Hostels Accepting Bitcoin

Hi Juan,

Thanks for the compliment. Today I found an article entitled "The Benefits of Bitcoin in International Travel" which underscores why I think Bitcoin is worth looking at as a currency accepted by hostels.

However, now I'm learning about the Ripple Network which would enable my hostel to receive payment in any currency including fiat currencies and have this currency immediately converted to whatever currency I find most usable to spend. I'm only gently testing these new ways to send money internationally and I recommend anyone else who is interested do the same.

Darren

We are accepting Bitcoin at my hostel.

I have someone working on a handheld device to allow hostels to accept Bitcoin easily. When a guest wants to pay by Bitcoin all the hostel staff has to do is enter the amount to be paid in the hostels local currency and the device will convert this amount into a Bitcoin QR code. The guest scans the code and the device issues a notification of Bitcoing received. Then, depending on how the hostel has configured the device the Bitcoin will either be automatically saved to the hostel's Bitcoin wallet or immediately converted into the hostel's local currency and deposited into a bank account they have designated. We expect this device to cost between $125-150 USD.

Would any hostels purchase and use such a device?

I asked the developer if it would be possible to create a device for the Ripple Network. He said at the moment, he is only focused on developing this for Bitcoin but it's technically feasible to do something like this for Ripple.

For those who don't know what the Ripple Network is, here is a video. It's a network by which a business (or individual) can accept any currency* instantaneously from anywhere in the world and have this automatically converted into any currency they have chosen to hold in their wallet. I'm working to integrate Ripple transaction processing into the hostel front desk system I'm working on so a guest can make a reservation or pay for accommodation in any currency they want and have this immediately converted into a currency the hostel wants to hold. This is another reason I feel OTAs will be obsolete in the future. It's an exciting time.

*currencies can include other cyrpto-digital currencies like Bitcoin, LiteCoin, PrimeCoin, DogeCoin etc. When you think about it, traditional currencies are also converted to a cyrpto-digital format before they are transmitted by credit card or wire transfer.