Amaiz has launched an international payment service using local banking networks across 96 countries, targeting smaller businesses making regular payments to overseas suppliers, contractors, and freelancers.
The UK-regulated electronic money institution says eligible transactions will typically arrive within 24 hours, with some reaching recipients on the same day depending on destination, cut-off time, payment method, and recipient eligibility.
The service gives businesses an alternative to routing every international payment through the SWIFT network. Local payment rails can settle funds through domestic infrastructure in the recipient’s market, potentially reducing the number of intermediaries involved in relatively small cross-border transfers.
Amaiz is pricing local bank transfers at 0.75% plus €1.49 and e-wallet payments at 0.75% plus €1.99. Currency conversion and third-party fees can also apply, meaning the total cost varies by destination and transaction.
The platform provides customers with a quotation showing the available exchange rate, fees, and amount expected to reach the recipient before a transfer is confirmed.
Initial destinations include markets such as India, Pakistan, Thailand, Nigeria, China, the Philippines, and Bangladesh. The product is available to approved Amaiz customers with a euro account, subject to onboarding, compliance checks, country restrictions, and the availability of individual payment routes.
Steve Taklalsingh, UK chief executive at Amaiz, said: “We encourage businesses to compare the final amount the recipient will receive, not simply the headline fee.”
Headline price and recipient value can differ substantially in international payments. A provider may charge a visible transaction fee while applying a margin to the exchange rate, while intermediary institutions can sometimes deduct additional charges before funds arrive.
Amaiz carried out its own comparison of international payment providers across eight destinations in August. It said that, when the sender’s total cost was held constant in a comparison with one leading provider, recipients in Egypt received around 3.5% more through Amaiz, while recipients in Sri Lanka received approximately 0.4% more.
The exercise is company research rather than an independent market study, and exchange rates and competitor prices move continuously. It does not establish that Amaiz will be the cheapest option for every corridor, transaction size, or payment method.
The wider proposition reflects increasing competition in business cross-border payments. Small companies historically relied heavily on incumbent banks, particularly where overseas payments were infrequent enough that maintaining several specialist accounts was impractical.
Fintech companies and payment institutions have expanded the routes available to include SEPA payments, local bank transfers, e-wallets, card payouts, and specialist foreign-exchange platforms. Businesses can increasingly choose a route according to destination, speed, transaction size, and recipient preference.
Amaiz already supports Faster Payments, SEPA, SWIFT, payment cards, and other payment methods through its business accounts. Its model is to bring several rails into one platform so customers can choose between payment types without maintaining separate providers for every use case.
That can be useful to companies operating distributed workforces or international supply chains. A UK SME may need to pay a European supplier through SEPA, a contractor in Asia through a domestic transfer, and another recipient through a wallet or card network, creating reconciliation and administration requirements alongside transaction costs.
Local payment infrastructure can reduce friction in suitable markets, but it does not remove the compliance obligations attached to international transfers. Providers still need to perform customer verification, sanctions screening, transaction monitoring, and other anti-financial-crime checks.
The service also underlines the regulatory distinction between an electronic money institution and a bank. Amaiz Ltd is authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority under the Electronic Money Regulations, with firm reference number 900857.
It is not a bank, and customer balances do not receive Financial Services Compensation Scheme deposit protection. E-money institutions instead have safeguarding requirements designed to keep customer funds separate from their operating money.
For smaller companies, selecting an international payment route involves more than comparing advertised fees. Exchange-rate margins, delivery speed, recipient deductions, compliance requirements, reconciliation, and tracking all influence the practical cost of a transaction.
Amaiz’s expansion to 96 countries broadens the number of corridors available through its account. Its commercial test will be whether businesses find the combined model sufficiently convenient and competitively priced to change established payment habits.
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