Tag: mobile payments

This new service is geared toward companies that receive funds through traditional paper checks.

WePay, a startup located in Palo Alto, California, has just announced that it is taking its first steps into the mobile payments marketplace by using its technology to help to replace paper checks.

The first app from the company was released last week and is designed for use by iOS only.

Though the company had previously provided online services, this app opens it up to mobile payments on iPhones and iPads. The application allows both the owners and employees of small sized businesses to be able to process credit card transactions and create invoices through their tablets and smartphones.

Though this may sound similar to other mobile payments services, it does stand out in some ways.

According to the CEO of WePay, Bill Clerico, though it may sound as though it is somewhat like Square or GoPayments, it is unlike them because it does not use an external credit card reading devices in order to make the transactions faster to process. Instead, the digits of the cards will be entered into this system the “old fashioned” way, but using a numeric keypad to type them in.

Clerico explained that “If you’re running a food truck or something where you have hundreds of customers a day, there is no way you’re going to use our app,” however he did go on to say that the app is not aimed at those customers. Instead, it is meant for businesses that employ 10 or fewer people, and whose transactions are primarily made up of checks. He explained that “I think our biggest competitor is paper.”

Clerico also added that when all is said and done, this mobile payments app means that small businesses can process transactions in a number of different ways, and this will help to keep them all in one place. He believes that this is an important step for the company, as smartphones and tablets are becoming increasingly important for processing, and desktops are losing importance in this area. He feels that the niche that his company has found will help to secure its position in the “noisy” market.

Though these two industry giants are working together, it is still unlikely that it will be enough.

Samsung and Visa have recently announced their mobile payments partnership that will have the PayWave app automatically installed in all of the Galaxy S4 smartphones, but most experts in the industry agree that this still won’t be enough to lead to mass adoption of the service.

This channel has seen considerable struggles in getting started, but this likely won’t be enough to make the difference.

It is particularly unlikely that this extra step toward mobile payments will lead to much of a difference overnight. The partnership brings the Visa service together with the Samsung NFC technology that would allow consumers to use their smartphones to tap a reader at a point of sale in order to quickly and easily complete a purchase transaction.

The devices with the mobile payments technology and app will become available next week.

It is unlikely that the mobile payments will begin to occur with any great impact as of that point. Experts feel that while this type of move is important so that potential users will have the technology that is required to actually use a wallet over their smartphones, those owners still don’t quite have the desire to use it as of yet.

Eden Zoller, a researcher from Ovum, said that “Ovum’s consumer survey showed that usage of mobile payments is still very low for most people and this clearly needs to be change if mobile payments are to become mainstream.” That said, she also pointed out that it is still very important to add the NFC technology equipped devices to the market so that as users become interested, they will have what is needed and be familiar with it.

Similarly, Forrester analyst Clement Teo said that adding the payWave app from Visa is only one of a large number of efforts that will be needed to plunge the world into the use of mobile payments. He pointed out that there are many players, and they will all need to align for the explosion of use to actually occur.

Teo added that “The popularity of Samsung handsets is but one factor for mobile payments, but it also depends on the type of payments.”