Few days ago the giant smart phone manufacturer Apple announced its new payment product ‘Apple pay’ and finally iPhone will come with NFC port in a step that all the world identified as very late step from Apple side!
Apart form the new introduced techniques, the added security value and the new payment experience, the announced product did not add any new value or proposition to the mobile payment industry.
In our recent post Saving the titanic we went through possible benefits of mobile payment and its capabilities and tracking options of this new revolutionary services. It was not possible to go through such capabilities without touching the most critical term Privacy!
Currently digitizing consumer life is always suspected and accused, with multiple cases and news about privacy hacking and the endless arguments if this is ethical or not, legal or not, you might refer to the recent announced news about Google via this link for a story about an internet user arrested due to illegal email contents.
Back to mobile payment, in a typical crime investigation you might be suspected and you will discover that the mini store you stopped by to buy a coke can was actually a hidden drug dealer.
Such obsesses will be doubled and might be a real showstopper for some set of customers, and it will increase wherever political or terrorism issues exists. In some cases shopping anonymously is a real need and its absence might block possible sales targets. You may now realize how Bitcoin and similar digital currencies found their way in.
To overcome this financial institutions, banks, MNO or even vendors must ensure that they are legally authorized and entitled for such financial services, and a preset agreement with regulators and government not to disclose customer information without certain approvals.
On the other side the service provider must state clearly in their contract under what circumstances they will release the customer data, another factor is the information sharing with 3rd parties. It sounds interesting to see an offer on a new mobile device dedicated for me as I was paying for the repair shop last week. But it also means I’m hacked and I’m fully monitored on the go!
This is not simple as social media sites situation, in social media I’m submitting my data and risk my privacy on my own and I’m still able to control what to be shared, but for payment I have no alternatives to pay for the coffee or maintenance.
Vendors must pay attention to this up rising risk, and it will not make sense to hand such controls over to the customer to decide when he will use his mobile wallet and when to go with cash as it will work against the mobile payment concept!
Very complicated indeed, and going through alternatives needs a separate article to carry on!
Khaled Sayed
Photo Credit: http://p1.pichost.me/640/59/1836187.jpg
Through our previous article Cash-In the passion fruit we explored how Cash-in can be a pain to any new mobile payment installation, and in the previous Saving the titanic article we explored some potential benefits for mobile payment.
We will carry on here to explore hidden benefits and values in mobile payment, and why we should consider mobile payment as on of the most innovative or revolutionary product.
Mobile payment is a new way to redefine our daily relations and operations, adding new unlimited features and helping the economy rising in emerging and poor countries.
Merchant boundaries,
If you are a certain product or store chain fanatic, most likely you are subscribed to your addicting product loyalty program either through mobile application or a plastic card. In developed countries users might join unlimited loyalty programs and during their daily trades they keep collecting points from different merchants and redeem it with simple gifts or discounts from time to time.
In emerging markets, with the absence of such mega stores or chains customers that does not have the same motivation to spend money, such deals or offers can’t be sponsored with those local dealers and micro merchants.
Value limits,
Another factor would be the transaction value, its a fact that mobile payment is designed for mini scale transactions, and tracking those micro payments will be a headache specially that a lucky customer should perform thousands of transaction to reach the minimum announced loyalty limit.
Due to the above limits both customers and merchant usually lose passion for loyalty programs and it does not help retaining a loyal customer or even help merchants to increase their sales, moreover it does not allow manufactures to run regular offers as usual.
Mobile payment and loyalty collection,
Thinking out of the box to overcome this situation mobile payment can help introducing a new loyalty concept, rather than being rewarded from a certain manufacture after achieving a preset purchase target. Loyalty programs may be combined under a group of merchant alliance offering customers rewards on the accumulated purchases target.
With your limited value purchases customers may collect points on their total bill value regardless the product or the store they are shopping in! Imagine collecting points for paying your monthly bills, buying food, coffee, pencils … etc. And being rewarded with unlimited rewards category from the program sponsors.
Rather than being focused on a certain brand mobile payment with its tracking capabilities will allow merchants and stores to run a new vertical loyalty concept, helping customers to stay engaged and increasing the traffic for merchants.
Photo Credit: http://ih.constantcontact.com/fs170/1103447193880/img/248.jpg?a=1114698228637
Over long decades, billions of financial transactions took place every day varying from purchasing food, coffee, clothes, tools, digital products and up to online purchase.
Those types of financial trades are not recently invented. No, actually it has started since those early days where people were trading goods with goods in a process called bartering, and as the society were developing, people touches the need to facilitate this process and find a way to store their wealth in a shape that does not rust, rotten or vanish, and it started with gold!
Since this time the financial trades and purchases passed through multiple changes and you may call it enhancements from gold and coins to paper currency and banknotes. Banks were established to provide a financial cover, and soon the world was heading to the electronic and plastic cards where the financial institutions had been pushing the society to convert to a cash less society! And due to implemented infrastructure, Banks were not sufficient to cover all the needs especially in emerging markets –as we previously discussed here– that’s where mobile payment was born.
On a dynamic and connected world like ours, financial trades are passing from country to country creating new market opportunities for those type of legal trades and resulting a pain for trades linked to criminal or illegal activities. And the ongoing effort to push for mobile payment is not just looking for stylish or elegant payment model,it’s more into control the daily money flow to save our titanic before it sinks!
What we are about to explore today is some of mobile payments benefits showing the –good side- of mobile payments.
Mobile payment to a theft crime- less society,
Whenever a theft crime happens the thieve tries to clear his footprints and not to be traced, that’s why the money laundering overseas happens and it will need different and more complicated techniques to trace it,but in smaller amounts after a theft crime,the thieve will spend the money buying small items and cash tracing is almost impossible.
In a Cash-free society, even stealing the victim mobile with its stored wallet still will be traced and on the first purchase request he will be surrounded by cops on spot. A live example for this theory is the decreased number of stolen iPhone devices after Apple Kill Switch implementation,it was simply decreased because thieves were sure that they will be always traced.
Mobile Payment to a drug-free society,
Whenever a drug store is reported and the cops catches the dealer it takes time and effort to trace his network and connections and it might not work all the time, but again in a Cash-free society when a dealer is caught, just you imagine that a simple transaction report will show the whole network starting from customers,other dealers and even their customers too.
Mobile payment save lives,
In emerging markets multiple crimes happens every day in an endless wrestling and race for food and security. It is simple to murder a poor guy for just a suspicion that he might be holding some cash. This crime risk increases in rural areas where citizens needs to do long trips to pay some fees or monthly installments – like what happens here.
Whenever mobile payment solutions were deployed,peoples were able to get rid of those risky trips and with a simple key press they were able to transfer those amounts avoiding the risk for a may be last trip!
And many more,
With a mobile wallet implementation,it’s easier and faster to transfer money in emergency cases to a relative or even a strangers whenever bank networks is not available, and helps in collecting donations or other charity activities.
It will also support in fighting the money laundering process where the specialized anti-laundering solutions and controls will take care of the big money chunks, mobile payment will carry on detecting whatever small amounts were missed or escaped!
Capitalizing on the same base,you may now notice that mobile payment is not just a fancy or fashion solution, but definitely it’s more into a real need to help both people and governments to overcome multiple issues and it could help in lowering the crime rate in a typical country.
Still there is a dark side and the cup is not totally full, we might need another article to carry on with the mobile payment devil side!
Photo Credit: http://drewpan.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/stealing_3673.jpg
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