Comprehensive Skrill Review 2022 by Ewallet specialist

Skrill . Skrill started in 2001 and has gone through numerous changes over the years. We’ve seen them grow from a startup digital wallet provider to become a huge multi-national financial behemoth.

But that doesn’t answer perhaps the most important questions you’ll ask when deciding who to trust with your hard-earned money - is Skrill safe, legit, and actually worth using? 

Today’s Topics Include:

• What is Skrill?
  • Is Skrill safe?
  • Is Skrill legit?
• Skrill Review:
  • Skrill fees
  • Skrill security
  • Skrill customer support
  • Skrill VIP programme
  • Skrill pros & cons
• Final verdict

What is Skrill?

As with all reviews, it’s important to start with the basics. Before you know it, we’ll be discussing fees, security, and customer service (you know, the nitty-gritty), but in the meantime let’s talk about the super simple stuff.

First off, let’s answer the three most commonly-asked questions we see on Volume Kings - what the heck is Skrill, is Skrill safe, and is it legit?

Skrill, formerly known as MoneyBookers, was established in the United Kingdom in 2001. Originally, it was created as an alternative to PayPal and has since grown into a number of secondary markets. Skrill was bought by the Paysafe Group in 2015 for roughly €1.1 billion.

At its basest definition, Skrill is a digital wallet provider that offers a broad range of options to send and receive money, both locally and internationally.

As a U.K.-based company, Skrill is regulated by the British Financial Conduct Authority. This means that it’s held to a number of extremely strict rules and regulations.

Nonetheless, a bit of prudence can’t hurt - if you’re still worried about safety, take a peek at the Skrill Privacy Policy. (Be sure to select your country and language in the top right corner, as these policies change by the country.)

Is Skrill Safe?

If you’re planning on trusting Skrill with your money (no matter how much or how little), it’s vital that you know that they’re going to keep your money and personal information secure.

The long and short of it is that Skrill takes multiple steps to ensure both your money and personal information are secure as possible. They've been in the business for quite a long time, and over the years have developed a foolproof way to protect their customers - after all, if they couldn't keep our money safe, we wouldn't be talking about them, would we?

In short, not only is Skrill safe, but it’s one of the safest methods in which to send and receive money internationally.

Is Skrill Legit?

As discussed above, Skrill is completely legit. They are an incorporated company in the U.K., owned by a U.S.-based company (PaySafe Group), meaning they’re heavily regulated by both the English FCA and the American SEC. 

Skrill primarily serves gambling and trading related customers. While those outside of the U.K. and EU may not be used to online gambling (with or without Skrill), it’s worth remembering that gambling is not only legal in some countries but extremely common. This is especially true when compared to places like the United States, which highly regulate and restrict when, where, and how gambling can occur.

Additionally, as Skrill operates in well over 100 countries, they maintain a strict set of guidelines that ensure they operate within the bounds of all local laws.

In short, Skrill is legit, heavily secured, and dedicated to keeping all of its customers’ financial and personal information as safe as possible.

Skrill Review: The Breakdown

It’s finally time for the nitty-gritty. So, let’s talk about the really in-depth things most people worry about. Namely fees, security, customer support, coverage, the VIP programme, and the overall pros and cons of Skrill’s total combined services.

First up are Skrill's fees.

Skrill Fees

If you’d like to see a detailed breakdown of all of Skrill’s fees, read our guide to Skrill's fees. Otherwise, here are the basics:

• All fees and limits are severely limited for unverified Skrill accounts, and both fees and limits decrease as you gain VIP levels.

• Most domestic (in-country) transactions are fee-free for verified Skrill users. 

• Most international transactions charge between a 1-2.99% fee, depending on your chosen method.

• Bank transfers are free, debit/bank transfers via Sofort or Klarna are 1%, and credit cards are generally 2.99% (varying by card carrier).

• Currency conversion takes a *3.99% fee.
  • *This fee drops drastically as you gain Skrill VIP Status to 3.19% with Silver VIP, 2.79% with Gold VIP, and only 2.39% for Diamond VIP members.

• Inactive accounts are charged €5 per month after 12 months of inactivity.

All withdrawal fees have a minimum of €5.50 or up to 3.99% fee, with the fees getting higher for withdrawals to credit or debit cards, rather than bank accounts.

All Skrill fees can be found on Skrill’s Fee page.

Overall, Skrill’s fees are quite competitive when compared to other, similar services, but there are some exceptions. If you have access to a bank account, a majority of your transactions will be near-instant and fee-free, but those who need to use a credit, debit, or Paysafe card will find that the fees can rack up quite quickly. 

It’s worth noting that the industry standard for fees in e-commerce and digital wallets ranges between 1.5% - 3.5%, making Skrill’s fees below the industry standard for most bank wire transactions.

All in all, Skrill’s fees are quite reasonable, especially if you plan to make a majority of your transfers via bank wire. There are, however, exceptions - so be aware of what you’ll incur before making transactions.

Skrill Security

Skrill is highly secure. In fact, they’ve worked on their security and verification policies to the point that they’re generally more secure than services like PayPal. Once two-factor authentication is added (highly recommended, by the way), Skrill is one of the most secure non-bank places you can store money.

Skrill Coverage

So where is Skrill available? 

Skrill is currently available in well over 100 countries, with access to 40 global currencies. 

They are accepted at a number of both physical (when using the Skrill prepaid card) and virtual retailers (detailed in our article on where to use Skrill) and are incredibly common with most online gambling, forex, and cryptocurrency sites due to their extremely secure payment gateway and broad range of accessible currencies.

And, if that weren't enough, you can use the Skrill prepaid Mastercard or Visa to spend your Skrill balance anywhere that accepts Mastercard or Visa.

Currently, Skrill is available in most EU/EEA (European Union/European Economic Area) countries, the U.K., North America (Canada/U.S.), and a number of countries across Asia and Africa. In case you’re wondering, though, here’s their list of non-serviced countries. 

Skrill Customer Support

Skrill’s one major downside is their customer service and support. If you’ve done even a rudimentary Google search on their name (let alone on MoneyBookers), you already know this, though. Skrill doesn’t have any brick-and-mortar locations and doesn’t provide easy access to any form of live customer support.

Most users that find they need help report waiting up to two weeks, only to be told via email that the customer support agent can’t actually do anything. This is especially bad for users experiencing issues with the following:

Locked out of funds

Often due to using a Mastercard to deposit funds, which in some countries (such as the United States) cannot be used for a number of services on Skrill, like gambling or cryptocurrency trading.

Unable to verify their account

Often due to an issue finding documents that are “verifiable,” as Skrill’s automated verification program is not great, and customer support can’t personally verify documents.

General inquiries

Even rudimentary questions can take over a week to get answered, if they even are at all. If you’re working on a timeline, you will likely be unable to get help day-of.

While Skrill does have a chatbot (Sophia), it’s highly limited in what it can and cannot answer, and is very rarely actually helpful.

Importantly, though, VIP members are given priority on customer support. This is actually a major part of the reason that you see these complaints so often - Skrill has a lot of VIP members, which means they need to dedicate their support teams to VIPs first and standard/non-verified members last.

This is one of the best possible reasons to connect Skrill to your Volume Kings account - you get faster access to VIP Silver through Fast Silver, meaning lower wait times, better rates on various transactions, and more.

Skrill VIP Programme

Skrill offers an extremely generous VIP programme which offers a number of incentives to those that use their service regularly. It’s worth noting that the requirements to achieve various levels of VIP status require that you spend between €15,000-90,000 per financial quarter (three months), so these VIP levels are generally reserved for high rollers as they spend more than the average user.

VIP users on Skrill get access to reduced fees on most transactions, higher spending/transaction limits, and access to unique rewards like tickets to sporting events and a reward system called Skrill Knect, among other things.

Check out our guide to the Skrill VIP Programme here for more information.

Skrill Pros & Cons

If you’d like to see a direct comparison between Skrill and other similar services, check out our comparisons between Skrill and Neteller, Payoneer, or Revolut.

Pros:

• The most widely accepted form of payment for online gambling, forex trading, and cryptocurrency exchange.
• Extremely secure

• Fast (near-instant) payment processing with most forms of payment

• Prepaid card

• Can be used with brick-and-mortar retailers and virtual merchants anywhere Mastercard or Visa is accepted.

• Can be used to withdraw your Skrill wallet funds from ATMs

• Both business and individual accounts are available on Skrill, whereas many other services (such as EcoPayz) only offer individual accounts.
• Unlike other services, you can still use an unverified account for rudimentary, highly limited transactions such as sending money to a friend on Skrill. The limits can be as low as €130 a month (or your local currency’s equivalent amount) on withdrawals, deposits, and transfers.
• Wide application - both mobile and desktop, Android and iOS.

• High-quality mobile app
• An excellent digital wallet option for those in the U.K., EU/EAA, and many parts of Africa and Asia.

Cons

• No live customer service or support*
  • *They do have an (occasionally useful) chatbot, named Sophia, and provide priority support to VIP members.

• Long verification process (up to 5 business days*)
  • *Unless, that is, you register for Skrill via Volume Kings, fast-tracking your verification process to a matter of minutes.

• Skrill is extremely limited in the United States, though this affects a very small portion of global users.

Final Verdict

If you are in an EU/EEA  country, chances are that you will find a great deal of use in Skrill - especially if you’re into online gambling, forex trading, or buying/selling cryptocurrency. Users in the United States will find that their use is a bit more restricted than their European brethren, though Skrill still offers quite reasonable fees on certain transactions when compared to their competitors. And Skrill’s surprisingly large global service coverage and broad range of accepted currencies, means they’re fantastic for online merchants and businesses who sell internationally.

However, when it comes to customer service and support, Skrill stumbles in an understandable (if somewhat frustrating) way. Skrill treats their VIPs like, well, VIPs. This means that they get priority service, better rates, and lower fees - and considering that they have millions of monthly users, they will eventually need to push non-VIP customers to the wayside.

We gave Skrill a score of 8/10, as their services are quite well-designed and offer seamless, secure, and fast payment in a number of countries that are often ignored by similar services. While all points docked were due to their customer service to non-VIP members, this is ultimately an easy problem to solve - register for Skrill via VolumeKings and get fast-tracked for Silver VIP status.

Be sure to check out our “Skrill Basics” series for a full breakdown of all of Skrill’s little tiny details.