Facebook’s F8 conference has announced a lot of things this year. One of these announcements was to introduce Facebook Messenger as a separate platform and opening it up for developers. This means developers can now create third party applications that can utilize information the Messenger platform offers, and create feature rich experiences for users.
However, this didn’t come as a surprise to many of us, as a couple of weeks ago Facebook introduced a payment method within its Messenger enabling users to send money to people in their friends list. In this post, we will discuss this payment method and what it actually means for Facebook.
Payments In Messenger
The new payment feature lets you connect your Visa or Mastercard debit card with Facebook Messenger. After that, all you have to do is tap a “$” button to send friends money on iOS, Android, and desktop, with zero fees. Facebook Messenger payments will be rolled out first in the U.S. over the coming months.
Once launched, users will see a “$” sign next to send photos and sticker button. Upon tapping that button, Messenger will ask them to enter their debit card info. For now, users can only use Visa and Mastercard debit cards. Facebook is not allowing credit cards to avoid any additional charges to their users.
As for security, users will be asked to set an in-app payments passcode or Apple TouchID fingerprint to confirm transfers. If users already have a debit card on record with Facebook from gaming, ads or donations, they can use that too.
Once the $ button is pressed, users enter the dollar amount and hit Pay. The money will be instantly transferred from their debit account and delivered to the recipient’s account. However, it may take a couple of days before the recipient can actually withdraw that cash, as banks usually take a few days to transfer funds. Both users see a confirmation message detailing the transfer status and time.
In case anything looks strange or suspicious, Facebook will ask users some extra security questions before allowing you to complete a transaction. Users can see all their previous payments and funds received in the Payments History section of the Messenger’s settings.
“Conversations about money are already happening on Messenger,” said Steve Davis, Facebook’s product manager. “People chat about bar tabs, splitting dinner bills, and sharing the cost of an Uber. What we want to do is make it easy to finish the conversation in the same place you started. You don’t have to switch to another app.”
Clearly Facebook Messenger seems to be following the trails of WeChat. As of November 2014, WeChat has 468 million active users and it is the number one social messaging app in China. WeChat allow its users to make payments, e-commerce purchases, hail taxis and more.
Wrap Up
For now, Messenger’s payment service is only available in the U.S. However, if Facebook opens this service for international users, it will be one of the most convenient and the cheapest way to make international payments as compared to high-fee remittance services.
