Skrill

Skrill is another e-payment option that is widely accepted at casino sites. Skrill casinos will allow you to make deposits and withdrawals. Some sites do have fees for using the facility so check the terms before using. This page features those sites with fluffy favourites accepting Skrill payments.

This electronic money transfer service can be used to make deposits at online and mobile slots sites. It can also be used to transfer funds to friends and family, based both within the same country and internationally. Skrill is also available as a method of making payments at most United Kingdom registered online casinos and bingo sites.

The service is licenced and regulated by the UK government’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). It also has a full licence to operate throughout the European Economic Area (EEA).

Skrill – A Look Back at its History

Skrill remains a very convenient service to use for a variety of online transactions, but it has undergone a complex and convoluted history. This involves multiple name changes, re-brandings and a series of changes in ownership.

Founded back in 2001, the service was originally known as Moneybookers. It was an immediate success, growing rapidly and attracting interest from rival payment services looking to expand their customer bases, and outside investors looking for suitable investment opportunities.

The extent of its success and growth was therefore demonstrated in the spring of 2007 when the service was bought by a global investment management company called Investcorp. The total cost of the takeover was estimated at well over €100 million.

This certainly turned out to be an astute investment, as barely two years later the service had more than tripled in value to over €360 million. This unrivalled growth continued, so that by the end of the decade, Skrill had a total of around 25 million customers and was accepted as a method of payment by well over 100,000 different merchants.

However, Moneybookers was considered a bit of an unwieldy name for the international market, which it was felt was the best opportunity for future growth as the domestic market became saturated. This meant that the service was forced to drop its very English sounding name for a simpler brand, more in tune with the non-English speaking people it was targeting overseas. This resulted in the simpler, but ultimately meaningless re-naming of the service to Skrill.

Further consolidation of the money transfer and online payment services industry resulted in additional administrative and ownership upheaval for the service. A veritable merry go round of transactions, take overs and mergers took place around the middle of the decade. These began when Investcorp acquired the rival pre-payment service Paysafecard in 2013. Meanwhile in August the same year, Skrill’s owners decided to cash in on their wise investment by accepting a bid of around €600 million from a rival international investment vehicle called CVC Capital Partners.

The ownership musical chairs didn’t end there though, as in 2015 Optimal Payments PLC stepped in with a new bid, valuing the company at a cool €1.1 billion. The takeover was completed toward the end of the year. At this point, three major payment services were together under the same corporate umbrella, as Skrill, its electronic payment rival Neteller, and the pre-payment Paysafecard were owned by the company.

It was at this point that Optimal Payments underwent their own re-branding, opting to take the name of their primary financial service, becoming known as the Paysafe Group. At the time of writing, all three services continue to operate as independent brands under the Paysafe Group corporate umbrella.

Skrill – But How Does it Actually Work?

Skrill is like an online wallet, which you can use to make payments for goods and services, or to transfer money to friends, family and colleagues, wherever they are in the world.

It’s free to open an account, and also very simple. All you need to do is supply your name and e-mail address, and think up a secure password. You’ll also need to decide which currency you wish to hold your account in. And that is all it takes – your account is set up.

Next, you’ll need to load your account with funds. This can be done easily via your bank account, credit or debit card, but there are over a hundred different ways to do this. You can even fill your Skrill online wallet using cash via Skrill’s sister service Paysafecard.

Most transactions made using Skrill are fee free. There are no charges when making online purchases. Instead, the vendor you are buying from pays a small commission when accepting your payment. There is also no charge when sending money to, or receiving funds from a friend, family member or colleague via their e-mail address. There is usually no fee for uploading funds either, although a charge of 1% is made if uploading via either of Skrill’s sister payment methods, Neteller or Paysafecard.

There are some other instances when fees do apply though. The most important of these is if the transaction involves any kind of currency conversion. In these cases, a fee of around 4% is applied. In addition, although transfers to international bank accounts are fee free, there is a 2% charge where the bank transfer is to another account in the same country.

There are also some additional fees according to how you load your account prior to using it for the first time. See the website for full details. It is also best to ensure that you actually spend the money in your account, because there are additional fees for withdrawing funds as cash. At the time of writing, these are set at around £5 per transaction for transfers into your own bank account, or a commission of 7.5% if transferred to your Visa card.

Summary

Skrill is a convenient and popular way of making online payments. It is widely accepted at many online casino and bingo sites. Look out for the Skrill logo at the checkout or banking page of your chosen site.[/fusion_text][/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]