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The reality shocked me. The systems I evaluate professionally failed completely when tested by crisis. Having dozens of payment options didn't mean having easy payment options.
I was born in Jamaica, spent part of my childhood there, and my father's family has deep roots in Black River — the capital of St. Elizabeth parish. When Hurricane Melissa devastated the community on Oct. 28, the damage was catastrophic: family homes destroyed or significantly damaged, the 40+ year-old family supermarket and factory damaged, even the nearly 200-year-old church reduced to rubble. Everyone we knew lost their home, their roof or their business.
Our extended family immediately mobilized to pool emergency funds. Someone needed to coordinate the money coming in and get it to Jamaica fast for immediate supplies — roofing materials, mattresses, clean water, clothing. I volunteered to handle the finances.
Money started flowing in from England, Amsterdam, Canada and the U.S. — all through what I thought were efficient international transfer services. The reality: Between currency conversion fees, transfer fees and exchange rate markups on both ends, nearly 10% disappeared into payment infrastructure before even reaching Jamaica. The first two donations from family in England and Amsterdam: $485. What actually arrived for emergency supplies: roughly $440. In a few weeks, I raised $20,000. Every transfer, large or small, meant losing more time and money.
To put this in context: Most nonprofits aim to keep administrative overhead under 15%-20% of donations. The payment rails themselves consumed 10% — more than half of what many organizations spend on administrative overhead — before purchasing a single tarpaulin, mattress or bottle of clean water. This reveals infrastructure designed for convenience, not crisis: When emergency relief loses 10% to payment rails alone, the system isn't serving those who need it most.
As money was coming in to me very quickly from various places, I set up multiple accounts strategically: a business banking platform for tracking, an international transfer service for Jamaica, and popular P2P apps including Venmo, Cash App, and Zelle for easy donations.
The reality?
Friends and family couldn't quickly send money directly to the business platform — their traditional banks rejected the routing number or required — at best — three-to-five-day verifications. Money took as long as two weeks to move through the system. And the fundamental issue: These services don't interoperate. Peer-to-peer apps can't connect to each other, P2P apps can't connect to international transfer services and business banking platforms operate in isolation.
I realized very quickly that the system isn't built for urgency. It's built for convenience when urgency doesn't matter.
This experience revealed fundamental flaws in our financial infrastructure. The payments industry has optimized for splitting brunch tabs, not crisis response — peer-to-peer transactions work well for brunch, while emergency aid and cross-border family support remain clunky and expensive. Despite decades of "digital transformation," interoperability is still broken: Each platform protects its walled garden while consumers pay the price in fees and friction.
Those who need money fastest in emergencies may pay the highest rates, and those sending to developing nations face penalty pricing. Perhaps most frustrating is how the system forces false choices: "business" or "personal" accounts, when disaster relief coordination fits neither category. Traditional remittance services requiring powered pickup locations became useless when 72% of Jamaica lost electricity. The Black River community did not get electricity restored for nearly two months.
What about cryptocurrency? Stablecoins like USDC promised to solve cross-border payments, but in this situation, they add complexity rather than eliminating it. USDC can't buy water — it requires conversion to local currency through centralized exchanges with fees, defeating the "no intermediary" promise. A crypto wallet requires the same electricity and internet infrastructure the hurricane destroyed. The "last mile" problem remains unsolved: Instant blockchain settlement is useless when there's no power to access your wallet and no way to convert digital assets to spendable local currency.
This fragmentation probably represents billions in annual inefficiency across the financial system — and a market opportunity. The institutions that solve crisis payments won't just serve consumers better; they'll capture loyalty and market share from competitors still optimizing for peacetime transactions.
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This experience revealed some opportunities for the industry. First, crisis-tagged transfers that reduce fees, prioritize speed, and work across platforms — not just for hurricanes, but for small businesses making payroll or families pooling resources for medical emergencies. Second, true interoperability standards that let money flow between P2P payment apps, international transfer services and traditional banks as seamlessly as email flows between providers. Third, transparent fee structures showing donors exactly how much reaches recipients across the full transaction chain. Fourth, emergency processing that prioritizes speed over standard risk checks when people need money immediately.
These aren't just consumer benefits — they're competitive advantages for institutions willing to lead.
Here's what this means in practice: The $45 lost to fees in my first transaction could have bought water or medication for distressed and displaced families. The payments industry talks about "financial inclusion" and "democratizing finance," but crisis scenarios expose where innovation has fallen short.
The infrastructure exists to move money instantly, globally and cheaply. We do it for stock trades. We do it for credit card payments. Crisis relief should be no different.
The path forward requires regulatory frameworks that distinguish emergency aid from commercial transactions, industry cooperation that enables true interoperability, product design that accounts for crisis scenarios, and fee structures that recognize when speed matters more than revenue optimization.
Right now, somewhere, someone is refreshing banking apps waiting for crisis or emergency funds to clear. They're calculating fees across multiple platforms, and explaining to family and friends why their perfectly reasonable question — "Can't I use a payment app?" — has a 15-minute answer about routing numbers and platform delays.
We can — and must — do better. The financial institutions that solve crisis payments won't just be doing good — they'll build lasting competitive advantage. The infrastructure problem isn't just what happened in Jamaica. It's happening every time disaster strikes or there is an emergency and families try to help each other across borders.
If consumers receive reliable service during emergencies, they may become long-term loyal customers. In an era of declining institutional trust, being the institution that works when it matters most isn't charity. It's strategy.
