GBP Local Currency Feature for United Kingdom-Based Merchants

In order to reduce the economic risk of fluctuating currencies and simplify the price-setting process for merchants, a store’s Local Currency Code may be set (accessible in the Currency Settings section of the Merchant Dashboard Account > Payment Settings page). Currently for United Kingdom-based merchants, Wish supports these Local Currency Codes: USD ($) and GBP (£).

This FAQ article walks merchants through all necessary information regarding GBP Local Currency Code.

Before January 14, 2020 12:00AM UTC, the Local Currency Code was defined based on where the merchant does business. Starting January 14, 2020 12:00AM UTC, the definition of the Local Currency Code is updated to reflect the currency that a merchant is receiving payments in (for example, if at a given time, the merchant is receiving payments in USD, the merchant’s Local Currency Code will be set in USD).

Wish may, in its sole discretion, update the Local Currency Code of merchant stores at any time, and request that merchants provide product prices in a currency consistent with the Local Currency Code; accordingly, merchants will also receive payments in the same currency consistent with the Local Currency Code.

To learn more on how to set localized prices for your new and existing products, check out the links:

Manual:

CSV:

API:

Frequently Asked Questions for United Kingdom-based merchants:

1. What does the ‘Local Currency’ mean to merchants?

Merchants have the ability to set localized pricing for their existing and new product listings based on the Local Currency Code in the Currency Settings section of the Merchant Dashboard Account > Payment Settings page.

Before January 14, 2020 12:00AM UTC, the Local Currency Code was defined based on where the merchant does business. Starting January 14, 2020 12:00AM UTC, the definition of the Local Currency Code is updated to reflect the currency that a merchant is receiving payments in (for example, if at a given time after January 14, 2020 12:00AM UTC, the merchant is receiving payments in USD, the merchant’s Local Currency Code will be set in USD).

Starting March 23, 2020, all United Kingdom-based merchants are able to directly update their stores’ Local Currency Code from USD to GBP at their own discretion. Please see below for more details.

Again, Wish may, in its sole discretion, update the Local Currency Code of merchant stores at any time, and request that merchants provide product prices in a currency consistent with the Local Currency Code; accordingly, merchants will also receive payments in the same currency consistent with the Local Currency Code.

2. Where do merchants view their current Local Currency Code?

A store’s current Local Currency Code can be found in the Currency Settings section of the Merchant Dashboard Account > Payment Settings page.

Merchants may also view their Currency Settings via API, specifically, GET /api/v3/merchant/currency_settings (relevant API documentation here).

3. What are the Local Currencies currently supported for United Kingdom-based merchants?

Currently for United Kingdom-based merchants, Wish supports USD ($) and GBP (£) as the available Local Currency Codes.

Starting March 23, 2020, if a merchant updates his/her store’s Local Currency Code to GBP, merchant only needs to provide product and shipping prices in GBP.

If a store's Local Currency Code remains in USD ($), merchant only needs to provide product and shipping prices in USD, and prices in all other localized currencies are optional.

4. Can I edit my store's Local Currency Code on Wish?

United Kingdomn-based merchants whose stores’ Local Currency Code is in USD as of March 23, 2020 are able to manually update their stores’ Local Currency Code from USD to GBP at their own discretion. Once the update to GBP is completed, merchants are not able to switch it back to USD.

To manually update the Local Currency Code, first go to the Currency Settings section of the Account > Payment Settings page on Merchant Dashboard:

After carefully reading through the Q&As on the right-hand side, once merchants decide to initiate the update to their stores’ Local Currency Code from USD to GBP, click “Get started” to begin.

A popup modal follows, allowing merchants to initiate the update and view all details around the update they are about to initiate:

As the example above shows, if a merchant initiates the update on March 23, 2020, the update will be completed by Wish on March 30, 2020 (7 calendar days after the “Update Initiated on” date).

Starting on the update completion day (i.e. March 30, 2020), the merchant’s Local Currency Code will be in GBP, and all product and shipping prices previously with USD amounts set will be automatically converted to GBP.

These new GBP amounts will be converted based on the average USD <> GBP exchange rate during the 30 calendar days immediately prior to the day this merchant initiates the update (i.e. March 23, 2020) to the Local Currency Code, in this case, the average exchange rate of 0.7755 from February 22, 2020 to March 23, 2020).

In addition, starting March 30, 2020, the merchant only needs to provide product and shipping prices in GBP.

In the “What should I keep in mind” section, a few additional key pieces of information are presented to merchants. Specifically, merchants need to set PayPal as their payment provider before initiating the update to GBP as PayPal is the only payment provider that supports receiving payments in Pound sterling. In the Currency Settings section of the Payment Settings page, Merchants will not be able to initiate the update if they are using a non-PayPal payment provider:

After reviewing & confirming all details in the popup modal above, click the “Update Local Currency Code to GBP (£)” button to proceed.

Next, the popup modal will disappear and merchants will be redirected to the Currency Settings section of the Payment Settings page, where they can see the pending update as below:

Before the update completion day (in the example above, March 30, 2020), merchants have the option to cancel the update by clicking the “Cancel update” link next to the “Pending” Update Status. Once done, the update is cancelled and the store’s Local Currency Code is back to USD:

Merchants may choose to update again at another time by clicking the “Update your Local Currency Code to GBP (£)” button here.

If no cancellation is made by merchants before the update completion day, merchants’ Local Currency Code will be updated to GBP as planned, and merchants will be able to see the following on their Payment Settings page, starting on the update completion day:

Once again, note that once the store’s Local Currency Code is updated from USD to GBP, merchants can no longer switch it back to USD.

5. Will I be paid in my Local Currency?

For merchants who update their stores’ Local Currency Code from USD to GBP starting March 23, 2020 based on the steps above, their orders released (i.e. available for fulfillment) after the update completion day will be paid in GBP.

6. What are some API changes I need to be aware of?

The localized_price, localized_shipping, localized_currency_code, localized_cc, and any other price-related fields with “localized_” will be mandatory for merchants whose Local Currency Code is GBP (not required for merchants whose Local Currency Code is USD). The following API endpoints are impacted:

/product/add

/product/update-shipping

/product/update-multi-shipping

/product/add-variation

/product/update-variation

/variant/add

/variant/update

ERPs are able to use the API endpoint /api/v2/get-currency-code to retrieve the merchant’s localized_currency_code. This API endpoints also returns the parameter: payment_currency_code, which represents the currency at which the merchant will be paid in at this time.

In addition, if merchants’ payment_currency_code = GBP, all price-related fields in the get pathways will return 999999 for the USD values. Please consume localized_ parameters instead.

The product and order API endpoints related to the new local currency API feature have been changed:

currency_code is now a response to all the following order pathways. Currency_code indicates the currency for all price-related fields for the related order. Currency_code returns need to be appropriately consumed by ERPs/private APIs for accurate records and/or displays of price-related fields for an order.

/order

/order/multi-get

/order/get-fulfill

/ticket

/ticket/get-action-required

For more details about the local currency API changes, merchants and EPRs may visit this API documentation.

7. I use PayPal to receive payments. How does using PayPal impact receiving payments in GBP?

PayPal is available to merchants with Local Currency Code set as USD or GBP, or who receive payments in USD or GBP.

In addition, PayPal is the only payment provider that supports receiving payments in GBP. For merchants who choose to update their stores’ Local Currency Code from USD to GBP, they can initiate the update only when they are using PayPal as the payment provider. Merchants using non-PayPal as their payment providers are not able to initiate the update until they switch to PayPal.

8. What other fees or amounts will be in GBP?

PB (ProductBoost) fees will also be converted to GBP based on the latest currency exchange rate at the time of when the fees or infractions are created.

In addition, as merchants update their stores’ Local Currency Code to GBP, merchants are able to manage their ProductBoost directly in GBP. As such, merchants are able to recharge their ProductBoost Balance and create new campaigns in GBP. All auto-renewed campaigns from existing campaigns with USD amounts will also be in GBP in this case, where the campaigns’ budget, spend, and GMV values in USD for the auto-renewed campaign will be converted from the previous USD amounts to GBP amounts using the USD <> GBP exchange rate at the time of campaign renewal. Merchants’ existing ProductBoost Balance and ProductBoost Credit will also be converted to GBP 7 calendar days after merchants initiate the Local Currency Code update to GBP (see details above), based on the latest USD <> GBP exchange at the time of conversion.

Note that PB fees are generated every Monday. The timestamp of when the exchange rate is based on will be displayed on the PB Fee ID Summary page.

Consolidation payments, one-off payments, or one-off infractions will be converted to GBP based on the exchange rate value at 12:00AM Pacific Time on each disbursement date (1st of the month and 15th of the month).

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