Compared Venmo to Zelle for contractor payments and one drained my patience fast

Venmo held my $850 for 5 days after a job while Zelle clears instantly, so which one do you guys use when you need the money same day?

3 comments

3 Comments

wesley_thompson1mo ago

My electrician hit me with a $1200 bill for a panel swap and I sent it through Venmo because that's what he had. Three days later it was still sitting there as pending and he was texting me asking if I actually sent it. Zelle would have had it in his account before he even packed up his tools. I get that Venmo has its place for splitting dinner tabs with friends but for work payments it feels like they're just sitting on your cash to collect interest or something. Do you think they hold larger amounts longer on purpose?

taylor.paige1mo ago

Its wild how every payment app has this one thing theyre not good at. Venmo is great for splitting pizza but bad for real bills. Zelle is fast but its tied to your bank so if you use the wrong bank you get errors. Cashapp is in the middle somewhere. @wesley_thompson youre right they probably hold bigger payments longer to make a little interest off it before releasing it.

andrew_miller9026d ago

Huh, I mean I guess? I've sent some decent sized payments through Venmo and never had them take more than a day or two tops. But your mileage may vary depending on the bank and all that. I'm not totally convinced they're sitting on big payments for interest, feels like a lot of conspiracy theory talk when it could just be their fraud detection being slow. Either way, for a $1200 bill I'd probably just use Zelle or a wire transfer to be safe, but that's just me.