Tag: payments

Amazon FPS: another US-only payments service

Post ImageAmazon launched another web service on Friday, called the Amazon Flexible Payments Service (FPS). The interesting thing about the launch is that Jeff Barr was teasing everyone on Twitter, building up the anticipation. I was eagerly watching for updates! I wish more product launches happened in a similar fashion.

Anyway, here is how Jeff described FPS:

We’ve taken all that we know about dealing with credit cards, bank accounts, fraud checking and customer service and wrapped it all up into one convenient package.

In much the same way that S3 and EC2 allow developers to forget about leasing space in data centers, buying servers and negotiating for bandwidth, FPS shields developers from many of the messy and complex issues which arise when dealing with money. Once again, we take care of the “muck” and developers get to focus on being innovative and creative.

As you know, I love S3. It shouldn’t be much of a surprise then when I say that FPS gets me really, really excited. I haven’t looked at it too closely, but even a quick glance suggests that FPS is amazing. PayPal is the giant of the payments space, but they badly need some competition. Unfortunately, no one seems prepared to provide it. No, not even FPS.

The problem is geography. There’s competition for US merchants, but everyone else is left out in the cold. Just like Google Checkout, FPS has launched with support limited to companies in the US (though buyers can be anywhere…and Google has since added UK merchant support but that’s it). There are certainly a lot of Internet users in the United States, but they still make up less than a quarter of the world total, and that percentage drops every day. There is a ton of e-commerce taking place outside the US.

PayPal is supported in over 190 countries and regions. There are 14 countries that PayPal describes as “localized” and another 21 that support withdrawals to local bank accounts. For merchants in 34 of these countries (ignoring the US), Google Checkout and Amazon FPS simply are not options. PayPal is the only viable choice.

And don’t get me wrong, I quite like PayPal, but there are definitely things that need to be improved. The FPS feature set addresses a wide range of these issues (such as support for micro-payments). But Amazon FPS and Google Checkout will simply not beat PayPal until they are supported just as widely around the world. Maybe they don’t want to take on PayPal, you say? Bullshit, I reply. PayPal is the target, even if Amazon and Google will only admit that behind closed doors.

I would suggest there are only five companies that could build a payment system to rival PayPal. The first two are eBay and Amazon, the giants of e-commerce. eBay owns PayPal, and Amazon now has FPS. The other three are the usual suspects: Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft. Google has Checkout, and Yahoo seems to be fine with PayPal. That leaves Microsoft. A small part of me is hopeful for a wicked payments service as part of Windows Live Core, but Microsoft’s track record with launching worldwide services isn’t so great either.

Will there ever be a viable, worldwide competitor to PayPal? I hope so, but I’m not holding my breath.

Read: Amazon FPS

Wow…Google Checkout really hates Canada

Post ImageYou may recall that when Google launched their Checkout service back in June, I posted about how Canadian merchants were left out in the cold. I went back to the site every couple weeks hoping to see that Canada had been added as a valid merchant country, but it never happened. I gave up around late August and haven’t been back to the site since, until today.

John Battelle posted this morning about a promotion Google Checkout is running for the holidays. I figured, what the heck, might as well check. Nope, still only American merchants allowed. Then I stumbled on the page titled: Google Checkout is available to buyers with billing addresses in…

I was shocked that Canada wasn’t on the list. Then I figured that maybe they left countries like Canada and the US off the list because it was assumed that they were valid countries. Nope. As you can see, the US as well as The United Kingdom are both on the list. The Vatican, Kazakhstan, and Namibia all made the list, yet Canada didn’t.

Either they screwed up and forgot to put Canada on that page, or they screwed up because they don’t allow Canadians to use the service. Unacceptable either way.

UPDATE (12/8/2006): I just checked the page again, and Canada now appears on the list. I wonder if my post had anything to do with it?

Read: Google Checkout

Google Checkout – @!%$ you too Google!

Post ImageWhen I got to the office this morning I checked to see if Google Checkout was working, and was happy to see that it was. And it’s not in beta either! I started looking through all the information (there’s a lot), glanced at the API information, and was generally feeling really great about the service. It’s really cheap too, at only 2% plus $0.20 USD per transaction. Actually, you get up to ten times your AdWords spend processed for free, which is pretty damn sweet.

And then, I came across this:

At this time, only merchants with a U.S. address and bank account can process transactions through Google Checkout. We look forward to offering more options in the future.

What?! Are you kidding me? I have an AdWords account, why can’t I create a Google Checkout account? Indulge me while I get on my soapbox for a moment…

I am sick of being treated like a third world country! We’re right next door! I’m as proud a Canadian as the next guy, but I’m not afraid to admit that we’re practically another state. Is it really so hard for Google (or any company for that matter, they aren’t the only ones) to make their services work for Canadians right from the get-go? I mean seriously, there cannot be that much work involved to make it happen.

So while I think Google Checkout looks great, and I’m happy that PayPal has some competition, I’m pissed that it doesn’t support Canada.

Read: Google Checkout

No GBuy Yet

Post ImageLike a lot of other bloggers (at least I’m assuming I’m not alone here) I have been waiting patiently today, for any sign of Google’s long-rumored “GBuy” service. A report was published a couple weeks ago by Forbes, that said today would likely be the day Google would launch the service.

According to bloggingstocks, eBay, who would feel the largest effects of a GBuy service, was doing better today:

So after eBay hit a 52-week low yesterday, mainly on fears of up and coming competition from Google, investors had time to cool off and rethink the ramifications of this play. EBay stock gained back 50 cents (1.77%) to close at $28.75.

And according to the Search Engine Roundtable blog, quite a few people would switch to GBuy if it was ever launched:

Currently we have over 38% saying they will switch, only 19% saying they will not and 42% saying they just don’t know. Why would someone switch without seeing it first? Well, it is Google.

I just want to see if it’s anything like PayPal, which I quite like.

Maybe it will come late tonight. Or maybe it won’t come at all?

UPDATE: I knew I wasn’t the only one waiting!

UPDATE 2: Looks like we’ll see Google Checkout on Thursday. The service doesn’t seem to be available yet, so I’ll reserve further comment until later.

Who pays – you or your credit card?

Post ImageI was reading some older posts at Signal vs. Noise, the 37signals blog about all sorts of things, and I came across a post on number portability and the idea that credit cards should be the same:

Maybe one day your card number will be portable like your phone number. Theres no reason for it to change unless fraud has been committed. If you need the number changed then you can change it, but otherwise it remains the same no matter the issuer or card type.

The reasoning behind this is that there are so many recurring monthly services now that changing your credit card number (which happens if you change account types, or in some cases, when your card is renewed, etc) causes huge problems with missed payments and the need to update information manually.

I see three problems with this. The first is that lots of people have multiple cards. This is more of a problem with credit cards than it is with cell phone numbers (where the majority of users have only one). I don’t think MasterCard and Visa, for example, would like the idea of combining your two cards into one number. So you’ve still got to worry about which card to use, when each one expires, etc. The second problem is fraud. Somehow I see more problems related to fraud occurring if you have the same number all the time. Maybe I’m wrong here, but that’s the gut feeling.

The larger problem is long term – when you pay for something, are you paying, or is your credit card? You are obviously. The solution to the problems described in the SVN post is not the ability to keep one credit card number, it’s the ability to not worry about how you’re paying, just that you are paying. As a business, I don’t care if you’re paying cash, Visa, or debit card. All I care about is that you’ve paid, either right now, or on a recurring basis. If transactions were as simple as “Mack has paid Paramagnus for this” then a lot of these problems would go away. Did Mack use his old credit card or a new one? Maybe cash? Who cares, he’s paid! The scenario today is explained very well in the SVN post:

Our customers swear their cards are in good standing, but it turns out that they just switched cards and didnt realize their card number changed. Even though they have the money, and their credit is pristine, the number they had in the system is no longer a valid number and the transaction is declined.

The ability to keep a credit card number consistent might solve this in the short term, but the larger problem still exists. At some point, I hope we can move from validating a piece of plastic, to validating a person’s actual credit and financial standing.

Read: Signal vs. Noise

TextPayMe

Post ImageCame across an article at Wired talking about TextPayMe, a service that lets you send money to someone simply by using your cell phone! I like the way reporter Rachel Metz sets it up:

When a group of people dine out together, someone always lacks cash. They forgot to go to the ATM, but they’ll pay you back ASAP. Right.

Funny, though, how people rarely forget their cell phones. Philip Yuen put these two observations together and came up with TextPayMe to let people send money using text messaging.

Ain’t that the truth!

Seems like a pretty good idea, though I don’t expect the company to last very long. As the article points out, PayPal is rumored to be working on something similar. There are already millions upon millions of people using PayPal, and I already have established accounts there – why would I or anyone else use TextPayMe instead? That’s what the company needs to be focusing on. I guess one reason is that the service is currently free, but certainly that can’t last forever.

I don’t think the service is available to us Canadians yet either (sign up form only has states and zip code, no country option).

Read: Wired