WhatsApp Payments Launching In December – Are You Ready?
The most-used messaging app in India is set to get its own UPI-integrated payments service.
With the roll out of ‘Live Location Share’ and ‘Delete For Everyone’ features, WhatsApp is in no mood to stop. The popular Facebook-owned messaging platform is gearing up for their much-anticipated in-app Payments feature in India.
With the Payments feature on board, one can transact digitally with their contacts directly through the app. As per Factordaily, WhatsApp is already working on their in-app Pay feature, and are in the final stage of development with a probable imminent launch by December.
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WhatsApp Payments – India Is First In The World!
This is going to be the first time that WhatsApp are introducing their in-chat pay feature anywhere in the world. Developers are testing this feature, and they may extend to a beta program, launching the fully-working feature by December in the country. In India, Facebook has partnered with three leading Indian banks – State Bank of India, ICICI Bank and HDFC Bank to launch the in-chat pay feature for Whatsapp.
How Will WhatsApp’s Pay Feature Work?
The Pay feature on WhatsApp will be very easy to use. Once you authorize your WhatsApp account to access your UPI account, you can pay directly through your chat interface. You can directly transfer money to your contacts, without leaving the app.
There is no official information, but as per the reports, there is going to be a separate payment option in the chat interface.
- Step 1:Â Payments will work similarly to the way you share images or documents. Once you click on the attachments icon, you will get a payment option, along with the other regular ones.
- Step 2: Tap on the payment icon. Enter the amount you want to transfer. Click ‘Send’. That’s it. The money will be transferred directly via UPI.
- Step 3:Â The receiver will get a message regarding the money received. The recipient then has the option to either accept or reject the payment.
Threat To Digital Payment Companies?
The Payments Feature on WhatsApp is poised to pose a big threat to the other players in the Indian digital payments space. The instant messaging app has over 200 million users in India, the largest anywhere in the world. The Payments Feature will bring in more value-addition to its users. WhatsApp has done the smart thing by collaborating with UPI (Unified Payments Interface) for their payment service.
Why This Is Powerful
First of all, users don’t have to leave the app to make payments. Presently in India, Paytm and PhonePe are doing really well in the digital payments space with several business transactions like bill payments and money transfers happening through these apps. Now, along with their upcoming stand-alone Business app, they can even integrate their payment feature with WhatsApp for Business.
The Future
It will interesting to see how WhatsApp will fare in the payments space. It is looking to be a big threat to current leaders in digital payments space like Paytm, MobiKwik or PhonePe. But if WhatsApp decides to follow a WeChat-like model in India, it could be dream run for WhatsApp in India.
India Is Ground Zero For Digital Payments Innovation
Google recently launched their payments app Tez in the country. Amazon is planning to expand their payments service in India. Apple is launching Apple Pay in India with an integrated digital payments service. Now, with WhatsApp entering this space, the digital payments game is starting to heat up with new entrants looking to usurp established players like PhonePe, Paytm and MobiKwik.
