How Long Does Selling Crypto Take? The Three Stages Before the Money Lands

A provider quotes the part of the sale it runs. The rest of the wait belongs to your user and to the network they send over.

• Nothing starts until the user's transfer lands, and a provider's published number does not cover that stage, because that transfer is not the provider's to run.
• Once the crypto arrives, the provider's own conditions decide when fiat moves. With Mercuryo, those are receipt of the asset plus the required AML checks.
• Fiat then goes to the card the user selected, and that is the part a provider can quote a time for.
• You can shorten the first stage and explain the second. What the user sees while each stage runs is yours to write.

A sale starts with a deposit address and a window to send to it. Until that transfer lands, there is nothing for a provider to process, and no published number describes it.

The user chooses when to send and which network to send over, so this is the one stage where your product can speed things up.

Settle two things with any provider. Ask how long the window is, and what happens to crypto that arrives after it. The answers decide what your status screens have to say.

In Mercuryo's flow, the user has six hours to send. Crypto arriving after that is credited to their Mercuryo Wallet as a regular crypto deposit rather than converted to fiat. The return address they enter at the start is used if there is an error on Mercuryo's side.

A visible clock and a reminder put the deadline in front of the user, and that is the influence your side has at this stage.

And the return address is worth collecting properly. It is where the crypto goes when something on the provider's side fails. A user who typed it carelessly becomes a harder support case later.

Fiat moves when the provider has the asset and its required checks are satisfied. Until both are true, the sale is still in progress.

This is the stage where users start writing in. The crypto has left their wallet, and nothing has arrived in its place.

So this stage is the kitchen, and your support team is the waiter. All the waiter can do is come back and say where the order is.

Worth asking a provider what has to be true before fiat moves, and whether anything in that stage can be chased.

Mercuryo states the condition plainly. An Off-Ramp order is finalized once the crypto asset is received at the designated wallet address and all AML checks have been satisfied.

This is work for your support macros, and it only has to be written once.

Without it, each agent answers differently, and some of those answers will contain a timing promise you cannot keep.

Once a provider has the crypto and its checks are satisfied, the remaining work is converting and paying out. That is the part it can quote a time for.

So ask any provider which part of the process its published time covers. The answer is the one that matters, and it is rarely the whole sale.

Mercuryo describes Off-Ramp as converting crypto to fiat and withdrawing it to Visa or Mastercard, all within minutes. The payout goes to the card the user selected during the flow.

The number describes conversion and payout. Move it to the top of your flow, and it reads as though it also covers a transfer your user has not sent yet.

Put it where the provider's work begins, and a slow sale points at the transfer, which is where the delay sat. Put it at the start, and the same sale looks like a fault in your product.

This map usually gets worked out after the fact, in a support thread. A user sold two hours ago, the money is not on the card, and three people on your side are each fairly sure it belongs to one of the other two.

Your team can see where a sale stands. Your user sees an address, and then nothing until the money appears, and that distance is where the questions come from.

Here is the same sale mapped in advance, with one table per stage and the user's view in between.

↓ Your user should be reading: "Your transfer has not arrived yet. 5h 40m left to send."

↓ Your user should be reading: "We have your crypto. The sale is being processed."

↓ Your user should be reading: "Your money is on its way to your card."

↓ The money reaches the card.

Read the tables down the lever row. In every stage but the first, what you control is the wording.

What your product can change happens before any quoted number begins, and everything after it belongs to somebody else. The number describing their work does not cover a transfer your user has not sent.

Once you see it, the work moves from chasing time you do not control to telling the user what is happening while they wait. The next question is whether the money can reach this particular user at all.

If you are scoping a cash-out flow and want to check these stages against your own markets, get in touch with us.

• How long does it take to sell crypto and receive the money? It depends on where you start counting. A provider's number describes its own work, which begins once it has the crypto. The transfer before that depends on the user and the network they choose.
• Why is a crypto sale taking so long? Check first whether the crypto has arrived at all. Once a provider has it, the sale is completed when its required checks are satisfied, and the payout is sent to the card.
• What happens if a user sends the crypto too late? That varies by provider. Settle it before you design the flow. With Mercuryo, the send window is six hours, and crypto arriving later is credited to the user's Mercuryo Wallet as crypto rather than converted to fiat.
• Can support speed up a sale that is already processing? The useful support action at that point is an accurate explanation of where the sale stands. The timing is set by the provider's own process.