The payments processor ProPay Inc. is testing a mobile application that lets consumers pay brick-and-mortar merchants through their smartphones instead of handing over a card.
Its Zumogo app went live last month on Apple Inc.'s iPhone and smartphones running on Google Inc.'s Android operating system and is in use by an undisclosed number of merchants in Utah, where ProPay is headquartered, Heather Mark, a spokeswoman for the company, said Wednesday. "It does actually remove the physical card from the equation and no sensitive payment data is actually transmitted between the" consumer and the merchant, Mark said.
A consumer downloads the app on their phone and sets up an account log-in and PIN to authenticate their identity and transactions.
To pay for a purchase, the merchant can send a request to the consumer through their existing payments software program or the consumer can send a message asking for a request.
For merchants, the benefit is improved efficiency and a better customer experience, Mark said. For instance, in a restaurant a customer could send a message to the merchant when they are ready to receive a payment request instead of waiting for the server to bring the bill. Mark would not say how much merchants pay to use the service, which is free to consumers.
ProPay plans to make a version of the app available for Microsoft Corp.'s Windows 7 platform by the end of the first quarter and expects to roll the service out nationwide in a "phased approach," Mark said.
