How do people in Finland pay online?
Most Finns shop online. Eurostat puts the share of people who bought something online in the previous 12 months at 82.04% in 2025, against an EU average of 73.56%.
Online bank payments come first. PostNord’s spring 2025 survey of Finnish consumers found that the online bank payment, where the shopper picks their bank at checkout and approves the payment in the bank’s service, is still the most preferred method. Its popularity is falling, especially among older shoppers, while credit and debit cards and mobile payments such as Google Pay and Apple Pay have grown since 2024.
Card payments online keep rising. The Bank of Finland reported that Finnish payment cards made 141 million remote payments, those started on a computer or in a mobile app, in April to June 2026. That was 13% more than a year earlier, worth EUR 6 billion and 27% of the value of all card payments. In total, Finnish cards made 680 million payments worth EUR 20.6 billion in the quarter.
MobilePay is the local wallet. Vipps MobilePay reported 2.86 million Finnish MobilePay users at the end of 2025, with more than 228,000 joining during the year, and said its Finnish e-commerce revenue grew 79% in 2025, the fastest of its markets. On a computer the shopper enters their phone number and approves the payment in the app; on a phone the app opens directly.
What rules shape online payments in Finland?
Payment options have a set order. Under chapter 6, section 12 b of the Consumer Protection Act, an online store must list payment methods without credit first, then methods that may include credit, then credit methods, and may not use any method as the default choice. The rule also applies to payment service providers and lenders where they can influence how methods are shown. An amendment of 4 September 2026 (835/2026) adds that a provider of a deferred payment method must verify the shopper’s identity with strong electronic identification when the method is accepted.
Card surcharges are banned. Section 46 of the Payment Services Act says a payee may not charge for the use of payment instruments covered by the EU rules on card interchange fees, or for payment services under the EU SEPA regulation.
Shoppers have 14 days to withdraw. For goods, the period starts when the shopper receives them. The store must refund without delay and at the latest 14 days after the withdrawal notice, by the payment method the shopper used and at no cost to them, and may hold the refund until the goods come back or the shopper shows they have sent them. For contracts made through a website or app, the act now also requires a clearly labelled withdrawal function that stays available for the whole withdrawal period.
VAT is 25.5%. The general rate rose from 24% on 1 September 2024. Food, books, medicines and several services moved to a reduced rate of 13.5% on 1 January 2026, down from 14%, and newspapers and magazines stay at 10%. A seller established in another EU country whose cross-border sales to consumers across the EU pass EUR 10,000 a year charges Finnish VAT on sales to Finnish customers, and can declare it through the One Stop Shop.
Card payments need strong customer authentication. Since 14 September 2019, payment service providers across the EU have had to confirm the shopper with two of three factors: something they know, something they own or something they are. The European Commission describes the rule as applying to online payments above EUR 30, with a number of exemptions.
How would Omno route payments in Finland?
A merchant would connect once and set routing rules per method, currency and customer group. In Finland:
- Online bank payments would go to a provider that connects Finnish banks, with the hosted checkout listing the banks and the order pending until the provider confirms the payment.
- Card pay-ins would follow the merchant’s rules by card type and amount, with cascading to the next provider in the rule when a provider is unavailable or rejects the request, until one accepts. Apple Pay and Google Pay would follow the same card rules.
- MobilePay pay-ins would go to a provider connected to Vipps MobilePay, with the amount reserved when the shopper approves and captured when the merchant fulfils the order.
- Pay later options would sit after the methods without credit in the hosted checkout, as the Consumer Protection Act requires.
Webhooks would report the final status of every payment, the record a back office should trust before shipping an order, and the routing-decision log would show which provider handled each payment and why.
What should merchants plan for?
Plan for online bank payments. They are still what Finnish shoppers prefer, so the checkout should list the main Finnish banks next to cards.
Plan for the payment order. Methods without credit come first, credit methods last, and nothing is pre-selected.
Plan for MobilePay and phone wallets. MobilePay’s Finnish e-commerce revenue grew 79% in 2025, and Apple Pay and Google Pay are growing too.
Plan for the 25.5% VAT rate. Prices need the general rate, and food and books the 13.5% rate in force since January 2026.