Direct payments are widely considered the default payment method for ecommerce in Sweden. Many shoppers pay straight from their bank accounts using tools such as Swish and BankID. Direct payments work quickly, are secure, and don't involve card networks or credit lines. If you’re a business owner based outside the Swedish market or you haven’t worked with the local payment stack yet, you might be unfamiliar with this payment method. Below, you’ll find a practical guide to direct payments in Swedish ecommerce, including how they affect businesses and their pros and cons.

What’s in this article?

• What is direct payment in Swedish ecommerce?
  
• What direct payment options are available in Sweden?
  
• Which direct payment methods do Swedish customers prefer?
  
• What are the pros and cons of direct payment for businesses?
  
• What should ecommerce businesses consider when offering direct payment?
  
• How Stripe Payments can help
  

What is direct payment in Swedish ecommerce?

Direct payment is exactly what it sounds like: money moving directly from the customer’s bank account to yours. At checkout, the customer clicks “pay” (or something similar), confirms the transaction through their bank, and then the funds land in your account—often in seconds. In Sweden, these payments are facilitated by the country’s sophisticated banking rails and nearly universal adoption of BankID, a digital identification system.

While card transactions run through processors, issuers, networks, and often have delayed settlement and chargeback risks, direct payments skip that chain entirely. The customer simply initiates the transfer and the money is moved from their account.

What direct payment options are available in Sweden?

Sweden offers a few different ways for customers to pay directly from their bank accounts. These are the most commonly used options.

Swish

Swish launched in 2012 and quickly became a top choice for online payments. It links your mobile number to your bank account and uses BankID for every transaction. At checkout, the customer enters their phone number, gets a prompt in their Swish app, and approves the payment. The money is sent instantly.

All major Swedish banks support Swish, which has more than 8.6 million users in a country of nearly 10.6 million. Swish payments offer real-time settlement and confirmation and low transaction fees compared to cards.

Direct bank transfers

Customers can also initiate direct transfers via Trustly, Zimpler, and other systems. At checkout, the customer picks their bank from a list, logs in using BankID, and authorizes a prefilled payment. Funds transfer directly from the customer’s account to yours, usually within seconds. It’s secure and straightforward, although slightly clunkier than Swish, as it can involve redirects or switching apps depending on the setup.

Autogiro

Autogiro is a direct debit system for recurring payments. The customer authorizes a business to pull funds from their bank account on a set schedule (e.g., monthly) with a signed mandate, usually via BankID. It’s commonly used for gym memberships, insurance, and subscription boxes.

In practice, if you’re selling to Swedish customers, “direct payment” means Swish or direct bank transfers. If you’re offering subscriptions, however, Autogiro is the tool of choice.

Which direct payment methods do Swedish customers prefer?

Swish is by far the most popular direct payment method in Sweden. It’s now second only to debit cards as a payment method in Swedish ecommerce. It’s deeply embedded in everyday life and used for everything from splitting a lunch bill to paying online businesses. Direct bank transfers are also common, but Swish is faster and more mobile-friendly, so it’s more convenient.

Swedish consumers want payment methods that are fast, easy to use, and have a familiar, reliable interface and strong built-in security measures (e.g. use of BankID). Swish offers all of the above, and that’s made it the most popular direct payment method in the current landscape.

What are the pros and cons of direct payment for businesses?

There are advantages to accepting direct payments, but it can also present certain drawbacks. Let’s take a look at this payment method’s pros and cons.

Pros of direct payments

• Instant settlement: Swish payments and direct bank transfers hit your account almost immediately. There’s no waiting for batch processing or overnight delays. That real-time cash flow can simplify everything from inventory to payroll.

• Lower transaction costs: Card payments typically carry higher processing fees. Swish and direct bank payments charge lower fees—often just a few kronor.

• Minimal fraud and no chargebacks: Customers initiate direct payments themselves and confirm transactions through BankID. This cuts down on fraud and eliminates chargebacks entirely. Once you’ve been paid, the money is yours unless you refund it.

• Better conversion among local users: Swedes use Swish constantly and know it’s backed by their own banks. Seeing it as a payment option at checkout offers confidence, which can mean higher conversion rates for businesses.

• Easier reconciliation: These payments usually come with strong references and instant confirmation. That makes them easier to match to orders, especially compared to delayed or bundled card settlements.

• Local credibility: Adding Swish as a payment method is a simple way for your non-Swedish business to signal that you’ve customized your checkout for local shoppers. It also helps your brand feel familiar and reliable.

Cons of direct payments

• Local use only: Swish and bank transfers require a Swedish bank account. So if you serve an international audience, you’ll need to accept other payment methods as well.

• Complex setup: Integrating with Swish involves working with banks, managing security certificates, and navigating application programming interfaces (APIs). Payments providers can take care of this for you, but if you’re handling it on your own, expect more technical overhead.

• No flexible credit: Direct payments mean customers pay up front, at checkout. That immediacy is great for your business’s cash flow, but it also means some customers—especially those placing large orders—might abandon their carts. Providing a credit or buy now, pay later (BNPL) option alongside direct payments can help customers follow through with their orders.

• No built-in dispute mechanism: Cards allow for chargebacks, but direct payments don’t. This reduces fraud but shifts the responsibility for handling customer disputes and refunds to you. You’ll need strong support policies in place.

• Manual refunds: Unless your payments provider supports automatic refunds for direct payments, you’ll need to process them manually by initiating a new transfer and confirming the customer’s information. This is more steps than traditional refunds entail.

• Extra step in the user experience (UX): BankID is second nature for Swedes, but the extra authentication step can add friction to the checkout experience. Clear instructions and mobile-friendly design are important for keeping customers from abandoning checkout.

Direct payments are faster, more cost-effective, and have better certainty than cards. But they’re not a complete replacement, especially if you’re serving global customers or selling high-ticket items. They work best as one part of a well-balanced payment stack.

What should ecommerce businesses consider when offering direct payment?

Integrating direct payment options into your ecommerce business takes time and planning. Here’s what you need to consider while you’re getting set up.

Customer base

If you’re serving Swedes, accepting Swish is a must. If you’re selling to international shoppers, you also need to accept cards and maybe a digital wallet or two. A local checkout experience should feel local, but you’ll likely need to support multiple payment methods if your audience is both foreign and domestic.

Integration

You’ll need a business agreement with a Swedish bank, plus a Swish certificate and backend integration, which involves some overhead. If you’re using a payments provider, you can skip the banking paperwork and manage everything in one place. This is ideal if you’re international or short on time. Make sure your setup includes real-time payment confirmation so orders can be marked as paid immediately.

Checkout flow

Let the user know what’s coming with clear instructions and messaging (e.g., “Open your Swish app to confirm the payment”). Make sure the transition between the browser and the Swish app is smooth. BankID and Swish are second nature in Sweden, so it’s even more important not to leave customers guessing about the next step in the flow.

Payment option display

Swedish regulation mandates your checkout can’t default to credit-based methods, such as BNPL. Put the direct payment methods you accept at the top of the list.

Costs

Swish via a bank account usually charges a low fixed fee per transaction. Swish via a payments provider often costs a little more for the added convenience, but it’s still cheaper than card payments.

Even a few kronor per order can add up, so weigh the processing costs against your average order value and volume. Some businesses offer small discounts for direct pay to incentivize customers to use lower-fee methods.

Refunds and support

Refunds are automated with cards, but with direct bank payments, you might need to push funds manually—unless your payments provider supports refund flows. Make sure your team is knowledgeable and can clearly explain the refund process to customers. You’ll need reliable support in place to refund bank transfers, since you can’t “reverse” them like you can with card payments.

Reconciliation

Direct payments don’t always behave like traditional settlements. Instead of one end-of-day deposit, you might see dozens of smaller ones rolling in live. That’s good for cash flow, but it might affect your reconciliation process if it isn’t built to handle high-frequency transactions. Use references tied to order IDs, and confirm your accounting tools can ingest and match them automatically.

Evolving preferences

The Swedish payment space changes regularly. Swish rolled out support for subscriptions and recurring payments in 2024, for example. Staying ahead means checking in on what Swish, BankID, and your payments provider are rolling out and adjusting your stack accordingly. If direct payments are a long-term play for your business, it’s also worth keeping your eye on that infrastructure.

Adding direct payments isn’t overly difficult, but doing it well takes thought. Customers expect them to work perfectly, and getting it right on the backend can pay off fast.

How Stripe Payments can help

Stripe Payments provides a unified, global payments solution that helps any business—from scaling startups to global enterprises—accept payments online, in person, and around the world.

Stripe Payments can help you:

• Optimize your checkout experience: Create a frictionless customer experience and save thousands of engineering hours with prebuilt payment user interfaces (UIs), access to 125+ payment methods, and Link, a wallet built by Stripe.

• Expand to new markets faster: Reach customers worldwide and reduce the complexity and cost of multicurrency management with cross-border payment options, available in 195 countries across 135+ currencies.

• Unify payments in person and online: Build a unified commerce experience across online and in-person channels to personalize interactions, reward loyalty, and grow revenue.

• Improve payments performance: Increase revenue with a range of customizable, easy-to-configure payment tools, including no-code fraud protection and advanced capabilities to improve authorization rates.

• Move faster with a flexible, reliable platform for growth: Build on a platform designed to scale with you, with 99.999% uptime and industry-leading reliability.

Learn more about how Stripe Payments can power your online and in-person payments, or get started today.