Overview
- Credit cards remain the best choice for high‑value or international purchases because Visa and Mastercard enforce chargebacks that let issuers reverse disputed payments and PSD2 forces two‑factor authentication for many online card transactions.
- Apple Pay and Google Pay add a privacy and fraud shield by tokenizing card numbers and asking for device biometrics so merchants never see your real card details.
- The Girocard is fine for trusted German shops but is rarely accepted online and usually works as a SEPA direct debit, which gives banks discretion over reversals rather than a guaranteed chargeback right.
- PayPal is widely used and offers its own buyer‑protection process but carries risks from account takeover, limits on which payments are covered, U.S. data‑jurisdiction rules, and the platform has not been addable to Google Wallet since April 2026.
- Consumer advisers this week warned that buy‑now‑pay‑later and multiple invoice or instalment plans can pile up unnoticed, so shoppers should track due dates with a simple list or calendar and treat pending payments as already spent.