Price-based ramp ranking sounds logical—cheaper is better, right? 

Wrong. This approach is deeply flawed, and it’s hurting your platform more than you realize. Why? 

Because ramp providers are gaming the system. 

They know that by initially offering the lowest price, they can move to the top of your list. But here's the kicker: once they’ve secured the transaction, they hike the price during the transaction flow, leaving your users to pay more than they bargained for.

It’s an all-too-common occurrence. In fact, if you’re a top-tier wallet, it’s happening to you right now, and it’s probably being done by multiple ramp providers.

At Onramper, we call this sneaky practice “quote spoofing”, and it’s been happening across the industry for years.

Here’s how you can check if this happens in your app:

1. Enter an amount of fiat to buy for, and go to the ramp comparison screen.

2. Write down the amount of crypto offered by each ramp provider, and open all onramp widgets.

3. Click-through to the end of the transaction in each widget, and write down the final crypto received.

4. Compare the amounts from step 1 and step 3.

Trust erosion and lost users

What’s the real impact of quote spoofing? First and foremost, it breaks trust. 

Your users come to your platform expecting transparency and the best experience to access crypto. But when they see prices increase mid-transaction, they feel deceived. Shattered trust isn’t easy to repair.

As conversion rates drop, so does your onboarding volume. That’s a direct hit to your growth, all because price was prioritized over actual conversion rates and user experience.

What’s worse, this practice doesn’t just frustrate users—it also makes their transactions more expensive, which pushes them away even more.

Most ramp providers have been guilty of quote spoofing at one time or another. It’s not because they’re inherently bad actors, but rather because price-based ranking encourages this behavior. 

The problem is systemic. Perverse incentives force ramp providers to prioritize getting picked over being transparent. To insiders, it is a known problem, and one that Onramper has been tackling for years.

Onramper Terminal: A window into the problem

Onramper's clients have been made aware of this practice for a long time. Thanks to the Onramper Terminal, they have insights into the accuracy of quotes and effective fees, giving them the information they need to prevent quote spoofing. 

The Onramper Terminal shines a light on the murky tactics some ramp providers use, providing your platform with the data needed to call them out or change routing for bad actors.

In the Fee Transparency Dashboard that comes with Onramper Enterprise, for example, you get perfect insight into ‘quote accuracy’, showing exactly which ramp providers are guilty of quote spoofing in your ramps marketplace and by how much.

The Onramper Terminal also gives you visibility into how ramps are actually performing. Instead of just relying on price, you can see metrics on quote accuracy, conversion rates, payment authorization rates, and payment methods across your entire ramps stack. 

This allows you to offer your users an experience that’s not only fair but also optimizes for successful transactions.

User loss = lower conversions

Here’s the bottom line: relying on price alone to rank ramps is costing you. It's ripping off your users and results in ramp providers gaming the system and sub-optimal UX.

When users abandon transactions halfway through because of price spikes, your conversion rates plummet. 

Onramps offering lowball quotes just to get picked initially, only to increase prices later, results in more than just bad user experience—it results in fewer completed lifetime transactions. 

And the fewer transactions that go through, the fewer users you onboard. In short, it’s the opposite of what your platform needs.

Moving beyond price-based ranking

So, what’s the fix? 

It’s simple: rank based on more factors than price alone. Platforms that include other metrics, like expected success rates, KYC friction, and payment method compatibility alongside price see higher user satisfaction and better conversion rates.

Imagine offering your users the best onramp for their specific situation, not just the one offering the lowest (and often misleading) quote. 

The result? A better experience for your users and higher completion rates for you. Onramper is leading the charge by providing advanced onramp routing based on pricing, success rate data and user-friction. 

The best part? Our onramp recommendations boost your conversion rates beyond what you think is possible. (More on this in next week’s post!)

Curious to your thoughts,

Thijs

thijs@onramper.com