Plan, Rewards Payments, etc.

Supported Currencies: CCAvenue supports multiple major currencies, including Qatari Riyal, UAE Dirham, Bahraini Dinar, Saudi Riyal, Omani Rial, Kuwaiti Dinar, United States dollar, British Pound, and Euro.

Approvals and Onboarding Time: CCAvenue allows you to go live within 24 hours.

eCommerce Platform Integration: Offers integration with a range of eCommerce platforms such as: 

• NopCommerce
• Opencart
• OsCommerce
• PrestaShop
• VirtueMart
• WHMCS
• WordPress
• ZenCart, and more.
   

5. Hesabe

Hesabe is a local payment gateway based out of Kuwait. It enables local businesses in Kuwait to send or receive money via email or WhatsApp. You can even access POS terminals for in-store transactions that are connected with call centers providing instant invoices for customers.

Hesabe allows businesses to keep track of their transactions and check the status whenever they want through the merchant dashboard.

Pricing and Other Fees:

Setup Fee: 300 KWD

Monthly Fee: KWD 15

Annual Fee: Free

Charges on Refunds: Information Available on request

Commission per transaction:  1.5% + 0.100 KWD for Knet and Fee value: 3.0% + 0.100 KWD for cards.

Accepted Payment Methods:

• Credit/Debit Cards: All major cards are supported.

• Other methods: Knet.

Supported Currencies: Hesabe supports EUR, GBP, USD, QAR, OMR, AED, and BHD.

Approvals and Onboarding Time: N/A

eCommerce Platform Integration: Offers numerous eCommerce plugins for easy integration across different platforms such as:

• Prestashop
• Wic
• WooCommerce
• Shopify
• Magento
  
  

Good Read : Top 6 payment gateways in Qatar

Local Payment Gateways and the Rising complexities for the Businesses

While there are local payment gateways businesses can rely on to facilitate payments within Kuwait, what if they want to expand to some other countries? Or what if one payment gateway is not reliable enough or fails? Well, such scenarios create complexities for businesses and make it hard for them to stay afloat. 

However, there's a solution: inai. 

How can inai Help?

inai is a global payment integration and aggregation platform that can help you integrate 30+ payment gateways and 300+ payment methods across 190+ countries. So, whether you're based out of Kuwait and want to offer online services to people in Kuwait or across the globe or expand your business in Kuwait, you can rely on inai to facilitate seamless payments.

As you can integrate multiple payment gateways in your website or app, you can easily switch to a reliable one in case one stops working or doesn't serve the purpose. Moreover, inai is completely customizable and fairly easy to integrate.