For single payments (freelance stuff or whatever), Western Union ( http://www.westernunion.com/ ) might be the way to go.

I received money via WU for about a decade with zero problems.

But for online shopping, I don't have an alternative.

Western Union is aimed at transfering money, not buying/selling goods. I had to transfer money to someone with WU and had to ring them up to verify it. They explicitly asked on the phone if I was sending money in exchange for goods, and that they don't support that, and you shouldn't use WU for that.

This is would scare off most customers and is not a good business idea.

I think those kind of checks are country-specific... I always received money here in Uruguay (from Austria and Canada) and nobody called the senders (family members or friends of family).

Still, you're right... Wikipedia says: "Western Union advises its customers not to send money to someone that they have never met in person."

Western Union is very expensive, especially when currency exchange is involved. Maybe once a year I accept a payment from some part of the World where this is the buyer's only option. WU usually eats my margin, but I feel a little better for getting stuff out to where it otherwise wouldn't.

I feel like WU has also been tainted by their frequent use by the 419 scammers.

Does anyone actually want to pay right out of their bank account? I won't even use my debit card online.

In Europe, yes.

Bank transfers are the default form of payment here, until very recently most people didn't even own credit cards.

Even today you can't use credit cards in most supermarkets in Austria, but you can normally pay with a direct bank transfer.

Or chip and pin.