Rush Hour – Mobile Payments

Rush Hour – Mobile payments rush hours i.e. every day a new entrant in mobile payments business jumping in with or without any experience or expertise. Mobile payment businesses like ApplePay, SamsungPay, Microsoft, Google, Facebook and many more are few examples for this. All of them jumped into the business with no prior knowledge and experience. All these players came out of the industry and made everyone in this industry to run. This post “Rush Hour – Mobile Payments and Financial Services” was originally published on 26-April-2015 on Linkedin.

 

The New Entrants – Without Any Prior Experience

Where we are and where we wanna be for payments? Advantages of using mobile payment also put emphasis on security risks it brings on board. The most important key point of today’s mobile payments revolution is the security of data. The virtual currencies on the backbone of Blockchain without any reasonable financial modelling and due diligence are putting entire private equity of funders at risk.

The aims to combine the advantages of direct cash transactions with the power of digital technology is still very grey. “Speed to market is the King” for who consumer or service providers? Are we heading towards cashless payment society or simply less cash society after all these massive arrangements?

Apple Pay’s launch some additional context about the state of mobile payments in general, which includes much more than just Apple Pay now after six months if we see where it is the answer is still in a very small balloon. The hectic pace of change in payment systems. All of this is because of the fact that this physical/digital world is converging. Online, mobile, virtual wallets and smartwatches, among others – means that all businesses need to remain alert to the latest trends and developments.

They and their customers will almost certainly start paying for goods and services in new ways in the future. A month after Apple Pay launched, MasterCard was quick to remind analysts in the company’s third-quarter earnings to call that Apple Pay wasn’t the only player innovating the mobile payments space. All these new ways will continue to change and proliferate as time goes on. Some provider of payment solutions for the financial industry, retailers, hospitality, and e-commerce.

 

Apple Pay – The New Mobile Payment Service

Apple is a well known and trusted brand and so the whole world was talking about Apple Pay for a while but now dust has settled down or can say the noise has calmed down so now we are getting voices for Samsung’s, Google’s, Facebook and Microsoft Pay services these are from big players but there are thousands of regional trusted small brand and MFS providers who are also coming into play to claim their share of hot cake pie, and all the banks are launching their own version, then there is MasterPass and Visa Checkout.

Apple Pay adoption is progressing, but it still has a long way to go — as recently released data from the InfoScout and PYMNTS survey of iPhone 6 users indicated. 85% of iPhone 6 users haven’t even tried to use Apple Pay.

Only 9% had even tried it, and just 6% revealed they were users of the service. The biggest reason – those who tried Apple Pay in the past who didn’t convert to users likely just forgot to use it again. In fact, 32% of respondents said they simply forgot to use Apple Pay again. In today’s time, subscribers/customers want value, convenience, ease in their life and If you those ingredients people will taste it and if they like they will continue and will be ready to pay a small extra fee.

Now the question is if not cash then which route as mentioned in last article Payments – “Cash, Internet, Cards, Mobile and Paper”. Mobile payments cover many types of transactions which fall into two categories: transactions with ‎a remote merchant or proximity payments at the merchant site. There is no standard definition of the terms mobile money transfer, mobile payment and ‎mobile banking. There are some proposed definitions from industry associations (e.g. GSMA and ‎Mobey Forum) and the European Union but there is no agreement on a common definition.

Technology changes very quickly and service provider habit of now to the market and give new ways and means to consumer quickly but on the other hand consumers, style and adoption to technology move at a slower pace compared to what service provider wants. It takes a lot to create a mindset shift. Consumers may not also be ready to switch over to one payment method option simply because the trust can not be built overnight in the same example Apple took decades to gain that kind of trust.

 

Mobile Payments – Accepting Mobile as a Payment Instrument

Leaving all other instruments of payment aside and consumer will move to just Mobile Payments will cost too much time, efforts, hard work, money and sweats from all services providers and assumption is there are no security issues around (Which is practically impossible we all know as newborn baby can start dance & run on day one)

Apple Pay talk about their mobile payment growth, and at the end of the day, yes, they’ve done a great job and it’s excited the market, but it’s still a very small percentage of what the total number of transactions are and now they already have competition from other wrestlers (FB & MS etc). MasterCard has also indicated its own digital wallet services (MasterPass), which would be another buddy & supplements in mobile payments space.

According to data gathered from London-based Currency Cloud, a FinTech company: “Nowhere is the M-banking market developing more rapidly than in Africa and China. While economically and culturally divergent in many ways, these two territories represent a fertile testing ground where mobile payments fill the financial services void for the vast ‘unbanked’ portion of their respective populations.”

There are articles, news headlines & posts flying about Mobile Payments will be 64 billion USD market, 70 billion USD Market or even 84 billion USD market (As my reading goes on google) by 2019 as World is running to get their bite of share from Payment cake including Apple, Microsoft, Facebook and many many other BIG players and off-course small ones are also millions of them . or should I call it as World Payments War where only one motive for everyone capture as much as possible and become the best pie part of this hot cake; who will get how much; I am highly excited and super worried about what will happen to Mobile Payments.

Six months after release, this incredibly informative data shows some encouraging things for Apple—usage is getting better and those who use it love it so much they would make merchant choices based on whether they accept it,” said MPD CEO Karen Webster, referring to the InfoScout report. “But Apple still appears to be struggling to get beyond a small percentage of early adopters.”

 

Some useful Data from Research

The research firm reckons the Middle East and Africa region is the biggest market for mobile money services. In Africa, in particular, there are large numbers of people who have no access to traditional banking services, and the mobile payments market is growing fast along mobile phone adoption. But the report said it expects increased traction for mobile money services also in the APAC and North American regions within the next five years.

Now after all these studies my questions to me for Which I am still looking for responses.

• All MPSP are just focusing on disrupting the market? or any action to create such market
• What all initiatives are going on by Mobile Payment Service Providers (MPSP) to create such needs where consumer feel for Mobile Payment Systems / Services
• Whom we are acquiring consumers or merchants
• Do we have those many mobile phones handset penetration (As other devices may not be used for payments in-store or on road) to handle such huge volume of 80 billion USD (I am assuming averages of all those figures which are flying all over the internet)
• And there are many many more questions are jumping ….. looking for some responses to share later on
• As said by my friend — ‘I think your questions have merits. Someone called the mobile payment industry, “a solution looking for a problem” ‘. So if that is true hope we find our problem soon for the solution we have created beforehand
• Are creating need now after got solution at hand

Financial inclusion and the concept of the unbanked has become a buzzword when it comes to mobile payments innovations. Who are the unbanked, who are the mobile money companies reaching, and where are there still gaps? And why? To some Apple critic’s points, getting consumers to change means giving a reason to stop what they are doing today and to start something new. More than one-third of the people surveyed said that they didn’t try Apple Pay because they didn’t have a reason to change from their current payment method, and one-fifth said that they preferred an alternative method of payment.

 

Points to Note:

All credits if any remains on the original contributor only. We have covered all basics around myth on mobile payments, its models and the importance of quality services. In the next upcoming post will talk about implementation, usage and practice experience for markets.

 

Books + Other readings Referred

• Research through open internet, news portals, white papers, notes made at knowledge sharing sessions and from live conferences & lectures.
• Lab and hands-on experience of  @AILabPage (Self-taught learners group) members.

 

Feedback & Further Question

Do you have any questions about AI, Machine Learning, Telecom billing/charging, Data Science or Big Data Analytics? Leave a question in a comment section or ask via email. Will try best to answer it.

 

Conclusion– I guess my analysis is reasonable but conclusion at this time might be a bit premature. The clearinghouses get real-time payment data to apply their expertise also have a vision beyond their current rails and the pockets to support it. Further, more data sources are added all the time. Start and grow businesses and prevent frauds by taking security before innovation. Transactions and data generated out of them will then be safe, quick and easy.

An efficient domestic payment system infrastructure is key to reduce the costs of remittance services, especially in receiving countries. Remittances are part of an individual’s access to financial services. A good remittance product improves value to the user in the short term and access to other financial products in the long term it also increases competition and could move transactions to the formal sector. Consequently, the data sources being compiled need to be secured in order to address security policies and compliance mandates.

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