Would you get paid in Bitcoin? Employer tells the ups and downs of crypto payrolls

By Gaia Lamperti

From celebrities to athletes and digital artists, crypto salaries are on the rise. Should financial services, especially those in the digital asset business, embrace the trend too?

There are advantages in paying and getting paid in cryptocurrencies like efficiency of transfers, cost-effectiveness, and independence from intermediary financial institutions. In an effort to attract and recruit talent, businesses are making fundamental changes and cryptocurrencies-based payrolls may be a bonus on the rise, seen the parabolic ascent of digital assets.

According to a survey by Visa, almost a quarter of small businesses in 9 countries around the world plan to accept digital currencies as a form of payment in 2022, while 13% of consumers in those countries expect retail stores to begin offering crypto payments this year and beyond. This suggests cryptocurrencies may be starting to go mainstream as a payment method, including payrolls.

Yet, digital currencies a form of salary has to be treated with caution as swings in their price might result in value losses cutting employee wages. Exposure to fraud risk is also another factor to be considered.

BetU, a sports, e-sports and crypto betting company, evaluated all these elements when it became one of the growing number of businesses adopting a cryptocurrency-based payroll.

“We pay in crypto all our staff and any supplier that we can, 98% of our bills are in crypto,” Paul Rogash, CEO of the company, told IBS Intelligence. “We raised all our funds with an ICO [Initial Coin Offering] last September. So, our capital is already in crypto.”

BetU’s employees work remotely and are based in different countries, such as Vietnam, Bali, Australia, Switzerland, France and the US. “There’s obviously a lot of advantages, like the speed in sending international transfers. Our staff get their payroll within seconds, as opposed to the amount it would take with a bank transfer,” added Rogash. “More and more neobanks now offer crypto services, so it’s also become very smooth and seamless to move funds across accounts.”

Also, he explained, when looking back at transactions for tax purposes or to check whether there are any discrepancies, with deposits on-chain it is easy to instantly see what the transfers were, when they were made and when they were received. “Crypto is all very transparent and instant.”

Because the company already operates in the crypto space, all the employees are already involved in the space. “There’s been only a couple of people that have come on board and hadn’t dealt too much with crypto, but they needed to learn anyway because that’s our business,” Rogash said. In those cases, the team helped them to set up Coinbase accounts and crypto-wallets.

There are some downsides though. “One of the difficulties is how to actually get your crypto funds back to your bank card for everyday purchases where you can’t use crypto, like buying your morning cup of coffee,” he explained.

“Also, obviously there’s no assistance if something goes wrong. For example, if someone from our staff paid some scammers by mistake, that money would be gone. There’s no complaint you can file, and you won’t be refunded as it would happen on PayPal or with a bank. It’s part of the game.”