Hasta La Gadget!

If you haven’t used your mobile phone to initiates some kind of financial transaction, then you better get on board because it is quickly becoming the fastest-growing segment in the consumer financial world. According to IDC Financial Insights, the number of consumers using their smartphones to complete online or offline transactions has doubled as of May 2012.

The research group also noted that prepaid debit cards are also growing at an almost unparalleled rate. Why group that finding in with mobile payments? Because it all points to a decrease in the monopolistic power that major banks have been getting used to for decades. For the first time in most people’s lives, you can now go to a store, complete a transaction, and not have any cash on hand or a credit or debit card, thanks to mobile payments.

This means that players like Chase, Citibank, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, and more need to be on their toes and innovate like they never have before. So what’s next? IDC practice director Aaron McPherson said, “Based on our results, we expect to see continued growth in open-loop prepaid cards and mobile payments next year, and believe that the improvements being offered in electronic-bill delivery will break electronic-bill presentment and payment out of its doldrums as well.”

[via QR Code Press]

US mobile payment use has doubled is written by Mark Raby & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Thought PayPal was done upping its mobile payment game when it unveiled its triangular Square competitor earlier this year? Think again. Despite Here being, well, here, PayPal’s not satisfied having but one way to scan your plastic, and so it’s snapped up Card.io. In case you’ve forgotten, Card.io gathers credit card info visually using a smartphone’s camera — no scanning dongle required — to save fingers and thumbs from having to enter payment info manually. Oh, and for folks fearing that PayPal would pull the plug on other apps’ access to Card.io’s SDK, not to worry — PayPal assures us that Card.io’s technology will remain available to developers.

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets

PayPal buys Card.io visual credit card scanner platform, is neither Here nor there originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Jul 2012 18:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ever since mobile payment pioneer Square started making huge waves in the industry, everyone started swarming into the nascent segment of allowing smartphones to be turned into makeshift credit card terminals. And thus began a war from service providers to offer the lowest possible credit card swipe fees and still be profitable. So you knew this day had to come.

That is, the day when a company would step forward and charge a 0% fee for processing credit card transactions. That’s LevelUp, from Boston company SCVNGR. It’s a QR code-based mobile payment app that previously charged users a 2% fee for all credit card purchases. That was already among the lowest in the business, but SCVNGR thinks it can change the way the entire business model works.

“We think we’ve actually got the model that obviates the need for Interchange to be how payments make money. We think that this is an economic inevitably,” company CEO Seth Priebatsch said in a VentureBeat interview. Square, by comparison, charges a 2.75% fee for every credit card swipe. So how does LevelUp make money? The idea is to monetize customer acquisition and customer loyalty campaigns, with LevelUp only making money when those campaigns pay off – but if they do, it can lead to much more than a measly 2.75%. Read more in the via link below.

[via VentureBeat]

LevelUp goes mobile payments without the fees is written by Mark Raby & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

The newest entry to the wildly and rapidly growing mobile payment environment is a company called Paydiant. It doesn’t expect you to rattle off its name when you’re out talking with your friends about Square and PayPal (because we all do that all the time), but it does want you to realize there are other alternatives to traditional credit card payments, and it has its sights set on QR.

QR codes have so far been used mainly for basic tasks like directing users to micro-sites. So if you go into Best Buy and scan the QR code next to a TV, you’ll go to a special landing page with more information about the product. Paydiant wants to bring that technology to mobile payments. In a VentureBeat interview, Paydiant founder Chris Gardner accused players like Square and Google Wallet of having “Visa envy.”

“We said, hey, regardless if that becomes a viable model, we believe there’s an opportunity for someone to offer mobile wallets and offers solutions to brands,” Gardner said. His company is also looking into NFC technology for when that might become a bit more accessible, but for now it likes the QR code idea. It has regional trials set up with five banks throughout the country and has secured nearly $20 million in funding.

[via VentureBeat]

Paydiant brings QR code option to mobile payment landscape is written by Mark Raby & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Coffee addicts in the United States have been able to pay for their fix using Starbucks’ mobile application for quite some time, but now the same functionality has been extended to customers in Canada and the UK with the launch of an Android app. Anyone who downloads the Starbucks Android app will be able to pay for their orders using a linked Starbucks Card, and also check their balance, locate stores, and transfer balances.

The Android app, which will be available for phones running 2.2 and up, will let you link your Starbucks Card number. After that, you can pay for orders by letting employees scan the barcode that appears on the phone. If you don’t want to jump out of Maps to find a Starbucks store, you can do it straight from within the app.

Users in the United States have a nice new addition to the current app as well. Your Starbucks Card can now be topped up using PayPal, and the app has support for all major credit cards too. Starbucks says there are now over 14,000 locations worldwide that can accept mobile payments, and that number is getting bigger every day.

Starbucks launches Android app in UK and Canada is written by Ben Kersey & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.