Aeropay is a pay-by-bank payment platform that lets customers pay businesses directly from their checking or savings account, bypassing credit and debit card networks entirely. Instead of swiping a card, you link your bank account once and authorize payments that move through bank transfer rails like ACH, RTP, and FedNow. The system is especially popular in industries where card networks restrict transactions, such as cannabis retail and online gaming.
How a Payment Works From the Customer’s Side
When you choose Aeropay at checkout, the process has three stages: linking your bank, approving the payment, and the money moving behind the scenes.
The first time you use Aeropay, you select your bank from a list of more than 2,700 supported institutions and authenticate through your bank’s own login flow. Typically, this means you’re redirected to your banking app, where you verify your identity using biometrics like Face ID or Touch ID, then you’re sent back to the checkout screen with your account connected. This is a one-time setup. For future purchases, your bank stays linked, so you skip the connection step and simply confirm the payment.
Once you approve a transaction, funds move directly from your bank account to the business’s bank account over established payment rails. There’s no card number involved, no card network in the middle, and no manual entry of account or routing numbers at any point.
What Happens Behind the Scenes
Aeropay’s internal engine, called Aerosync, handles the connection between your bank and the merchant’s system. It uses OAuth, the same secure handoff protocol you encounter when logging into a website with your Google or Apple account. Your bank authenticates you directly, and Aeropay never sees your banking password.
Once your account is verified, Aeropay tokenizes your account information. That means your actual account and routing numbers are replaced with a random stand-in code. The merchant never sees your raw banking details. When a payment is triggered, Aeropay assembles compliant transfer files and routes the money through ACH or, where available, real-time payment networks like RTP and FedNow.
Settlement Timing for Merchants
Merchants don’t receive funds instantly, but the timeline is relatively fast. For retail merchants, Aeropay batches transactions at 3:00 a.m. CST each day. Payments that fall within that batch window typically appear in the merchant’s bank account the next business day. Payments made over the weekend get bundled into a single batch that processes Monday morning.
Gaming merchants operate on a slightly different schedule, with batching at 12:00 p.m. CST. Weekend payments follow the same Monday-morning processing pattern. Bank holidays are treated like weekends, so if a holiday falls on a weekday, settlement shifts to the next business day.
For reconciliation purposes, merchants can expect credits and debits to land in their business bank account one business day after the batch date.
What It Costs
Aeropay does not publicly list its exact fee schedule, which suggests pricing varies by merchant size, volume, and industry. However, online bank transfer platforms in this category generally charge merchants between 0.5% and 3% of each transaction amount. Some charge a flat fee per transaction, commonly in the range of $0.50 to $3.00, rather than a percentage. Monthly platform fees may or may not apply depending on the plan.
Merchants may also face fees for failed transfers (sometimes called chargebacks in this context), which can range from $0 to $25 per instance. For customers, there’s no publicly documented fee for making a payment through Aeropay. The cost structure is merchant-facing, similar to how credit card processing fees work.
Why Some Industries Rely on It
Aeropay has carved out a niche in industries that card networks like Visa and Mastercard restrict or refuse to serve. Cannabis dispensaries are the most prominent example. Because marijuana remains federally illegal, major card networks block cannabis purchases. This has historically forced dispensaries to operate as cash-only businesses or use workarounds like cashless ATMs, which disguise purchases as generic “miscellaneous transactions.”
Regulators have increasingly scrutinized those workarounds for compliance risks. Aeropay positions itself as a transparent alternative: since the payment moves bank-to-bank without touching card networks, it sidesteps the card restrictions entirely. Aeropay partners with licensed financial institutions and complies with Bank Secrecy Act and anti-money-laundering (BSA/AML) requirements, and it is registered as a money transmitter where required.
Online gaming is another major use case. Gaming operators need fast, reliable deposit and withdrawal methods, and bank transfers give them a compliant payment channel with built-in reporting that satisfies regulatory requirements.
Security and Privacy Protections
Aeropay encrypts all data both in transit (while it’s being sent) and at rest (while it’s stored), using bank-grade encryption protocols. The tokenization system mentioned earlier means that even if a merchant’s system were compromised, attackers would find only meaningless tokens rather than real account numbers.
On the fraud prevention side, Aeropay uses machine-learning models that continuously monitor transactions and user behavior, flagging anomalies before they result in losses. Multi-factor authentication and phone verification block unauthorized account creation, and biometric login support adds another layer for mobile users.
Aeropay is SOC 2 compliant, meaning an independent auditor has verified that its security, availability, and confidentiality controls meet enterprise-grade standards. It also undergoes annual independent audits of its ACH operations to ensure compliance with NACHA, the organization that governs the ACH network. The company states it never sells user data and only partners with accredited data providers.
Merchant Controls and Reporting
Businesses using Aeropay get a portal where they can manage payments, issue refunds, void transactions, and pull reports. Team access is role-based, so a store manager might have different permissions than a finance director. Every action taken in the portal is logged, creating an audit trail for compliance purposes.
The batch reporting system is designed to simplify reconciliation. Merchants can match each batch to the corresponding credit or debit in their bank account, making end-of-day accounting straightforward even with high transaction volumes.