Are you considering changing your payout currency? Do you want to learn more about how changing currencies might impact your income and your patrons’ payment experience? Then this article is for you!
In this article, we’ll cover everything you need to know about switching your currency, including:
- What you need to know before changing your payout currency
- How to change your payout currency
- How your payout currency changes your dashboards
- How changing your payout currency impacts patrons
- Communicating the change with your patrons
- Frequently asked questions
For a list of currencies currently supported on our platform, visit Patreon's supported currencies
What you need to know before changing your payout currency
- Changing currencies: You can change your currency once every 6 months.
- Your existing balance: When you start the currency changing process, we’ll prompt you to withdraw your current balance, in total, in your current currency. This prompt is part of the flow.
- Your tier prices: You’ll have the opportunity to adjust your tier prices when you change your payout currency. Nothing changes here for existing patrons.
- Patron experience: Patrons can pay you in their choice of supported currencies. Nothing will change for existing patrons. Review the section below, What this means for new and existing patrons, to learn more about the patron experience.
Payment things to know
- PayPal: Ensure that you set your PayPal account up to hold multiple currencies before changing your currency. Do this by following the instructions on this PayPal help article: How can I use PayPal to manage multiple currencies?
- Stripe: If you’re using Stripe, and switching to EUR or GBP, you’ll need to set up an alternative payout method (Paypal or Payoneer) after changing your currency.
- Payment processing fees: By changing your payout currency, you’ll be subject to the associated payment processing fees related to the new currency choice. For creators with Founders status, while your platform fee stays the same, you will be subject to your new currency choice's associated payment processing fees. When receiving a pledge in a different currency than your payout currency, Patreon charges you a 2.5% currency conversion fee.
How changing your payout currency works
While changing your currency won’t take long, this process will timeout after 1 hour if you have not completed the currency change. If you exit out at any point before completing the currency change, your changes will not be saved and your currency will not be updated.
While you are making this change, anyone trying to pledge will receive a maintenance notification and will be asked to try again in 15 minutes.
- While logged in to your creator account, click on the My Page button from the left sidebar navigation
- While on your page, click on the Page controls “…” button and go to Edit Page
- Click on the Getting paid link from the menu bar
- Click on the Change currency button to start the change process. Make sure you have read through the key things to know before changing your currency
- Your balance must be zero before changing your payout currency. We’ll prompt you to withdraw any existing balance in your current currency to zero things out
- After that, you can select your new currency. Note the payment processing rates of your newly chosen currency. We recommend reviewing payment processing rates for supported currencies before changing your currency
- Next, confirm your tier prices. The tier prices shown are the same as your previous currency. If you’d like to, you can change your tier prices for new patrons — existing patrons will continue to pay the original price
- Finally, click the Confirm and Save button to finalize the switch to our new currency
Refunding patrons after you change your payout currency
Once you change your payout currency, if you need to refund a patron this will be deducted from your balance in your new currency and refunded to the patron in their choice of currency (if supported).
If you'd like guidance, read this article on how to refund a patron.
Payout currency changes in your dashboards
Earnings dashboard
In the month that you change your payout currency, your balance will display as a stacked chart with both currencies reflected. We’ll display your monthly balance in your new payout currency from that point on.
Patron Relationship Manager
All surfaces in the Relationship Manager will be updated with your newly selected currency, except for the pledge amount, which will always display each patron’s preferred currency. Each patron’s Lifetime Value and the amount you receive are shown in your currency. Similarly, when you download your CSV report from Relationship Manager, this will show amounts in your payout currency.
What this means for new and existing patrons
You can encourage patrons in your region to update their pledges and pay you in the same currency as your payout balance. Doing so will save you additional conversion fees applied by banks, credit cards, and other services.
We’ll list your prices in their local currency (where supported) for anyone new to your page. If Patreon does not support their currency, tiers will be displayed in your chosen currency.
For example, if a creator in the UK changes from USD to GBP, an existing US patron will continue to pay the same amount in USD; their pledge doesn't change. The creator would be subject to the 2.5% conversion fee for a pledge in a different currency.
If your existing local patrons edit their pledge to be in your local currency, they'll pay the new tier price you set, which saves them any foreign transaction fees from their bank and any currency conversion fees.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why do I have to withdraw my balance prior to changing my payout currency?
Patreon does not currently support multiple currency balances, in order to change currencies and start receiving payment in your local currency, your balance must be zero.
Can I revert back to my old currency?
You should only change your currency once, so make sure you are ready to choose your new currency before starting the process. If you need to switch currencies again, you’ll have to wait 6 months before you can make the change.
Why am I unable to change my currency at this time?
There are a couple of reasons why you might not be able to change currencies at the moment.
- If you are a merch creator, changing currencies while using merch isn’t yet supported: this will be available soon.
- It’s the first or last day of the month - your currency balance must be withdrawn and closed out before you can accrue earnings in a new currency. Therefore, you cannot change currencies on the first and last day of the month during payment processing.
- We also retry declined payments on varying days throughout the month between 4 am - 10 am Pacific Time. If you find that you cannot change currencies, please try again after 10 am Pacific Time to make sure that the declined payment retries have been completed.
I'm using a Payoneer prepaid card; how does this affect me?
You can learn more about ordering a Payoneer card for your new currency here.